Gascoyne-Cecil family, Marquesses of Salisbury

On the death of William Cecil, Lord Burghley in 1598 (see Cecil, Marquesses of Exeter) his properties in Hertfordshire, Middlesex, Surrey and elsewhere passed to Robert Cecil (1563-1612), his son by his second wife, who was created Earl of Salisbury in 1605 and who became, like his father, Lord Treasurer. Hatfield was acquired in 1607, in exchange with King James I for Lord Salisbury’s earlier seat of Theobalds. The 1st Earl also acquired estates in Dorset (Cranborne), Cornwall (St Michael’s Mount), Kent (following the attainder of his brother-in-law, Lord Cobham, in 1603), Northamptonshire (Brigstock Parks), Wiltshire and elsewhere; but the bulk of these (except Cranborne) were sold in the 17th and early 18th centuries.

The marriage of the 4th Earl in 1683 to Frances Bennett of Beachampton (Buckinghamshire) led to the inheritance of estates in Buckinghamshire, Nottinghamshire and the North Riding of Yorkshire, but these, with some other outlying properties, were sold by the 1st Marquess of Salisbury (1748-1823). In 1821, however, the 2nd Marquess married Frances, daughter of Bamber Gascoyne of Childwall (Lancashire), who brought valuable estates in Lancashire (Liverpool etc.) and Essex (Ilford, Barking etc.). For a time in the mid 19th century the family also owned the Scottish island of Rhum.

Estates in 1883: 13,389 acres in Hertfordshire; 3,118 acres in Dorset; 1,796 acres in Lancashire; 960 acres in Middlesex; 758 acres in Essex; 89 acres in Bedfordshire, 80 acres in Norfolk and 12 acres in Wiltshire, worth a total of £33,413 a year.