in 1865; relinquished the Chatham command in 1866; was promoted to be lieutenant-general on 25 Oct. 1871, and was selected for command at the autumn manœuvres of 1872.
Walpole died on 12 July 1876 at the Grove, West Molesey, Surrey. He married, on 29 Jan. 1846, Gertrude, youngest daughter of General William Henry Ford of the royal engineers. He had nine children. Two sons and three daughters, with their mother, survived him. A watercolour portrait of Walpole, by Alfred Edward Chalon [q. v.] (1826), and an oil portrait by John Phillip [q. v.] (1847), both in rifle-brigade uniform, were formerly in possession of the widow, Lady Walpole of Hampton Court Palace.
[War Office Records; Despatches; Kaye's History of the Sepoy War; Malleson's Hist. of the Indian Mutiny; Shadwell's Life of Lord Clyde; Defence of Lucknow; Grant's Sepoy War; Cope's Hist. of Rifle Brigade, 1877; Annual Register, 1876; private sources.]
WALPOLE, SPENCER HORATIO (1806–1898), home secretary, born on 11 Sept. 1806, was second son of Thomas Walpole of Stagbury, Surrey, by his wife Margaret (d. 1854), the youngest daughter of John Perceval, second earl of Egmont [q. v.] His great-grandfather was Horatio Walpole, first lord Walpole of Wolterton [q. v.], the diplomatist; his grandfather, Thomas Walpole, was the friend of Chatham. Sir Robert Walpole (1808–1876) was his younger brother. He owed his first name to his maternal uncle, Spencer Perceval [q. v.], the prime minister, whose daughter he subsequently married; his second name he owed indirectly to the Walpoles, directly to Lord Nelson, the cousin and friend of his father. He was educated at Eton during the head-mastership of John Keate [q. v.], and he had for his tutor Edward Craven Hawtrey [q. v.] At Eton Walpole rose rapidly to be head of the school, and both in the Eton debating society and in ‘speeches’ gave evidence of oratorical power. At election 1823 he was entrusted by Keate with the speech which Lord Strafford delivered on the scaffold, and which Canning had recited, on a similar occasion, some thirty-six years before. Canning happened to be present, and paid the young orator the unusual compliment of rising from his seat, shaking hands with him, and congratulating him on the fervour and feeling with which he had spoken.
From Eton Walpole proceeded to Trinity College, Cambridge. He graduated B.A. as a senior optime in 1828, having won the first declamation prize and the prize for the best ‘Essay on the Character of William III.’ On leaving Cambridge he chose the law as a profession. He was called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn in 1831, and became queen's counsel in 1846. In the interval he had attained prominence in his profession. His increasing practice induced him to confine himself almost exclusively to the rolls court, where he enjoyed, to a remarkable degree, the confidence of the presiding judge, Sir John Romilly, and during the years which preceded his final retirement from the bar in 1852 he was engaged in all the most important cases which came before that court.
Other interests, however, were rapidly absorbing a considerable portion of his time. On 30 Jan. 1846 he entered the House of Commons as conservative member for Midhurst, where his cousin, Lord Egmont, exercised a predominating influence. He represented Midhurst till 1856, when he left it for the university of Cambridge. He sat for the university till his final retirement from parliament in 1882.
In the House of Commons Walpole rapidly acquired the respect which is always conceded to ability and character, and his speeches on the repeal of the navigation laws, on the Jewish disabilities bill (1848), and on the ecclesiastical titles bill (1851) brought him into notice; the last two were published by request. On the formation of Lord Derby's ministry in February 1852 he was offered and accepted a seat in the cabinet as secretary of state for the home department. During the following session he introduced and carried a measure for the reorganisation of the militia. He resigned with the rest of the ministry in December. When Lord Derby again formed a government in February 1858, Walpole resumed the position of home secretary. But he differed from his colleagues on the provisions of the Reform Bill which Lord Derby's cabinet resolved in January 1859 to submit in the ensuing session to the House of Commons, and he retired from office. Walpole, when writing to announce his resignation to the prime minister on 27 Jan., complained especially of the proposed reduction of the county franchise. He stated his reasons for withdrawing from the government to the House of Commons on 1 March, the day after Disraeli introduced the Reform Bill. His own views on reform were elaborately explained in two articles which he contributed to the ‘Quarterly Review’ in October 1859 and in January 1860.
In June 1866 Walpole became home secretary for the third time, on the formation of Lord Derby's third ministry, and his third tenure of the office was rendered memorable by his action in relation to the popular
