Name George 8th | ||
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George Victor Drogo Montagu, 8th Duke of Manchester, etc. (Kimbolton, Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire, 17 June 1853 – Tandragee Castle, County Armagh, 18 August 1892), styled Lord Kimbolton from 1853 to 1855 and Viscount Mandeville from 1855 to 1890, was a British peer and Member of Parliament.
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Background
Montagu was the son of William Drogo Montagu, 7th Duke of Manchester, and Countess Louise von Alten.
Political career
In 1877 Montagu was elected to the House of Commons for Huntingdonshire, a seat he held until 1880. Apart from his political career he also achieved the rank of Captain in the Royal Irish Fusiliers. In 1890 succeeded his father in the dukedom and took his seat in the House of Lords. He was declared bankrupt the same year.
Family
On 22 May 1876, Manchester married Consuelo Yznaga, the daughter of a wealthy Cuban plantation owner and a renowned beauty. It was widely accepted that he had married her for her money and she him for his titles. One of Consuelo Yznaga's closest friends, Edith Wharton, was said to have incorporated certain aspects of her friend's marriage in her unfinished novel, The Buccaneers. Their union produced a son and twin daughters:
Manchester died in August 1892, aged only 39, and was succeeded in his titles by his son William.