George Glyn, 1st Baron Wolverton

George Carr Glyn, 1st Baron Wolverton (27 March 1797-24 July 1873), was a banker with interests in the railways, a partner in the family firm of Glyn, Mills and Company, which was reputed to be the largest private bank in London.

He was the fourth son of Sir Richard Carr Glyn, 1st Baronet, also a banker, and former Lord Mayor of London. His mother was the daughter of John Plumptre of Nottingham. The Wolvertons lived at the manor house in Iwerne Minster, two miles south of Fontmell, in Dorset. They also owned Gaunts House, Wimborne.

Glyn and his bank were important in the development of the railways - hence the link with Wolverton. By the 1850s, over 200 railway companies, both domestic and foreign, banked with Glyn, Mills, and Co. In 1836 Glyn became Chairman of the North Midland Railway, and in 1837 the second Chairman of the London and Birmingham Railway. In 1841 he resigned his Chairmanship of the North Midland, but remained a director. In 1842, he founded the Railway Clearing House, an organization that helped determine payments by companies that operated trains to the many different companies that owned connecting tracks. In 1846, when the London and North Western Railway was formed, he was its Chairman until 1852. Glyn's bank served as one of the London agents for the provincial government of Canada, and in 1852 he was a promoter of the Grand Trunk Railway. Apart from his business career he also represented Kendal in the House of Commons from 1847 to 1868. On 14 December 1869 Glyn was raised to the peerage as Baron Wolverton, of Wolverton in the County of Buckingham.

Lord Wolverton married Marianne Grenfell, daughter of Pascoe Grenfell, M.P. for Penryn, on 17 March 1823. They had nine sons and two daughters. Several of his sons gained distinction. The Hon. Sidney Glyn and the Hon. Pascoe Glyn were both Members of Parliament. The Right Reverend the Hon. Edward Glyn was Bishop of Peterborough and the father of Ralph Glyn, 1st Baron Glyn. The Hon. Henry Carr Glyn was a Vice-Admiral in the Royal Navy. Lord Wolverton died in July 1873, aged 76, and was succeeded in the barony by his eldest son George Grenfell Glyn. Lady Wolverton died in March 1892.

References

*Michael Reed, ‘Glyn, George Carr, first Baron Wolverton (1797–1873)’, "Oxford Dictionary of National Biography", Oxford University Press, 2004.
* [http://www.angeltowns.com/town/peerage/ Leigh Rayment's Peerage Page]