Curzon, George Nathaniel (1859-1925), Marquess Curzon of Kedleston, politician, traveller, and Viceroy of India

Mentioned by George Mallory in a letter to his wife Ruth.

Curzon, George Nathaniel, Marquess Curzon of Kedleston (1859–1925), politician, traveller, and viceroy of India, was born on 11 January 1859 at Kedleston Hall, Derbyshire, the second of the eleven children of the Revd Alfred Nathaniel Holden Curzon, fourth Baron Scarsdale (1831–1916), rector of Kedleston, and his wife, Blanche (1837–1875), daughter of Joseph Pocklington Senhouse of Netherhall in Cumberland. His family was of Norman ancestry and had lived on the same site since the twelfth century. In 1759 Sir Nathaniel Curzon, later first Baron Scarsdale, demolished the existing house at Kedleston and commissioned Robert Adam to build him a great country house in the Palladian style. His descendant, George Nathaniel, was always conscious, however, that the family home was more distinguished than the family which inhabited it, and from an early age he was determined to prove himself a fitting master for Kedleston. In the closing words of the epitaph he composed for himself, 'he sought to serve his country and add honour to an ancient name'.

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography