Sir Henry Bruce, 3rd Baronet

Sir Henry Hervey Bruce, 3rd Baronet PC (Ire) (22 September 1820 – 8 December 1907) was an Irish Conservative politician. He was Member of Parliament for Coleraine from 1862 to 1874, and from 1880 to 1885.

Early life Bruce was born on 22 September 1820. He was the eldest son of Ellen Hesketh (d. 1864) and Sir James Bruce, 2nd Baronet, an officer in the Royal Horse Artillery at Waterloo who served as a Vice-Lieutenant of County Londonderry. Among his siblings were Col. Robert Bruce (who married Mary Caroline Burgoyne, a daughter of Col. Sir John Burgoyne, 9th Baronet), the Rev. Lloyd Stuart Bruce (father of Edith Agnes Kathleen Bruce, the wife of Robert Falcon Scott). His grandfather, who was the brother of Sir Stewart Bruce, 1st Baronet, inherited Downhill House from their cousin, Frederick Hervey, 4th Earl of Bristol, and was created Baronet, of Downhill in the Baronetage of the United Kingdom, in 1804.

Career He held the office of High Sheriff of County Londonderry in 1846. Bruce was elected to the House of Commons at an unopposed by-election in 1862, following the death of the Conservative MP John Boyd. He was re-elected unopposed at the general elections in 1865 and 1868, but was defeated at the 1874 general election by the Liberal candidate Daniel Taylor. He defeated Taylor (by 222 votes to 193) at the 1880 general election, and held the seat until the borough of Coleraine lost its separate parliamentary representation at the 1885 general election. and Honorary Colonel of the Londonderry Militia (later 9th Brigade, North Irish Division, Royal Artillery) from 1878. He was sworn of the Privy Council of Ireland in 1889.

Personal life In 1842 he married Marianne Margaret Clifton (d 1891), daughter of Sir Juckes Granville Juckes-Clifton, 8th Baronet of Clifton Hall, Nottingham. Together, they were the parents of:

Sir Hervey Juckes Lloyd Bruce, 4th Baronet (1843–1919), who married Ellen Maud Ricardo, daughter of Percy Ricardo, in 1872. Admiral Sir James Andrew Thomas Bruce (1846–1921), who married Catherine Mary Philippa Wodehouse, daughter of Col. Edwin Wodehouse and sister of Sir Frederick Wodehouse, in 1877.

Lady Bruce died on 28 July 1891. Sir Henry died on 8 December 1909 and was succeeded in the baronetcy by his eldest son, Hervey.