Marquess of Rockingham
marquessate in the Peerage of Great Britain

Marquess of Rockingham, in the County of Northampton, was a title in the Peerage of Great Britain. It was created in 1746 for Thomas Watson-Wentworth, 1st Earl of Malton. The Watson family descended from Lewis Watson, Member of Parliament for Lincoln. He was created a Baronet, of Rockingham Castle in the County of Northampton, in the Baronetage of England in 1621. In 1645 he was further honoured when he was raised to the Peerage of England as Baron Rockingham. The third Baron served as Lord-Lieutenant of Kent. In 1714 he was created Baron Throwley, Viscount Sondes and Earl of Rockingham in the Peerage of Great Britain. His eldest son Edward Watson, Viscount Sondes, predeceased him and he was succeeded by his grandson, the second Earl (the eldest son of Lord Sondes). The second Earl was Lord-Lieutenant of Kent before his early death in 1745. He was childless and was succeeded by his younger brother, Thomas.
The public source identifies “Marquess of Rockingham” as marquessate in the Peerage of Great Britain. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Marquess, Rockingham and marquessate.
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This entry incorporates text from “Marquess of Rockingham” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.