Rosalind Howard, Countess of Carlisle

Rosalind Frances Howard, Countess of Carlisle (née Stanley; 20 February 1845 – 12 August 1921), known as the Radical Countess, was an English aristocrat and activist for women's political rights and temperance movement. She was a member of the Stanley and Howard families.

Family

The Countess of Carlisle was born in 1845 at Grosvenor Crescent, Belgravia, the tenth and last child of the Whig politician Hon. Edward Stanley, and the women's education campaigner Hon. Henrietta Stanley. Her father was the eldest son of John Stanley, 1st Baron Stanley of Alderley and his wife Lady Maria, daughter of the Earl of Sheffield. In 1848, her father was raised to the peerage as Baron Eddisbury and two years later succeeded to his father's title, Baron Stanley of Alderley.

She was educated at home by private tutors. The Stanley family was exceptionally diverse in terms of religious convictions: Lord and Lady Stanley were high-church Anglicans, their eldest son Henry was a Muslim, their third daughter Maude was a low-church Anglican, their youngest son Algernon became a Roman Catholic bishop, their penultimate daughter Kate leaned towards atheism, while Rosalind herself identified as an agnostic. They shared a dislike for alcohol, but little else; when the Liberal Party split on the issue of Irish home rule, which Rosalind supported, George decided to side with his cousin, the Duke of Devonshire, and the Liberal Unionist Party. Due to their personal and political disagreements, the Howards spent most of their married life separated, with Rosalind preferring to stay at their country houses, Castle Howard and her favourite home, Naworth Castle.

Although she had opposed the South African War, Lady Carlisle firmly supported British resistance to the Germans in the First World War. The temperance movement and the Liberal Party had divided by then, leaving her without significant political influence. She supported H. H. Asquith despite his unwillingness to promote prohibition and opposed David Lloyd George's proposal to nationalise the drink trade during wartime. Though she worked hard to improve the working-class people's living conditions, she was an élitist who resented their role in democracy.

Lady Mary Henrietta Howard (20 July 1865 – 2 September 1956), who married George Gilbert Aimé Murray, son of Sir Terence Aubrey Murray, in 1889. Charles James Stanley Howard, 10th Earl of Carlisle (1867–1912), married Rhoda Ankaret L'Estrange, eldest daughter of Col. Paget Walter L'Estrange. Lady Cecilia Maude Howard (23 April 1868 - 6 May 1947), married Charles Henry Roberts, the Under-Secretary of State for India, in 1891. Hon. Hubert George Lyulph Howard (3 April 1871 – 2 September 1898), killed at the Battle of Omdurman while serving as a correspondent for The Times Capt. Hon. Christopher Edward Howard (2 June 1873 – 1 September 1896), 8th King's Royal Irish Hussars, died of pneumonia at Slains Castle after contracting a cold at a shooting party Hon. Oliver Howard (14 March 1875 – 20 September 1908), diplomat, who married Muriel Stephenson (1876–1952) in 1900. After his death of fever in Northern Nigeria, where he was British resident, his widow married Arthur Meade, 5th Earl of Clanwilliam. Hon. Geoffrey William Algernon Howard (1877–1935), married Hon. Ethel Christian Methuen, eldest daughter of Paul Methuen, 3rd Baron Methuen. Lt. Hon. Michael Francis Stafford Howard (23 January 1880 – 9 September 1917), married Nora Hensman in 1911. He was killed in action in the First World War. Lady Dorothy Georgiana Howard (6 August 1881 – 14 September 1968), married Francis Robert Eden, 6th Baron Henley (1877–1962) in 1913. Elizabeth Dacre Ethel Howard (12 March 1883 – 17 July 1883), died in infancy. There is a terra cotta effigy by Sir Edgar Boehm on her tomb at Lanercost Priory. Lady Aurea Fredeswyde Howard (4 October 1884 – 15 January 1972), married Denyss Chamberlaine Wace in 1923; he was granted an annulment in 1926 on grounds that the marriage was never consummated. She married Maj. Thomas MacLeod OBE in 1928.

Death and legacy By the time Lord Carlisle died in 1911, Lady Carlisle's autocracy had estranged her from most of her children and friends. She strongly disapproved of her daughters' flirtatiousness and bitterly argued with her eldest son Charles, a Tory politician. For several years, Lady Carlisle refused to speak to her daughter Lady Dorothy due to her marriage to the brewer Francis Henley (afterwards Baron Henley).

Arms