Gerald Legge, 9th Earl of Dartmouth

Gerald Humphry Legge, 9th Earl of Dartmouth (26 April 1924 – 14 December 1997), styled Viscount Lewisham between 1958 and 1962, was a British peer and businessman.

Background and education Legge was the only son of Humphry Legge, 8th Earl of Dartmouth, and his wife, Roma Ernestine (née Horlick). He was educated at Eton College.

Career On leaving Eton in 1942, he joined the Coldstream Guards as a captain and served with them until the end of the Second World War, having been mentioned in despatches. He was subsequently a director of the Merchant Bank Rea Bros (based at Kings House, King Street) from 1958 to 1989, chairman of the Royal Choral Society from 1970 to 1992 and chairman of the Anglo-Brazilian Society from 1975 to 1994. He also served as Chairman of the investment holding business, Ocean Wilsons.

Family Lord Dartmouth married Raine McCorquodale, the only child of the romance novelist Barbara Cartland and her first husband, Alexander McCorquodale, on 1 July 1948. They had four children; William Legge, 10th Earl of Dartmouth (born 1949), The Honourable Rupert Legge (born 1951), Lady Charlotte (born 1963) who married Don Alessandro Paternò Castello, 13th Duke of Carcaci and The Honourable Henry Legge (born 1968) who married Cressida Hogg (youngest daughter of Sir Christopher Anthony Hogg), Lord Dartmouth died in 1997 and was succeeded by his oldest son, William.