Charles Powlett, 3rd Duke of Bolton

Who was Charles Powlett, 3rd Duke of Bolton?

Lieutenant-General Charles Powlett, 3rd Duke of Bolton KG PC was a British nobleman and politician.

Paulet was the eldest son of Charles Paulet, 2nd Duke of Bolton and Frances Ramsden, born in 1685 at Chawton. From 1685 until 1699 he was styled Earl of Wiltshire, and from 1699 until his accession, Marquess of Winchester.

He was Whig MP for Lymington from 1705 to 1708, Hampshire from 1708 to 1710 and Carmarthenshire from 1715 to 1717. In 1739, he became a founding governor of the Foundling Hospital in London, an orphanage for abandoned children.

On 21 July 1713, he married Lady Anne Vaughan, a daughter of the 3rd Earl of Carbery. The marriage was not a happy one, and there were no children. In 1728, he began a long-standing affair with the English actress, Lavinia Fenton. Lady Anne died in 1751 and the Duke married Lavinia Fenton on 20 October 1751 at Aachen. She had already born him three illegitimate sons: Charles, Percy, and Horatio Armand Powlett.

The third Duke of Bolton died in 1754, aged 68, at Royal Tunbridge Wells and was buried at Basing.