The Right Honourable The Viscount Peel PC |
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Speaker of the House of Commons | |
In office 1884–1895 |
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Monarch | Queen Victoria |
Preceded by | The Hon Sir Henry Brand |
Succeeded by | Sir William Gully |
Personal details | |
Born | 3 August 1829 |
Died | 24 October 1912 | (aged 83)
Nationality | British |
Political party |
Liberal Liberal Unionist |
Spouse(s) | Adelaide Dugdale (d. 1890) |
Alma mater | Balliol College, Oxford |
Arthur Wellesley Peel, 1st Viscount Peel, PC (3 August 1829 – 24 October 1912) was a British Liberal politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1865 to 1895. He was Speaker of the House of Commons from 1884 until 1895 when he was raised to the peerage.
Peel was the youngest son of the Conservative Prime Minister Sir Robert Peel by his wife Julia, daughter of General Sir John Floyd, 1st Baronet, and was named after Arthur Wellesley, the Duke of Wellington. He was educated at Eton and Balliol College, Oxford.
Peel was elected Liberal Member of Parliament (MP) for Warwick in the 1865 general election and held the seat until 1885 when it was replaced under the Redistribution of Seats Act 1885. From 1868 to 1873 he was Parliamentary Secretary to the Poor Law Board, and then became Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade. In 1873–1874 he was patronage secretary to the Treasury, and in 1880 he became Under-Secretary of State for Home Affairs in the second Gladstone government. On the retirement of Sir Henry Brand, Peel was elected Speaker of the House of Commons on 26 February 1884.