# William Cornwallis-West

Colonel William Cornwallis Cornwallis-West, VD, JP, DL (20 March 1835 – 4 July 1917) was a British landowner, politician for seven years from 1885 and raised the 6th (Ruthin) Denbighshire Rifle Volunteer Corps followed by further ceremonial duties in the wider territorial army in Wales.

## Early life

(William) Cornwallis West was born on 20 March 1835 at Florence. He was the son of Frederick Richard West, a Tory MP for Denbigh Boroughs and East Grinstead who was a member of the Canterbury Association, and his wife, Theresa Cornwallis Whitby. His father first married Lady Georgiana Stanhope (a daughter of Philip Stanhope, 5th Earl of Chesterfield).
A scion of the De La Warr Wests, his paternal grandfather was the Hon. Frederick West (a son of John West, 2nd Earl De La Warr). His maternal grandparents were both Royal Navy figures: Captain John Whitby and Mary Anne Theresa Symonds (adoptive daughter and heiress of Admiral William Cornwallis).
Following his education at Eton, he returned to the country of his birth as, like his parents, he was an enthusiastic lover of the Italianate art. While in Italy he was an amateur painter and may have fathered several illegitimate children. He returned and was called to the Bar, Lincoln's Inn, in 1862.

## Career

Cornwallis-West was High Sheriff of Denbighshire in 1872, Lord-Lieutenant of Denbighshire from 1872 to 1917, and a Justice of the Peace for Hampshire and Denbighshire. In 1885 he won a fought election to Parliament for Denbighshire West as a Liberal, a seat he held until 1892 latterly as a Liberal Unionist (which took an anti-Irish Home Rule line).
He lost to the Liberal Party's candidate that year as the parties began their clearer left/right split. He raised the 6th (Ruthin) Denbighshire Rifle Volunteer Corps in 1861 and became commanding officer of the 1st Volunteer Battalion, Royal Welch Fusiliers in 1885. In 1890 he became Honorary Colonel of the battalion and later of its successor, the 4th (Denbighshire) Battalion, Royal Welch Fusiliers in the Territorial Force.
In 1895 he assumed by deed poll the surname of Cornwallis-West. In his most active years he lived simultaneously in London, at Ruthin Castle, Denbighshire and at Newlands Manor, Milford, Hampshire.

## Personal life

Cornwallis-West married Mary Eupatoria ("Patsy") Fitzpatrick, daughter of Rev. Frederick Fitzpatrick and Lady Olivia Taylour (daughter of the 2nd Marquess of Headfort), on 3 October 1872 at Dublin. Patsy, a prominent mistress Edward VII, was known as a great beauty and leading socialite.
Their had three children, all of whom endured divorce:
* Mary Theresa ("Daisy") Cornwallis-West (1873–1943), who married Prince Hans Heinrich XV von Hochberg (going by the name Henry of Pless from 1914).
* George Frederick Myddleton Cornwallis-West (1874–1951), second husband of Lady Randolph Churchill (the American heiress formerly known as Jennie Jerome), mother of Winston Churchill. After their 1914 divorce, he married the actress and beauty Mrs Patrick Campbell (formerly Beatrice Tanner).
* Constance Edwina ("Shelagh") Cornwallis-West (1875–1970), who married Hugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster. They divorced and she married her private secretary and agent, Captain John Fitzpatrick Lewis.
Cornwallis-West died in July 1917, aged 82. His widow died in July 1920, shortly after returning from Monaco, at her family's Arnewood House which has a half-wooded holding 1.2 miles (1.9 km) north of her other mansion: Newlands, near Milford-on-Sea in Hampshire.

## Newlands Manor

Newlands Manor, Hampshire is a Grade II listed Strawberry Hill Gothic style manor house, dating from the late 18th century.
George, who had already been declared bankrupt, after the sale of certain lots, decided to dispose of the bulk – the rest – of the Hampshire estate so astutely acquired by his great-grandmother.
In 1920 the estate of 2,000 acres was put up for auction in 91 lots. The mansion and its grounds and four lodges were sold in one lot. Other lots included arable, pasture and woodland, building sites in Milford, 30 cottages and farms including Batchley, Kings, Harts, Lea Green and Downton Manor.
The house, which had been badly neglected, and 500 acres was bought by Sir John Power, MP for Wimbledon, who made improvements but put it up for sale in 1948. The house and 38 acres were then acquired by a developer who turned it into six flats. As of 2023, the house was on sale for an estimated £3 million.