Major General Sir Albert Henry Wilmot Williams, KCVO (7 February 1832 – 29 October 1919) was a British Army officer and courtier.

Early life and family

Albert Henry Wilmot Williams was born on 7 February 1832, the second son of Captain James Wilmot Williams (died 1845), of Herringston in Dorset, and his wife, Elizabeth Anne Magenis, daughter of Richard Magenis, of County Down, a member of Parliament, by his wife Lady Elizabeth Cole, daughter of William Cole, 1st Earl of Enniskillen.^[1][2] The family were long-established members of the English landed gentry and the elder Williams had inherited his father's estate in 1757.^[2] The younger Williams had four siblings: Edward Wilmot Williams, JP, DL (b. 1826), sometime an officer in the Bengal Cavalry and husband of a daughter of the 2nd Viscount Guillamore; Ashley George Wilmot Williams (b. 1834), who married, and lived at Cadlington, Blendworth, Horndean in Hampshire; Florence Elizabeth Wilmot Williams (d. 1887), who married Hon. St Leger Richard Glyn; and Gertrude Mary Wilmot Williams, who married Major General Sir Alexander Elliot.^[3]

Military career

In December 1849, Williams was promoted from Gentleman Cadet to second lieutenant in the Royal Artillery.^[4] Further promotions followed: lieutenant in 1851,^[5] second captain (1856),^[6] captain (1863),^[7] and major (1872).^[8] In 1875, he was made a lieutenant colonel and six years later a colonel. During his career, he saw active service in the Crimean War and in central Asia, and was mentioned in despatches during the Indian Mutiny.^[9][10] In 1883, he was appointed a Colonel on the Staff in command of the Royal Artillery at Aldershot, in the place of Colonel William Reilly;^[11] two years later, he was appointed an Extra Aide-de-camp to the Duke of Cambridge,^[12] and then three years after that he was made major general on the staff commanding troops at Woolwich.^[13] In 1892, Williams was made Deputy Adjutant General at the Artillery Headquarters;^[14] in 1894, he was placed on retired pay and made an Extra Equerry to the Duke of Cambridge.^[15][16] He remained in the Duke's service, eventually as an equerry, until the Duke's death in 1904, when Edward VII appointed him a Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order.^[17] The following year, he became Colonel Commandant of the Royal Horse Artillery.^[18]

Williams never married. He was a member of the United Service and Turf clubs and died on 29 October 1919.^[9]

Likenesses

• Portrait by Walter Stoneman; bromide print, 1917 (6 ¹/₈ in. x 4 ³/₄ in./155 mm x 120 mm). Housed in the Photographs Collection, National Portrait Gallery, London (ref. number NPG x186167).

References