Baron Rookwood

Baron Rookwood, of Rookwood Hall and Down Hall, both in the County of Essex, was a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom.[1]

It was created on 15 June 1892 for the Conservative politician Sir Henry Selwin-Ibbetson, 7th Baronet. He was Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department from 1874 to 1878 and Financial Secretary to the Treasury from 1878 to 1880. The Ibbetson family were descended from Samuel Ibbetson, a Leeds cloth merchant who founded the family trading firm that would generate great wealth in the centuries to come.[2]

His descendant Henry Ibbetson raised a force of 100 men at his own expense during the Jacobite rising of 1745, served as High Sheriff of Yorkshire in 1746 and was created a Baronet of Leeds in the County of York in the Baronetage of Great Britain in 1748.[3] He was succeeded by his son, the second Baronet, who married Jane, daughter of John Caygill and his wife Jane Selwin. On his death the title passed in turn to his son, the third Baronet, who was High Sheriff of Yorkshire in 1803, died childless and was succeeded by his younger brother, the fourth Baronet.

In 1817 the fourth baronet assumed by sign manual the surname of Selwin in lieu of Ibbetson. However, after succeeding in the baronetcy in 1825 he regained by sign manual the surname of Ibbetson in addition to that of Selwin. When he died the title passed to his son, the fifth Baronet, who was childless and thus succeeded by his uncle, the sixth Baronet. In 1825 the sixth baronet reassumed by sign manual the surname of Selwin in lieu of Ibbetson. On his death the title passed to his only son, the seventh Baronet, who in 1868 assumed by Royal licence the additional surname of Ibbetson and was elevated to the peerage as Baron Rookwood in 1892. Lord Rookwood died childless on 15 January 1902, when both the baronetcy and barony became extinct.