Edward Smith-Stanley, 13th Earl of Derby

The 13th Earl of Derby

Edward Smith-Stanley, 13th Earl of Derby KG (21 April 1775 – 30 June 1851), styled Lord Stanley from 1776 to 1832 and known as The Lord Stanley from 1832 to 1834, was an English politician, landowner, builder, farmer, art collector and naturalist. The Derbyan parakeet, Psittacula derbiana, is named after him.

He was the 1st child and only son of Edward Smith-Stanley, 12th Earl of Derby and Elizabeth Hamilton, daughter of James Hamilton, 6th Duke of Hamilton.

On 10 November 1796, he was appointed a deputy lieutenant of Lancashire. He was commissioned the colonel of the 1st Battalion of the Lancashire Supplementary Militia on 1 March 1797; this regiment subsequently became the 2nd Regiment Royal Lancashire Militia. He was breveted as a colonel in the regular Army with seniority from that date, retaining the rank until his regiment was disembodied, which occurred at the end of 1799. He resigned his commission as colonel on 13 April 1847.

On 30 June 1798 he married Charlotte Margaret Hornby, daughter of Reverend Geoffrey Hornby, with whom he fathered future Prime Minister Edward Smith-Stanley, 14th Earl of Derby.

After receiving his education at Eton College and Trinity College, Cambridge, Lord Stanley was Member of Parliament for Preston and Lancashire from 1796 to 1832, when he was ennobled as Baron Stanley of Bickerstaffe, of Bickerstaffe in the County Palatine of Lancaster. In 1834 he succeeded his father as 13th Earl of Derby and withdrew from politics, instead concentrating on his natural history collection at Knowsley Hall, near Liverpool. He had a large collection of living animals: at his death there were 1,272 birds and 345 mammals at Knowsley, shipped to England by explorers such as Joseph Burke.

Lord Derby was also the patron of the writer Edward Lear.

Many of Derby's collections are now housed in Liverpool museum. From 1828 to 1833 he was President of the Linnean Society.

External links

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by the Earl of Derby
• Stanley, Edward Smith, thirteenth earl of Derby (formerly Lord Stanley) (1775–1851), politician and naturalist by Clemency Thorne Fisher in Dictionary of National Biography
• Archival material relating to Edward Smith-Stanley, 13th Earl of Derby listed at the UK National Archives
• The TAL & Dai-ichi Life Derby Collection at the State Library of New South Wales

Parliament of Great Britain
Preceded by William Cunliffe Shawe and Sir Henry Philip Hoghton	Member of Parliament for Preston 1796–1800 With: Sir Henry Philip Hoghton	Succeeded by (Parliament of Great Britain abolished)
Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by (self in Parliament of Great Britain)	Member of Parliament for Preston 1801–1812 With: Sir Henry Philip Hoghton 1801–1802 John Horrocks 1802–1804 Samuel Horrocks 1804–1812	Succeeded by Edmund Hornby Samuel Horrocks
Preceded by Thomas Stanley John Blackburne	Member of Parliament for Lancashire 1812–1832 With: John Blackburne 1812–1830 John Wilson-Patten 1830–1831 Benjamin Heywood 1831–1832	Constituency divided
Honorary titles
Vacant Title last held by The Duke of Hamilton	Vice-Admiral of Lancashire 1831–1851	Vacant
Preceded by The Earl of Derby	Lord Lieutenant of Lancashire 1834–1851	Succeeded by The Earl of Sefton
Peerage of England
Preceded by Edward Smith-Stanley	Earl of Derby 1834–1851	Succeeded by Edward Smith-Stanley
Peerage of the United Kingdom
New title	Baron Stanley of Bickerstaffe (descended by acceleration) 1832–1844	Succeeded by Edward Smith-Stanley