Francis Byng, 5th Earl of Strafford

From Wikipedia: Francis Byng, 5th Earl of Strafford

Rev. Francis Edmund Cecil Byng, 5th Earl of Strafford (Thursday, 15 January 1835 – Friday, 18 January 1918) was an English Anglican minister and member of the peerage.

Background

Byng was born Thursday, 15 January 1835, third son of George Byng, 2nd Earl of Strafford. He was educated at Eton (where he took a Prince Albert Prize for Modern Languages) and Christ Church, Oxford, where he studied law and modern history.

Religious career

After taking holy orders, Byng became the rector of Little Casterton, Rutland from 1859–62; served as vicar of Holy Trinity in Twickenham and chaplain at Hampton Court from 1862-67. He was appointed an honorary chaplain to Queen Victoria in 1867 and Chaplain-in-Ordinary in 1872; then served as Chaplain to the Speaker of the House of Commons from 1874-89. In 1867 Byng was appointed vicar of the high church St. Peter's Church, Cranley Gardens, by Charles James Freake (who had the living of the church). He remained vicar of St. Peter's, which became fashionable ("His fine presence, his beautiful voice and his high birth made him a favourite of the couples that were going to get married.") through 1889; and kept up a long correspondence with the former organist of St. Peter's, Sir Arthur Sullivan. In 1889 Bing was elected Grand Chaplain of Freemasonry in England.
Resignation from office

In 1889 Byng reportedly suddenly resigned all his benefices and left London, supposedly owing to trouble over a gambling debt (he was said to be "addicted to cards").

Personal life

On Wednesday, 8 June 1859 he married Florence Louisa Miles (1840–1862), daughter of Sir William Miles, 1st Baronet; she died in 1862 giving birth to their second son, Edmund. He succeeded to the earldom in May 1899 when his brother Henry Byng, 4th Earl of Strafford was decapitated in a railroading accident, a year after inheriting the title from their childless elder brother, George Byng, 3rd Earl of Strafford, the Liberal politician. On Saturday, 4 August 1866 he married Emily Georgina Kerr, daughter of Admiral Lord Frederick Herbert Kerr; they had eight children of their own.

He was succeeded on his death by his second son, (the first, Arthur, having died in infancy) Edmund Byng, 6th Earl of Strafford.

From British Newspaper Archive: Boston Guardian Saturday, 26 January 1918 Page 5 Death of Lord Strafford. Former Chaplain of Commons

The death occurred on Friday, 18 January 1918, at Wrotham Park, Barnet, of the Earl of Strafford, at the age of eighty-three.

The Rev. Francis Edmund Cecil Byng, Earl of Strafford, Viscount Enfield, and Baron Strafford, of Harmondsworth, was the third son of the second Earl, and succeeded his brother, the fourth Earl, in 1899. The third Earl was also his brother; and General Sir Julian Byng, the cavalry leader, is a half-brother.

Lord Strafford went first to Eton, and then to Christ Church. After taking honours in the School of Law and Modern History, he took his degree in 1856. Two years later he was admitted to orders by the Bishop of Manchester, and became curate of Prestwich, and afterwards he held successively the rectory of Little Casterton, Stamford, and the vicarage of Holy Trinity, Twickenham. The latter he held until 1867, when he was appointed Vicar of St. Peter's, Cranley Gardens, S.W., and at the same time chaplain to Queen Victoria.

In 1872 he was advanced to be a chaplain in ordinary, and in 1874 he was appointed chaplain to the House of Commons, where he was a well-known figure, and continued to officiate regularly at prayer time when the House was in session up to 1889, when he resigned not only that appointment, but his vicarage and his chaplaincy in ordinary.

He is succeeded in the Peerage by Lord Enfield, the surviving son of his first marriage, who was born in 1862, and is married to the youngest daughter of the late Sir Thomas Edward Colebrooke.