General
A general officer is an Officer (armed forces), officer of highest military ranks, high rank in the army, armies, and in some nations' air forces, space forces, and marines or naval infantry.
In some usages the term "general officer" refers t ...
Charles Murray Cathcart, 2nd Earl Cathcart (21 December 1783 – 16 July 1859), styled Lord Greenock between 1814 and 1843, was a
British Army
The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...
general who became
Governor General of the Province of Canada
The Governor General of the Province of Canada was the viceregal post of the pre-Confederation Province of Canada that existed from 1840 to Canadian Confederation in 1867.
The post replaced the Governor General of New France and later Governor Ge ...
(26 November 1845 – 30 January 1847). He was a keen amateur geologist, with enough recognition to warrant being made a Fellow of the
Royal Society of Edinburgh
The Royal Society of Edinburgh is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was established i ...
.
Early life
Cathcart was born at
Walton Walton may refer to:
People
* Walton (given name)
* Walton (surname)
* Susana, Lady Walton (1926–2010), Argentine writer
Places
Canada
* Walton, Nova Scotia, a community
** Walton River (Nova Scotia)
*Walton, Ontario, a hamlet
United Kingdo ...
,
Essex
Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and G ...
, on 21 December 1783, the eldest surviving son of
William Cathcart, 10th Lord Cathcart (later the
1st Earl Cathcart).
Career
Cathcart entered the army as a
cornet
The cornet (, ) is a brass instrument similar to the trumpet but distinguished from it by its conical bore, more compact shape, and mellower tone quality. The most common cornet is a transposing instrument in B, though there is also a sopr ...
in the
2nd Regiment of Life Guards on 2 March 1800.
He served on the staff of Sir
James Craig in Naples and Sicily.
[ He became heir apparent to the lordship of Cathcart in 1804, after his brother William Cathcart, Master of Cathcart died while commanding a Royal Navy vessel in the West Indies.] After his father was elevated to an earldom in 1814 he became known by the courtesy title
A courtesy title is a title that does not have legal significance but rather is used through custom or courtesy, particularly, in the context of nobility, the titles used by children of members of the nobility (cf. substantive title).
In some co ...
Lord Greenock.
Cathcart saw service on the ill-fated Walcheren Expedition
The Walcheren Campaign ( ) was an unsuccessful British expedition to the Netherlands in 1809 intended to open another front in the Austrian Empire's struggle with France during the War of the Fifth Coalition. Sir John Pitt, 2nd Earl of Chath ...
in 1809 and at the siege of Flushing
Flushing may refer to:
Places
* Flushing, Cornwall, a village in the United Kingdom
* Flushing, Queens, New York City
** Flushing Bay, a bay off the north shore of Queens
** Flushing Chinatown (法拉盛華埠), a community in Queens
** Flushing ...
, after which for some time he was disabled by the injurious effects of the pestilence which cut off so many thousands of his companions. Becoming lieutenant colonel on 30 August 1810, he embarked for the Peninsula, where he was present at the Battle of Barrosa
The Battle of Barrosa (Chiclana, 5 March 1811, also known as the Battle of Chiclana or Battle of Cerro del Puerco) was part of an unsuccessful manoeuvre by an Anglo-Iberian force to break the French siege of Cádiz during the Peninsular War ...
, for which he received a gold medal
A gold medal is a medal awarded for highest achievement in a non-military field. Its name derives from the use of at least a fraction of gold in form of plating or alloying in its manufacture.
Since the eighteenth century, gold medals have bee ...
on 6 April 1812, at the Battle of Salamanca
The Battle of Salamanca (in French and Spanish known as the Battle of Arapiles) on 22July 1812 was a battle in which an Anglo-Portuguese army under the Earl of Wellington defeated Marshal Auguste Marmont's French forces at Arapiles, so ...
, and the Battle of Vitoria
At the Battle of Vitoria (21 June 1813) a British, Portuguese and Spanish army under the Marquess of Wellington broke the French army under King Joseph Bonaparte and Marshal Jean-Baptiste Jourdan near Vitoria in Spain, eventually leading to ...
, during which he served as assistant quartermaster-general.[
He was next sent to assist Sir Thomas Graham in Holland as the head of the quartermaster-general's staff and was present at the ill-fated Siege of Bergen op Zoom in March 1814. Thereafter he was present at the ]Battle of Waterloo
The Battle of Waterloo was fought on Sunday 18 June 1815, near Waterloo, Belgium, Waterloo (at that time in the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, now in Belgium). A French army under the command of Napoleon was defeated by two of the armie ...
, where he had three horses shot from under him.[ He was awarded the Russian ]Order of St. Vladimir
The Imperial Order of Saint Prince Vladimir (russian: орден Святого Владимира) was an Imperial Russian order established on by Empress Catherine II in memory of the deeds of Saint Vladimir, the Grand Prince and the Baptize ...
, the Dutch Military William Order
The Military William Order, or often named Military Order of William (Dutch: , abbreviation: MWO), is the oldest and highest honour of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It is named after St. William of Gellone (755–814), the first Prince of Oran ...
, and made a Companion of the Order of the Bath
The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I of Great Britain, George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate medieval ceremony for appointing a knight, which involved Bathing#Medieval ...
(CB). In 1823, he was appointed a lieutenant colonel
Lieutenant colonel ( , ) is a rank of commissioned officers in the armies, most marine forces and some air forces of the world, above a major and below a colonel. Several police forces in the United States use the rank of lieutenant colone ...
in the royal staff corps at Hythe
Hythe, from Anglo-Saxon ''hȳð'', may refer to a landing-place, port or haven, either as an element in a toponym, such as Rotherhithe in London, or to:
Places Australia
* Hythe, Tasmania
Canada
*Hythe, Alberta, a village in Canada
England
* T ...
.[
In 1830 he moved to ]Edinburgh
Edinburgh ( ; gd, Dùn Èideann ) is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. Historically part of the county of Midlothian (interchangeably Edinburghshire before 1921), it is located in Lothian ...
where lived at "Whitehouse villa" on Bruntsfield Links
Bruntsfield Links is of open parkland in Bruntsfield, Edinburgh, immediately to the south-west of the adjoining Meadows.
Unlike The Meadows, which formerly contained a loch drained by the end of the 18th century, Bruntsfield Links has always ...
. He became involved in the proceedings of the Highland Society, became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh
The Royal Society of Edinburgh is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was established i ...
and where he announced the discovery of a new mineral, a sulphide of cadmium, which was found in excavating the Bishopton tunnel near Port Glasgow
Port Glasgow ( gd, Port Ghlaschu, ) is the second-largest town in the Inverclyde council area of Scotland. The population according to the 1991 census for Port Glasgow was 19,426 persons and in the 2001 census was 16,617 persons. The most recen ...
and which is now known as Greenockite
Greenockite is a rare cadmium bearing metal sulfide mineral consisting of cadmium sulfide (CdS) in crystalline form. Greenockite crystallizes in the Hexagonal crystal system, hexagonal system. It occurs as massive encrustations and as hemimorphic ...
. On 17 February 1837 he was made Commander-in-Chief, Scotland and Governor of Edinburgh Castle. On 17 June 1838, on the death of his father, he became second earl and eleventh baron Cathcart. On 16 March 1846 he was appointed commander-in-chief in British North America from 16 March 1846 and in 1850 he was appointed to the command of the Northern and Midland District, and in 1855 he retired.[
]
Family
On 30 September 1818 he married Henrietta Mather, daughter of Thomas Mather in France. The couple remarried at Portsea, England, 12 February 1819. Lady Cathcart accompanied her husband, and their daughters, to Canada in June, 1845. Lady Cathcart presented colours to one of the militia regiments in Montreal. The family returned to England in May, 1847.
Cathcart died at St. Leonard's-on-Sea on 16 July 1859. His wife died on 24 June 1872.
Publications
He was the author of two papers in the ''Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh'' in 1836, ''On the Phenomena in the neighbourhood of Edinburgh of the Igneous Rocks in their relation to the Secondary Strata,'' and ''The Coal Formation of the Scottish Lowlands.''
References
Sources
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External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Cathcart, Charles Cathcart, 2nd Earl
11th Hussars officers
1783 births
1859 deaths
1st King's Dragoon Guards officers
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Governors-General of the Province of Canada
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People from Walton-on-the-Naze
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