Sir Warwick and Lady Morshead

Sir Warwick and Lady Morshead


A carte-de-visite portrait of Sir Warwick Charles Morshead and his wife, Lady Selina Anne Morshead.

Born in 1824, Warwick Charles Morshead was the son of Sir Frederick Treise Morshead, of Trenant Park in the County of Cornwall, and his wife Jane née Warwick. He was baptised on 30 December 1824 at Crosthwaite in Cumberland. Four years later he inherited his father’s baronetcy.

On 8 June 1854 he married Selina Anne Harcourt, the daughter of Reverend William Harcourt, the Rector of Bolton Percy in Yorkshire, and his wife Matilda Mary née Gooch. The marriage produced no children.

The couple appear on the 1861 census living at Binfield in Berkshire. Sir Warwick gave for his profession; ‘J.P. for Berks late Capt. Dragoons.' The household included six servants, among them a footman and coachman.

On the night that the 1871 census was taken, Sir Warwick and his wife were visiting Lady Morshead’s brother Edward William Vernon Harcourt at Nuneham Courtenay in Oxfordshire.

Lady Selina Morshead died, aged 49, on 14 September 1883. Sir Warwick remarried in 1887. His second wife was Sarah Elizabeth Wilmot.

Sir Warwick Morshead died, aged 80, on 17 March 1905, leaving an estate valued at £75707. He was buried at Blisland in Cornwall. On his death, his title became extinct.

His obituary appeared in The Times on 20 March 1905. ‘Sir Warwick Charles Morshead, third baronet, who had been in failing health for some time, died on Friday at his Berkshire residence, Forest-lodge, Binfield, in his 81st year. Sir Warwick Morshead, who was born in 1824, was the only son of Sir Frederick Treise Morshead, by Jane, daughter of Mr Robert Warwick, of Warwick-hall, Cumberland, and succeeded to the title in 1828. He was educated at Edinburgh, and joined the Inniskilling Dragoons, from which he retired with the rank of captain in 1853. He was one of the oldest magistrates for Berkshire, having qualified at the Michaelmas Sessions in 1856, and for a long time he was chairman of the Wokingham petty sessional division. He also represented the Easthampstead electoral division in the Berkshire County Council, and otherwise took an active interest in public affairs, not only in Berkshire, but also in Cornwall, where he was a landowner and accustomed to spend a portion of each year. For many years he had been a liberal supporter of the Royal Berkshire Friendly Society, of which institution he was the major trustee. Sir Warwick Morshead, who leaves no heir to the title, married first, in 1854, Selina Anne, third daughter of the Rev. W. Vernon Harcourt, of Nuneham-park, Oxfordshire, and sister of the late Sir William Harcourt, who died childless in 1883; and secondly, in 1887, Sarah Elizabeth, second daughter of Mr Montague Wilmot, who survives him. The funeral will take place at 11 o’clock on Wednesday, at Blisland, Bodmin.’

Photographed by Camille Silvy of London on 19 April 1861.

From an album compiled by the naturalist, editor, travel writer and Conservative politician Edward William Vernon Harcourt (1825-1891), who served as MP for Oxfordshire from 1878 to 1885 and for Henley from 1885 to 1886.




 


Code: 126243
© Paul Frecker 2024