Manners, John James Robert (1818 -1906)

John James Robert Manners was born at Belvoir Castle in Leicestershire, the younger son of John Manners, 5th Duke of Rutland, and Lady Elizabeth Howard, daughter of Frederick Howard, 5th Earl of Carlisle.  He was educated at Eton Collegebefore entering Trinity College, Cambridge in 1836. He graduated MA in 1839, and was later awarded the honorary degrees of LLD by the same university in 1862, andDoctor of Civil Law by Oxford in 1876. Pursuing a political career, from 1841 to 1847 he was Tory Member of Parliament for Newark.  Subsequently he represented Colchester, North Leicestershire, and Melton Mowbray. 

In the early 1840s he was a leading figure in the Young England movement, led by Benjamin Disraeli, whom he accompanied on a tour of English industrial areas in 1844. He was an advocate of public holidays, factory reforms, and an allotments system.  In 1852, 1858–59, and 1866–68, he served as First Commissioner of Works, and in 1852 he was admitted to the Privy Council.  He later served as Postmaster General, and in the Conservative government of 1886–1892 he was Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.  On his retirement in 1880 he was made a Knight of the Bath, and in 1891 a Knight of the Garter. He succeeded to the dukedom of Rutland in March 1888, upon the death of his elder brother Charles, the 6^thDuke.  In addition to his political career he also wrote two books of poetry: England's Trust and Other Poems, published in 1841, and English Ballads and Other Poems, published in 1850.

In 1851 Rutland married firstly Catherine Louisa Georgina, daughter of George Marley and Catherine Louisa Augusta Tisdall.  She died in 1854 leaving a son, Henry John Brinsley who became the 8^thDuke of Rutland.  In 1862 he married secondly Janetta (d. 1899), daughter of Thomas Hughan, and had seven children.  The 7^thDuke died on 4 August 1906, aged 87, at Belvoir Castle.