PERCY, George, Lord Lovaine (1778-1867), of 8 Portman Square, Mdx.

Lovaine, who continued to be returned unopposed for Bere Alston on his father’s interest, enjoyed a temporary revival of his political fortunes in the early 1820s. He voted in defence of the Liverpool ministry’s conduct towards Queen Caroline, 6 Feb., and against Maberly’s resolution on the state of the revenue, 6 Mar. 1821. Later that month he was appointed to the household and thereafter he voted silently with government. He cast no recorded votes on the Catholic question. In 1824 Charles Williams Wynn*, president of the India board, who had met him at Spa, suggested that he might make a suitable governor of Madras, observing that ‘he is very poor, and has more information and sense than the world gives him credit for’. Buckingham, Mems. Geo. IV, ii. 165, 170-1. He was granted three weeks’ leave on account of ill health, 17 Feb. 1825. After 1826 he relapsed into inactivity and gave no more recorded votes; in February 1829 Planta, the Wellington ministry’s patronage secretary, listed him as one who would be ‘absent’ from the divisions on Catholic emancipation. He was counted among the ministry’s ‘friends’ in September 1830, but had royal permission to spend the winter in Italy. He wrote to Wellington from Florence, 8 Oct. 1830, explaining that as he was anxious to support the government he had obtained his father’s permission to ‘place my seat at your disposal’, although he stipulated that he should ‘have the power of resuming the seat’ after two years. Alnwick Castle mss Add F/176. His father’s death a fortnight later resolved the matter by removing him to the Lords. The will was proved under £250,000 (PROB 11/1781/67; IR26/1245/105). He was considered for reappointment to the household by Peel in 1834, and was given a post by him in 1842. Although he tendered his resignation in 1846 over repeal of the corn laws, he was apparently dissuaded from carrying it out. Wellington Pol. Corresp. ii. 461; Add 40582, ff. 373-4, 377-9; Parker, Peel, iii. 308. He succeeded his cousin as duke of Northumberland in 1865 and died in August 1867, when he was succeeded by his eldest son Algernon George Percy*.