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Earl of Eldon, in the County Palatine of Durham, is a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. It was created in 1821 for the lawyer and politician John Scott, 1st Baron Eldon, Lord Chancellor from 1801 to 1806 and again from 1807 to 1827. He had already been created Baron Eldon, of Eldon in the County Palatine of Durham, in the Peerage of Great Britain in 1799, and was made Viscount Encombe, of Encombe in the County of Dorset, at the same time was given the earldom. His grandson, the second Earl, briefly represented Truro in the House of Commons. As of 2017 the titles are held by the latter's great-great-great-grandson, the sixth Earl, who succeeded his father in 2017.
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William Scott, 1st Baron Stowell, was the elder brother of the first Earl of Eldon. The Hon. Sir Ernest Scott, second son of the third Earl, was Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to Hungary.
Earls of Eldon (1821)
The heir apparent is the present holder's son John James Robert Columba Scott, Viscount Encombe (b. 1996)
The other "Earl of Eldon"
A striking example of a cargo igniting spontaneously occurred in 1834 when the Earl of Eldon departed Bombay with many passengers. A cargo of cotton had been loaded into the ship's hold in a damp condition. What one passenger some time later believed was steam billowing from the hold, turned out to be smoke. Within the hour, the deck was ablaze and by mid-afternoon, the entire vessel was in flames. 45 men, women and children and the crew took to three ships' boats to make their escape. After they had rowed for an hour, the Earl of Eldon's powder-magazine exploded, the ship disintegrating spectacularly. Her small boats eventually reached Rodriguez Island safely after 450 miles and thirteen days adrift.