# Dictionary of National Biography, 1927 supplement/Grey, Albert Henry George

​GREY, ALBERT HENRY GEORGE, fourth Earl Grey (1851–1917), statesman, was born 28 November 1851, the younger but only surviving son of General the Hon. Charles Grey [q.v.], second son of Charles, second Earl Grey [q.v.], the prime minister. His mother was Caroline Eliza, eldest daughter of Sir Thomas Harvie Farquhar, second baronet, of Cadogan House, Middlesex. He was educated at Harrow and Trinity College, Cambridge, passing out first in the old law and history tripos in 1873. From 1880 to 1885 he was member of parliament for South Northumberland, a constituency for which he had stood unsuccessfully in 1878. From 1885 to 1886 he sat for the Tyneside division of that county. Although nominally attached to the liberal party he took up from the first a somewhat independent position, being especially interested in subjects such as proportional representation and the reform of the national church. He was one of the dissentient liberals who voted against the Home Rule Bill of 1886, but he was defeated when he stood as a liberal unionist at the ensuing general election. No one was more catholic in his interests. Agriculturist, traveller, and sportsman, he was also a social reformer and a champion of unpopular causes; so that there seemed some risk lest his energies, diverted into such varied channels, might run to waste. Fortunately, however, they became mainly concentrated upon one object, the promotion of imperial unity.
In 1884 Henry George, third Earl Grey [q.v.], had transferred the entire management of his estates to Albert, who made the family seat at Howick, Northumberland, his head-quarters, although he did not succeed his uncle until 1894. During this period he made friends with William Thomas Stead [q.v.] who was then editing the Pall Mall Gazette. Stead introduce him to Cecil Rhodes, who in later years impressed him the most of any man that he had known.
At the time of the granting of the charter to the British South Africa Company (29 October 1889) Grey was invited ​to join the board of directors as one in whom the British government and the public could place confidence. Mr. Joseph Chamberlain sought to dissuade him from accepting; but, confessing his belief in Rhodes as a single-minded patriot, Grey joined the board. This ‘paladin of his generation’ was undoubtedly a tower of strength to Rhodes; and, throughout the difficult days that were to follow, Grey remained staunch in his loyalty to his friend and hero. It is manifest that the transparent goodness and charm of Grey brought out what was best in the enigmatic nature of the great empire-builder. After the Jameson Raid (29 December 1895) Grey accepted the thankless task of succeeding (Sir) Leander Starr Jameson [q.v.] as administrator of Rhodesia (1896–1897), although it is doubtful if it was a position for which he was specially fitted. At the outbreak of the Matabele rebellion in 1896 Grey was away on leave; and the presence of Rhodes during the subsequent proceedings inevitably made the administrator of less importance.
Grey was soon, however, to find a field more suited to his temperament and talents. From 1904 to 1911 he was governor-general of Canada. Sir Wilfrid Laurier [q.v.] has testified that from the moment that Grey landed in Canada he gave ‘his whole heart, his whole soul, and his whole life’ to Canada. The fervour of his imperial patriotism called forth a response even in unexpected quarters. His governor-generalship has been described as a most happy combination of the office and the man. To a country then on the wave of great financial prosperity and much occupied with material considerations, Grey bore constant witness of the importance of the things of the spirit, never swerving from the beliefs which he had learnt from the study of the life of Mazzini. Occasionally his imperialism exposed him to the shafts of the party politician, as when he applauded the plan of a Canadian navy; but generally he remained conscious of his constitutional limitations, walking ‘on the tight rope of platitudinous generalities’. As an example of the independent and chivalrous character of his imperialism may be cited his defence of Laurier in connexion with reciprocity negotiations with the United States (24 October 1911 and 15 January 1913). His extraordinary tact was shown by the manner in which he prevailed upon the French Canadians to approve (in 1908) the commemoration of the victory of the Plains of Abraham. His period of office was twice extended; the first time because of his exceptional popularity; the second to suit the convenience of his successor, the Duke of Connaught. But his interest in imperial affairs did not end with the termination of his governor-generalship. In 1912 he paid his last visit to South Africa in order to unveil the memorial to Rhodes on Table Mountain, and the speech which he made on that occasion, giving expression to the faith that was in him, deeply impressed his hearers. By his suggestion and advocacy of the Dominion House scheme, which aimed at a common imperial centre in London for the Dominions, he sought to promote imperial unity; and, when this attempt proved hopeless, he threw himself, as president of the Royal Colonial Institute, into the work of extending the membership of that body, the non-political and practical character of whose activities especially appealed to him.
Although imperial patriotism was the main dogma in his political creed, Grey by no means neglected other interests. He was a keen promoter of the public house trust and ‘garden-city’ movements; and he gave eager support to the efforts of Sir Horace Plunkett to devise an eirenicon for the Irish question. So great was the attraction of his personal charm that Irishmen, such as ‘A. E.’ (George William Russell), bore witness that he had thrown new light for them upon the possibilities of the English character.
Grey was lord-lieutenant of Northumberland from 1899 to 1904. In the latter year he was created G.C.M.G., and in 1908 G.C.V.O. He died at Howick 29 August 1917.
Lord Grey married in 1877 Alice, third daughter of Robert Stayner Holford, M.P., of Westonbirt, Gloucestershire, by whom he had one son and two daughters. He was succeeded as fifth earl by his son, Charles Robert (born 1879). A charcoal-drawing by J. S. Sargent is in the possession of the family.
[The Times, 30 August 1917; Harold Begbie, Albert, fourth Earl Grey; a last word, 1917; Basil Williams, Cecil Rhodes, 1921; H. Henson, A History of Rhodesia, 1900; Castell Hopkins, The Canadian Annual Review, 1904 onwards; Canadian House of Commons Debates; United Empire, vol. viii, new series, no. 9.]
H. E. E.