Page:Wives of the prime ministers, 1844-1906.djvu/70

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.

II

LADY PEEL


"… thou upon the statesman's path hast cast
 The quiet sunshine of domestic gladness."


JULIA FLOYD, the third child and second daughter of General Sir John Floyd, Bart., K.B., was born in India, on 19th November 1795. Her father had a distinguished military career and came of a family of soldiers.—Documentary evidence points to a certain Thomas Floyd as an ancestor of the family who obtained a commission in the 1st Dragoon Guards in 1680. His son John became a captain in the same regiment and was present at the battle of Minden on 1st August 1759, and died on duty in Germany in the following September. He left two sons, John and Thomas, and two daughters, Elizabeth and Caroline. Thomas went into the Navy, and as a midshipman volunteered for the expedition to the North Pole in 1773 under the command of Captain Constantine Phipps. Horatio Nelson,

44