Sir Charles Grey, First Earl Grey: Royal Soldier, Family Patriarch

Paul David Nelson

Jan. 1996 · Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press

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Historian Paul David Nelson has written the first complete scholarly biography of Sir Charles Grey, First Earl Grey, one of the most important British Army commanders in the eighteenth century. Considering Grey's importance, and the prominence of the family he helped to found, it is surprising that he has been neglected by history. Only a short sketch in the Dictionary of National Biography, and an article by Sir John Fortescue in the Edinburgh Review have ever attempted even perfunctory assessments of his life. As a man and an army officer, Grey represented some of the best qualities of eighteenth-century British civilization. In America, he fought during the War of American Independence and in 1794 in the West Indies against France. Hence, as Nelson shows, his career is important in American History. Given his long service to the British nation in all her wars from 1744 to 1800, it is clear from Nelson's account that Grey is an important character in British history as well. During his lifetime, Grey proved himself a reliable and successful soldier, earning and deserving all his honors: Knight of the Bath in 1782, baron in 1801, viscount and earl in 1806. Nelson shows that Grey was an aggressive fighter who often achieved amazing feats of arms, often simply because of his driving personality and his most outstanding personality trait, loyalty.