Sir Ernest Salter Wills, 3rd Baronet of Hazelwood & Clapton in-Gordano, Laird of Meggernie Castle

CStJ The Order of St John, short for Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of Saint John of Jerusalem (french: l'ordre très vénérable de l'Hôpital de Saint-Jean de Jérusalem) and also known as St John International, is a British royal order of c ...

JP (30 November 1869 – 14 January 1958) was

Lord Lieutenant of Wiltshire Lord is an appellation for a person or deity who has authority, control, or power over others, acting as a master, chief, or ruler. The appellation can also denote certain persons who hold a title of the peerage in the United Kingdom, or are ...

from 1930 to 1942.

Life

The son of

Sir Edward Payson Wills ''Sir'' is a formal honorific address in English for men, derived from Sire in the High Middle Ages. Both are derived from the old French "Sieur" (Lord), brought to England by the French-speaking Normans, and which now exist in French only as ...

, 1st Baronet, KCB, JP and of Lady Wills (she was Mary Ann, elder daughter of J. Chaning Pearce MRCS, FGS, of Montagu House, Bath), Wills was born in 1869. He was educated at Monkton Combe School, just outside Bath in Somerset from 1884 to 1885. He succeeded his elder brother in the

baronetcy A baronet ( or ; abbreviated Bart or Bt) or the female equivalent, a baronetess (, , or ; abbreviation Btss), is the holder of a baronetcy, a hereditary title awarded by the British Crown. The title of baronet is mentioned as early as the 14th ...

in 1921. The Wills family were part owners of W. D. & H. O. Wills, tobacco importers and cigarette manufacturers, which had been founded by Wills's great grandfather,

Henry Overton Wills I Henry Overton Wills I (2 March 1761 – 1826) was a British merchant who founded the firm of W.D. & H.O. Wills in Bristol, England, which eventually became one of the largest tobacco companies in late 19th-century Britain, and later became the ...

, JP, in 1786, and later became part of

Imperial Tobacco Imperial Brands plc (formerly Imperial Tobacco Group plc), is a British multinational tobacco company headquartered in Bristol, England. It is the world's fourth-largest international cigarette company measured by market share after Philip Mor ...

. Wills was a cousin of

Gilbert Wills, 1st Baron Dulverton Gilbert Alan Hamilton Wills, 1st Baron Dulverton (28 March 1880 – 1 December 1956), also known same Sir Gilbert Wills, 2nd Baronet of Northmoor & Manor Heath, was a British businessman and Conservative Member of Parliament from 1909 to 1929. ...

, Sir

George Alfred Wills Sir George Alfred Wills, 1st Baronet of Blagdon (3 June 1854 – 11 July 1928) was a President of Imperial Tobacco and the head of an eminent Bristol family. He was the son of Henry Overton Wills III and Alice Hopkinson and was educated at Mill ...

, Baronet of Blagdon, and a nephew of

Henry Overton Wills III Henry Overton Wills III (22 December 1828 – 4 September 1911) of Kelston Knoll, near Bath in Somerset, was a prominent and wealthy member of the Bristol tobacco manufacturing family of Wills which founded the firm of W. D. & H. O. Wills. As ...

Sir Frederick Wills Sir Frederick Wills, 1st Baronet (22 November 1838 – 18 February 1909) was a businessman, philanthropist and politician in the United Kingdom. He was a director of W. D. & H. O. Wills, a famous tobacco company headquartered in Bristol which ...

Bt &

Sir Frank William Wills Sir Frank William Wills (17 August 1852 – 26 March 1932) of Berkeley Square, Bristol, England, was a member of the Wills tobacco family, who became a noted British architect and went on to serve as Lord Mayor of Bristol. Early life and care ...

Kt. In 1894, Wills married Caroline Fanny Maud, daughter of William Augustine de Winton, of Westbury Lodge, Durdham Down,

Bristol Bristol () is a city, ceremonial county and unitary authority in England. Situated on the River Avon, it is bordered by the ceremonial counties of Gloucestershire to the north and Somerset to the south. Bristol is the most populous city in ...

, later appointed DStJ, and they had two sons and three daughters. * Doris Maud de Winton-Wills (9 August 1896 – 29 September 1968) married (14 June 1920) Norman Carl Haag, HM's Consul-General at Basel, Switzerland * Margaret Joyce de Winton-Wills (21 June 1898 – 10 October 1976) married (10 June 1918) Thomas Trevor Kyffin, son of Dr John Kyffin * Barbara Joan de Winton-Wills (23 February 1902) married (28 October 1925) Lt.-Col. Thomas Ansell Fairhurst, MA (Cantab.) JP, Lord of the Manor of Arlington * Lt.-Col. Sir Ernest Edward de Winton-Wills, 4th Baronet of Hazelwood, Laird of Meggernie Castle, Scots Guards (8 December 1903 – August 1983) married 1. (26 January 1926) Sylvia Margaret Ogden at St Margaret's Westminster. He married 2. (29 June 1949) Juliet Eve Graham-Clarke at Gloucester Cathedral * Major George Seton Wills, TD (18 May 1911 – 4 February 1979) married (30 October 1935) Lilah Mary Hare, daughter of Captain Percy Richard Hare Wills owned substantial properties in England and Scotland:

Clapton Court Clapton Court is a Grade II listed building, in Clapton in Gordano within the English county of Somerset. Local lords of the manor, the Arthur family originally built on the site. The current porch tower remains from the 15th-century house; th ...

, Somerset;

Ramsbury Manor Ramsbury Manor is a Grade I listed country house at Ramsbury, Wiltshire, on the River Kennet between Hungerford and Marlborough, in the south of England. It belongs to the Capricorn Foundation, a trust which has the task of maintaining the ho ...

and

Littlecote House Littlecote House is a large Elizabethan country house and estate in the civil parishes of Ramsbury and Chilton Foliat, in the English county of Wiltshire, about northeast of the Berkshire town of Hungerford. The estate includes 34 hectares of hi ...

(the family seat) in Wiltshire; and

Meggernie Castle Meggernie Castle is a castle in the heart of Perth and Kinross, in central Scotland. It is located halfway up Glenlyon, where the river Lyon flows through on its way to join the river Tay, shortly below Loch Tay. From 1920, until his death in 1958 ...

in Perthshire. He also owned the ''Château de l'oiseau bleu'' at

Menton Menton (; , written ''Menton'' in classical norm or ''Mentan'' in Mistralian norm; it, Mentone ) is a commune in the Alpes-Maritimes department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region on the French Riviera, close to the Italian border. Me ...

on the

French Riviera The French Riviera (known in French as the ; oc, Còsta d'Azur ; literal translation " Azure Coast") is the Mediterranean coastline of the southeast corner of France. There is no official boundary, but it is usually considered to extend fro ...

. He was a director of Imperial Tobacco and of the Portishead District Water Company. He was succeeded in the title by his elder son, Lieutenant-Colonel Ernest Edward de Winton Wills,

Scots Guards The Scots Guards (SG) is one of the five Foot Guards regiments of the British Army. Its origins are as the personal bodyguard of King Charles I of England and Scotland. Its lineage can be traced back to 1642, although it was only placed on the ...

, whose grandson is

David Brudenell-Bruce, Earl of Cardigan David Michael James Brudenell-Bruce, Earl of Cardigan (born 12 November 1952), is the heir apparent to the marquessate of Ailesbury, and its subsidiary titles. These include Earl of Cardigan, which he currently uses as his courtesy title. Bio ...

References

*''WILLS, Sir Ernest (Salter) 3rd Bt'' in ''Who Was Who 1897-2007'' (London, A. & C. Black)
Sir Ernest Wills, 3rd Baronet
at cox.net *Sir Ernest Salter Wills, 3rd Baronet of Hazelwood, in Burke's Peerage and Baronetage *Sir Ernest Wills, 3rd Baronet of Hazelwood, in Debrett's Peerage and Baronetage *Sir Ernest Wills, 3rd Baronet of Hazelwood, at www.broadhurst-family.co.uk *Family of Sir Ernest Wills, 3rd Baronet of Hazelwood, at www.hungerfordvirtualmuseum.co.uk {{DEFAULTSORT:Wills, Ernest, 3rd Baronet 1869 births People educated at Monkton Combe School 1958 deaths Baronets in the Baronetage of the United Kingdom Lord-Lieutenants of Wiltshire English justices of the peace