Major-General Sir Robert Garrett
(1794-1869)
29 May 1862

Volume 7, page 33, sitting number 8378.

Born at Ramsgate in Kent in 1794, Robert Garrett was the son of John Garrett of Elllington House, Isle of Thanet, and his wife Elizabeth née Gore. 

Following his education at Harrow, he joined the Army as an Ensign in the 2nd (The Queen’s Royal) Regiment of Foot in 1811. He served in the Peninsular War, was present at the Battle of Fuentes de Ono in 1811 and was twice wounded in the attack on the forts of Salamanca. 

In 1814 he married Charlotte Georgina Sophia Cavendish-Bentinck, daughter of Lord Edward Bentinck and granddaughter of the 2nd Duke of Portland. After her death in 1819 he married widow Louisa Davaynes, by whom he had a son and a daughter. 

In 1846 he was appointed Commanding Officer of the 46th Regiment of Foot and in 1854 he was despatched to the Crimean War where he commanded a Brigade of the 4th Division at the Siege of Sebastopol.

In 1858 he was appointed major-general on the staff of the Bengal Presidency and commanded a division in India until he returned home in 1862. In July 1865 he took command of the south-eastern district with headquarters at Shorncliffe. He attained the rank of lieutenant-general on 10 March 1866. 

He was made Knight of the Hanoverian Guelphic Order in 1836; in 1857 he was made a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath in recognition of his services with the Eastern Army. In retirement he lived on Pall Mall in London. 

Lieutenant-General Sir Robert Garrett, K.C.B. and K.H., died on 13 June 1869 at 40 Pall Mall. ‘A tough, hard-going veteran of the old school, Garrett died rather suddenly on 13 June 1869, aged 75’ (Dictionary of National Biography).