It has been announced that the Duke of Westminster, Major-General Gerald Cavendish Grosvenor, died on Tuesday at the age of 64.
A question that many people have been asking is who will succeed the title of Duke of Westminster following His Grace’s untimely passing?
The answer is 25-year-old Hugh Grosvenor, The Duke’s third child and only son, who becomes the 7th Duke of Westminster.
Hugh Grosvenor may be familiar to some royal followers as he is the youngest godparent to Prince George, after being chosen for the role by The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. Similarly his mother, the Duchess of Westminster was godmother to Prince William after his Christening.
Hugh Grosvenor, who won’t hold the title of Duke until after the funeral, now inherits much of his father’s fortune and estate which is valued at £9.35 billion (c$13 billion) – which made him the third richest man in Britain until his death.
Some of the land the young Duke now inherits includes 100 acres of Mayfair and 200 acres of Belgravia.
Unusually for children of hereditary peers, Hugh attended a state primary school, as were his three sisters. When they got older, they moved to a small private school near their family home of Eaton Hall. This is thought to be because his parents were so protective of him and his sisters, they refused to send them to boarding school and wanted them to remain local.
This is a very short explainer as to who the new Duke of Westminster is, as not much is known about him at all. This is because the family have always maintained a very private life, and have stayed out of the public eye.
He has maintained such privacy in fact, not many pictures are in circulation of him. In the image above he is to the far right.
His biggest public appearance was at the Christening of Prince George, when it was announced he would become a godparent.
It is unknown whether he will make more public appearances in the future, or whether he will stick to the life he is used to.
One point of protocol: It is customary for the heir to a title to not adopt its use until after the funeral of his predecessor. To put it more simply, it is not correct to call Hugh Grosvenor “Duke of Westminster” until after the funeral of his father. Now it is perfectly understandable why journalists (or bloggers) would not follow this convention as it would be greatly confusing to their readers. However, since the readers of this site are generally interested in such matters of trivia, I thought I would point it out.
What will you do when all this protocol is swept away?
The same things that historians of the Roman Empire have done in the 1500 years since it ended.
This was pointed out in the article.
I wanna F**K his brains out and swallow his wealthy babies”!!
Dukes? Earls? Viscounts? Lords? It’s 2016, not 1735. Can we just get rid of this title rubbish and refer to people by their actual names?
Says someone calling himself Baron!!!
stupid idiot, throw you first title of Baron !!
Says someone who won’t give their true name. Typical lefty snot.
Do you not know that outside the Royal family no more hereditary peers are being created? Which means that in time they will more and more die out?
Be proud of your past, at least respect others even if you can’t respect yourself. Or, come over here with your long lost last cousins and we’ll let you PC all you want.
They were probably dazzled by the high breeding of the young Duke…..
“People asking who will succeed him”????? If ‘people’ don’t know it’s his eldest son then I guess they should seriously read more.
Although I think that Gerald, Duke of Westminster was basically a well meaning and nice man, it doesn’t sit well with the current economic climate and mood of the country that his wealth was quite so great. I hope his son Hugh will be at least as philanthropic as his late father, but fear it does not bode well that his 21st birthday party was said to have cost around £5 million.
Let’s hope Hugh is advised wisely and spends plenty of his money on good causes, medical research etc. – rather like Bill and Melinda Gates have done for many years.
Bill and Melinda Gate’s “philanthropy” has been little more than a thinly veiled endowment for New World Order shibboleths.
The Gates have done a huge amount of good in their philanthropic efforts.
I must say I really admire the late His Grace the Duke of Westminster, Gerald Cavendish Grosvenor for saying that his wealth did not belong to him and that he was not interested in material things…and I believe him, some ” old rich people ” are like that….And beeing a baron is nothing to be ashamed off is it ? Lorentz baron von Hadeln.
Who is next in line for the title should the 7th Duke die unexpectedly?
The Duke of Westminister had no lesser included title for Hugh?