Henry Eaton, 1st Baron Cheylesmore

Henry William Eaton, 1st Baron Cheylesmore (13 March 1816 – 2 October 1891) was a British businessman, Conservative politician, and art collector.

The son of Henry Eaton, he was head of William Eaton & Sons, China-silk brokers. He was also Member of Parliament for Coventry from 1865 to 1880, and from 1885 to 1887. The latter year, in Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee Honours, Eaton was raised to the peerage as Baron Cheylesmore, of Cheylesmore in the City of Coventry and County of Warwick.

Lord Cheylesmore married Charlotte, daughter of Thomas Leader Harman, of New Orleans in 1839. They had three sons and one daughter. His wife died in 1877 and his eldest son two years later. Cheylesmore died in October 1891, aged 75, and was succeeded in the barony by his second son William.

In 1871 he bought the medieval Cheylesmore Manor House and park, then just outside Coventry, now a Grade II* listed building used as a Registry office in the suburb built on the historic park.

Cheylesmore was a significant art collector, mainly of contemporary British painting. The star of his collection, and his posthumous sale at Christie's in May 1892 (lot numbers and prices realized noted), was undoubtedly The Monarch of the Glen (lot 42, £7,245) by Sir Edwin Landseer, one of the most popular paintings of the age. Altogether 31 of the 86 lots were by Landseer, many bought at his studio sale in 1874. Other artists with several works included William Powell Frith, lots 19-21, the Biblical Orientalist Frederick Goodall, lots 22-28, David Roberts, lots 71-73, and the American sculptor Hiram Powers, with three busts as lots 84-86.

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