LONDONDERRY, CHARLES WILLIA5I VANE, emu MAR QUIS OF, K.G., G.C.B., only son of Robert, first Marquis, by his second wife, Frances, daughter of Lord Chancellor Camden, and half-brother of the second Marquis above noticed, was born in Dublin May 18,1778. He was in his fifteenth year when he received his first commission as ensign in a foot regiment, and embarked under the Earl of Moira I (afterwards Marquis of Hastings), to relieve H.R.H. the Duke of York from the perilous position in which he found himself after the reduc tion of Ypres and the capture of Charleroy. Having held for a few mouths the post of assistant quartermaster-general to a division of the forces under General Doyle, he was attached in the followiog year to Colonel Cralvfurd's mission to the court of Vienna; and while thus occupied, he received a severe wound at the battle of Donauwerth. Returning home, he became aide-de-camp to his uncle, Earl Camden, during his Lord Lieutenancy in Ireland; having gained his majority in 1796, he was made in the following year lieutenant-colonel of the 5th Dragoon Guards, and while encamped on the Curragli of Kildare succeeded in bringing into partial discipline and order "tho worst of bad regiments," which he commanded through the trying period of the Rebellion of 1798. The regiment having been subsequently disbanded for insubordination, Charles Stewart was appointed to the command of the 18th Light Dragoons, which he accompanied to Egypt under Sir Ralph Abercrombie; and in this expedition he was again severely wounded. In 1803 he became full colonel, and aide-de-camp to his Majesty, and for a short time occupied the post of under secretary of state for the war department. This post lie quitted in order to accept the command of a hussar brigade under Sir John Moore in Poi tugal, as brigadier-general, and he did good service by covering the march of Sir John Hope's division into Spain, and the retreat of Sir John Moore, during which he successfully repulsed an attack of the French Imperial Guard. On reaching Corunna he was labouring under severe ophthalmia, and Sir John Moore, who had the highest opinion of his abilities, sent him home to report progress. In a few months however he returned to the scat of war as adjutant-general under Sir Arthur Wellesley, which post he held until May 1813. During the of Marshal Soult's army across the Douro, and again at it lie rendered important services, for which he received the thanks of the House of Commons. During all this time, since the meeting of the first parliament of the United Kingdom in 1801, he had represented the county of Londonderry, and continued to do so until 1814, when he was raised to the Peerage as Lord Stewart, and sworn a member of the Privy Council. In the meantime he had risen to the rank of lieutenant-general, and had received the order of the Bath, besides Portuguese, Russian, and Prussian honours, in recognition of his services not ouly in the field, but also in the capacity of envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary at the court of Berlin, where he acted as commissioner to the allied sovereigns, and was specially charged with the supervision of Bernadotte, the Swedish king, who had armed his troops with English supplies, but was thought to be wavering in his allegiance.
The secret history of the time shows what kind of remonstrances the British envoy found it necessary to employ at so critical n moment as that which immediately preceded the battle of Leipzig. In 1814 he was appointed ambassador to Austria, and in the following year was one of the plenipotentiaries at the Congress of Vienna, together with his brother, Lord Castlereagh, the Duke of Wellington, and Lords Cath cart and Clancarty. Having been left some years a widower, in 1819 Lord Stewart married the only daughter of Sir Harry Vane Tempest, Bart., and assumed the name and arms of Vane; and having succeeded to the marquisate on the death of his brother in 1822, was soon after wards created Earl Vane, with remainder to his SOUS by his second marriage. In right of his wife he became possessed of large estates in the county of Durham, and applied himself actively. to the develop ment of their mineral and commercial resources. With this view he constructed the harbour of Seabam, a vast undertaking for private enterprise, and one which will long be regarded as a wondrous achieve ment of engineering science. After this time the marquis never accepted any public office or employment, with the exception of the embassy to Russia, which he undertook dnriug Sir Robert Peel's brief tenure of office in 1881-35, but relinquished before proceeding to his destination. In 1837 he obtained the rank of general, and became colonel of the 2nd Life Guards in 1843. In 1852 the Earl of Derby bestowed on him the Garter vacated by the death of the Duke of Wellington. His lordship was the author of a ' History of the Penin sular War,' published in 4to, 1808-13, and he also edited the corre spondence of his brother Robert, the second marquis, which he published In 1850. Daring upwards of half a century Lord London derry advocated in the Upper and Lower House the strongest Tory principles, and not always in the way best calculated to disarm opposition. He died at Holdernesee-house, London, March 1, 1854, from an attack of influenza, and was buried at Long Newton, near Wynyard Park, his princely seat in the county of Durham. He was succeeded in the marquisate and Irish estates by his eldest son William Robert, who represented the-County of Down for many years as Viscount Castlereagh ; the earldom of Vane and his English pro perty passed to the eldest son of his second marriage, George, viscount Statham, 31.P. for the Northern Division of the county of Durham.