Lord Farnham

A carte-de-visite portrait of Lord Farnham (1799-1868).

Henry Maxwell was born on 9 August 1799, the son of Reverend Henry Maxwell, 6th Baron Farnham and Lady Anne née Butler. On 3 December 1828 he married Anna Frances Esther Stapleton, daughter of Sir Thomas Stapleton, 16th Baron Le Despencer.

He represented County Cavan in the House of Commons before succeeding his father on 19 October 1838, when he became the 7th Baron Farnham. He served as an Irish represenative peer from 1839 until his death at the age of 69 in 1868. He and his wife were killed in the Abergele train disaster in North Wales, when a passenger train collided with a run-away cargo truck loaded with paraffin. The resulting explosion and fire killed 32 passengers, leaving the bodies so charred that the majority were beyond recognition. Lord Farnham's remains were only identifiable by the crest engraved on his watch. The accident was the worst railway disaster in Britian up to that date.

Photographed by Camille Silvy of London on 2 July 1861.