DUDLEY, BARONS AND EARLS OF. The holders of these English titles are descended from John de Sutton (c. 1310 59) of Dudley Castle, Staffordshire, who was summoned to parlia ment as a baron in 1342. Sutton was the son of another John de Sutton, who had inherited Dudley Castle through his marriage with Margaret, sister and heiress of John de Somery (d. 1320 ; he was called Lord Dudley, or Lord Sutton of Dudley, the latter being doubtless the correct form. However, his descendants, the Suttons, were often called by the name of Dudley; and from John Dudley of Atherington, Sussex, a younger son of John Sutton, the 5th baron, the earls of Warwick and the earl of Leicester of the Dudley family are descended.
John Sutton or Dudley (c. 1400-87), the 5th baron, was first summoned to parliament in 144o, having been viceroy of Ireland from 1428 to 143o. He died on Sept. 3o, 1487. He was succeeded as 6th baron by his grandson Edward (c. 1459-1532), and one of his sons, William Dudley, was bishop of Durham from 1476 until his death in 1483. His descendant Edward Sutton or Dudley, the 9th baron (1567-1643 ), had several illegitimate sons. Among them was Dud Dudley (1599-1684), who in 1665 published Metallum Martis, describing a process of making iron with "pit coale, sea-coale, etc.," which was put in operation at his father's ironworks at Pensnet, Worcestershire, of which he was manager. During the Civil War he was a colonel in the army of Charles I.
Dying without lawful male issue in June 1643, the 9th baron was succeeded in the barony by his grand-daughter, Frances (161 ; she married Humble Ward (c. 1614-70), the son of a London goldsmith, who was created Baron Ward of Birming ham in 1644. Their son Edward (1631-1701) succeeded both to the barony of Dudley and to that of Ward, but these were sepa rated when his grandson William died unmarried in May 174o. The barony of Dudley passed to a nephew, Ferdinando Dudley Lea, falling into abeyance on his death in Oct. 1757; that of Ward passed to the heir male, John Ward (d. 1774), a descendant of Humble Ward. In 1763 Ward was created Viscount Dudley, and in April 1823 his grandson, John William Ward (1781-1833 ) foreign minister in 1827-28, became the 4th viscount. He was created Viscount Ednam and earl of Dudley in 1827, and when he died unmarried on March 6, 1833, these titles became extinct. His barony of Ward, however, passed to William Humble Ward (1781-183 5 ), whose son, William (1817-85) was created Viscount Ednam and earl of Dudley in 186o. The 2nd earl of Dudley in this creation was the latter's son William Humble (b. 1866), who was lord-lieutenant of Ireland from 1902 to 1906, and gov ernor-general of Australia from 1908 to 191 I. He died in 1932.
See H. S. Grazebrook in the Herald and Genealogist, vols. ii., v. and vi. ; in Notes and Queries, end series, vol. xi. ; and in vol. ix. of the publications of the William Salt Society (1888) .