# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Long, Charles (1761-1838)

​LONG, CHARLES, Baron Farnborough (1761–1838), politician, born in 1761, was third son of Beeston Long of Carshalton, Surrey, a member of a well-known firm of West India merchants, Drake & Long. His mother, Susannah, was daughter and heiress of Abraham Cropp of Richmond, Surrey. His father's family, settled originally in Wiltshire, had been connected with Jamaica since Charles Long's great-grandfather, Samuel, had been made, on the conquest of Jamaica, secretary to the Jamaica commissioners (see Hasted, Kent, ed. Drake, 1886, pt. i. pp. 255-6). In 1788 he was entered at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, but appears to have taken no degree. In 1833 he was made an honorary LL.D. He entered parliament in January 1789, as one of the members for Rye, and having held that seat till 1796, was returned for Midhurst, and in 1802 for Wendover. In 1806 he came in for Haslemere, and held that seat till his elevation to the peerage. From an early time in his career he was a respectable official and a successful placeman. In 1791 he was appointed joint secretary to the treasury, resigned with Pitt, his patron, in 1801, and on Pitt's return to power in 1804 became a lord commissioner of the treasury. His personal friendship with both Pitt and Addington had made him an invaluable intermediary between them in the previous year (see Stanhope, Life of Pitt, iv. 26; Yonge, Life of Lord Liverpool, i. 149). He was sworn of the privy council on 5 Oct. 1805 (Gent. Mag. 1805, ii. 1231). In February 1806 he was advanced to be secretary of state for Ireland, and was sworn of the Irish privy council. In 1810 he was appointed joint paymaster-general, and eventually became the sole occupant of the office. He was despatched to France in 1817 as a commissioner to settle the accounts connected with the army of occupation. While a member of the House of Commons he voted steadily with the tories, and spoke only so far as his office required. On 27 May 1820 he was created a civil grand cross of the Bath, and at the request of Canning he retired in 1826 from his post of paymaster-general, and was created a peer, Baron Farnborough, 13 June. He enjoyed a pension of 1,500l. a year until, on the death in 1829 of Francis Henry Egerton, eighth earl of Bridgewater [q. v.], his wife's brother, he inherited property of the value of 4,000l. a year, when he resigned his pension. From the time of his elevation to the peerage he devoted himself principally to artistic pursuits. He was a recognised judge of pictures and architecture, formed a considerable gallery of paintings and ​sculpture, erected his celebrated mansion, Bromley Hill Place in Kent, and with the assistance of his wife laid out its extensive ornamental gardens. He published a pamphlet in 1826, 'Remarks on the Improvements in London,' having previously figured as an author with pamphlets on the French revolution in 1795, and on the price of bread in 1813. He suggested many of the new streets and buildings which were then laid out. He was the personal friend of both George III and George IV, and assisted them with his taste in the decoration of several of the royal palaces. He became lieutenant-colonel of the Lee and Lewisham volunteer corps in September 1803, was a fellow of the Royal Society from 1792, and of the Society of Antiquaries from 1812; was elected a trustee of the British Museum in 1812, and was also a trustee of the National Gallery, deputy president of the British Institution, and chairman of the committee for the inspection of national monuments. He died at Bromley Hill, 17 Jan. 1838, and was buried 27 Jan. at Wormley.
Farnborough married, 28 May 1793, Amelia [see Long, Amelia, Lady Farnborough], eldest daughter of Sir Abraham Hume [q. v.] of Wormleybury, Hertfordshire, who died on 15 Jan. 1837, but had no issue.
[Cadell's Contemporary Portraits, 1810; Correspondence of Lord Grey and Madame de Lieven; Cussans's Hertfordshire, ii. 255; Brit. Mus. Cat.; Gent. Mag. 1838; Moore's Memoirs, iv. 128.]
J. A. H.