Sir Edward Bowater
(1787-1861)

Volume 1, page 114, sitting number 659.

General Sir Edward Bowater, only son of Admiral Edward Bowater of Hampton Court Palace, was born at St James’s Palace, London, on 13 July 1787. Educated at Harrow, he became an Ensign in 3rd Foot on 31 March 1804; from 12 October 1826 to 10 January 1837 he held the rank of Major. He served in the Peninsular War and was a veteran of Waterloo.

From 1831 to 1837 he was an equerry to King William IV, and from 1840 to 1846, an equerry to Prince Albert. On 3 March 1846 he was created a groom in waiting in ordinary to the Queen. He was Colonel of the 49th Foot from 24 April 1846 until his death.

Sir Edward Bowater 'of Richmond Park in the County of Surrey' died on 14 December 1861 at Cannes in the South of France, where he had been sent in charge of Prince Leopold. By a strange coincidence, this was the same day on which Prince Albert died at Windsor.

'The gallant officer, as Groom-in-Waiting to the Queen, was selected by her Majesty to take charge of his Royal Highness Prince Leopold during the Prince's sojourn in the south of France. He had been declining in health ever since his arrival at Cannes' (Dublin Evening Mail, 17 December 1861).

'His demise happened under peculiarly melancholy circumstances, for the Prince had scarcely been told of it when the tidings of the death of his Royal father reached him. Sir Edward, who was in his seventy-fourth year, was the only son of the late Admiral Edward Bowater, of Hampton Court. He entered the 3rd Foot Guards in 1804, and saw much active service with that gallant regiment during the Peninsular War. He served at the siege and taking of Copenhagen in 1807, and subsequently in the Peninsula [...] and shared in all the famous battles and sieges of that glorious period. He was also present at the battles of Quatre Bras and Waterloo. He was wounded both at Talavera and Waterloo. [...] Shortly after the lamented Prince Consort's arrival in this country in 1840, General Bowater was appointed Equerry to his Royal Highness; and in 1846 he was made a Groom in Waiting in Ordinary to her Majesty. He received the colonelcy of the 49th Regiment in April, 1846. [...] Sir Edward married, in 1839, Emilia Mary, daughter of Colonel Michael Barne, M.P., of Sotterley Park, Suffolk' (Illustrated London News, 4 January 1862). 

[From an album compiled by Gertrude Frances Vesey of Long Ditton, Surrey. Born in 1842, she was 18 years old when she began to compile the album. She lived at home with her parents for many years, until on 23 November 1876, at the age of 34, she became the second wife of the 58-year-old Reverend John William Hawtrey. Their marriage produced two children.]