Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington

Field Marshal Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, KG, KP, GCB, GCH, PC, FRS (c. 1 May 1769 – 14 September 1852), was an Anglo-Irish soldier and statesman. He was one of the leading military and political figures of the nineteenth century.

Born in Ireland to a prominent Ascendancy family, he was commissioned an ensign in the British Army in 1787. Serving in Ireland as aide-de-camp to two successive Lords Lieutenant of Ireland he was also elected as member of Parliament in the Irish House of Commons. A colonel by 1796, Wellesley saw action in the Netherlands and later India where he fought in the Fourth Anglo-Mysore War at the Battle of Seringapatam. He was later appointed Governor of Seringapatam and Mysore.

Wellesley soon rose to prominence as a General during the early Napoleonic Wars. In the Peninsular Campaign he led the Allied forces to victory against the French and after the Battle of Vitoria in 1813, promoted to the rank of field marshal. Serving as the ambassador to France following the exile of Napoleon in 1814, during which time he was granted a Dukedom, he returned to fight Napoleon's forces during the Hundred Days in 1815. This culminated at the Battle of Waterloo, which saw the defeat of the French Emperor and a decisive coalition victory.

An opponent of parliamentary reform, he was given the epithet the "Iron Duke" because of the iron shutters he had fixed to his windows to stop the pro-reform mob from breaking them. He was twice Prime Minister of the United Kingdom under the Tory party and oversaw the passage of Catholic Relief Act 1829 . He continued as Prime Minister until 1830 and again served briefly in 1834. Although unable to prevent the passage of the Reform Act of 1832 he continued as one of the leading figures in the House of Lords until his retirement. He remained Commander-in-Chief of the British Army until his death.

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