Charles Vane, 3rd Marquess of Londonderry, Irish soldier and diplomat, British Ambassador to Austria (d. 1854)
Charles William Vane, 3rd Marquess of Londonderry, (born Charles William Stewart; 1778–1854), was an Anglo-Irish nobleman, British soldier and politician. He served in the French Revolutionary Wars, in the suppression of the Irish Rebellion of 1798, and in the Napoleonic wars. He excelled as a cavalry commander in the Peninsular War under John Moore and Arthur Wellesley (the later Duke of Wellington).
On leaving Wellington's command, his half-brother Lord Castlereagh helped him to launch a diplomatic career. He was posted to Berlin in 1813, and then as Ambassador to Austria, where his half-brother was the British plenipotentiary at the Congress of Vienna.
He married Lady Catherine Bligh in 1804 and then, in 1819, Lady Frances Anne Vane, a rich heiress, changing his surname to hers, thus being called Charles Vane instead of Charles Stewart from there on. In 1822 he succeeded his half-brother as 3rd Marquess of Londonderry, inheriting estates in the north of Ireland where, as an unyielding landlord, his reputation suffered in the Great Famine. It was a reputation he matched as a coal operator on his wife's land in County Durham. In opposition to the Mines and Collieries Act of 1842, he insisted on his right to employ child labour.

1778May, 18
Charles Vane, 3rd Marquess of Londonderry
Choose Another Date
Events on 1778
- 5Feb
Articles of Confederation
South Carolina becomes the second state to ratify the Articles of Confederation. - 18Jun
Philadelphia
American Revolutionary War: British troops abandon Philadelphia. - 28Jun
Battle of Monmouth Courthouse
The American Continentals engage the British in the Battle of Monmouth Courthouse resulting in standstill and British withdrawal under cover of darkness. - 10Jul
Louis XVI of France
American Revolution: Louis XVI of France declares war on the Kingdom of Great Britain. - 26Nov
James Cook
In the Hawaiian Islands, Captain James Cook becomes the first European to visit Maui.