Sir Curtis Miranda Lampson, 1st Baronet (21 September 1806 – 12 March 1885) was an

Anglo Anglo is a prefix indicating a relation to, or descent from England, English culture, the English people or the English language, such as in the term ''Anglosphere''. It is often used alone, somewhat loosely, to refer to people of British d ...

-American

fur A fur is a soft, thick growth of hair that covers the skin of almost all mammals. It consists of a combination of oily guard hair on top and thick underfur beneath. The guard hair keeps moisture from reaching the skin; the underfur acts as an ...

merchant A merchant is a person who trades in goods produced by other people, especially one who trades with foreign countries. Merchants have been known for as long as humans have engaged in trade and commerce. Merchants and merchant networks operated i ...

, best remembered for his promotion of the

transatlantic telegraph cable Transatlantic telegraph cables were undersea cables running under the Atlantic Ocean for telegraph communications. Telegraphy is a largely obsolete form of communication, and the cables have long since been decommissioned, but telephone and dat ...

Life

Born

New Haven, Vermont New Haven is a New England town, town in Addison County, Vermont, United States. The population was 1,683 at the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census. In addition to the New Haven (CDP), Vermont, town center, New Haven contains the communities o ...

, to American Revolutionary soldier, William Lampson (1761–1827) and Rachel Powell (1766–1813), he started work as a

clerk A clerk is a white-collar worker who conducts record keeping as well as general office tasks, or a worker who performs similar sales-related tasks in a retail environment. The responsibilities of clerical workers commonly include Records managem ...

before moving to New York and then, in 1830, to London as

John Jacob Astor John Jacob Astor (born Johann Jakob Astor; July 17, 1763 – March 29, 1848) was a German-born American businessman, merchant, real estate mogul, and investor. Astor made his fortune mainly in a fur trade monopoly, by exporting History of opiu ...

's agent. He established the business of C. M. Lampson & Co. and became a

naturalised Naturalization (or naturalisation) is the legal act or process by which a non-national of a country acquires the nationality of that country after birth. The definition of naturalization by the International Organization for Migration of the ...

British citizen The primary law governing nationality in the United Kingdom is the British Nationality Act 1981, which came into force on 1 January 1983. Regulations apply to the British Islands, which include the UK itself (England, Wales, Scotland, and Nor ...

on 14 May 1849. He was elected to the board of directors of the

Atlantic Telegraph Company The Atlantic Telegraph Company was a company formed on 6 November 1856 to undertake and exploit a commercial telegraph cable across the Atlantic Ocean, the first such telecommunications link. History Cyrus Field, American businessman and finan ...

on its formation in 1856 and served it over the next decade. His endeavours, along with those of the other principals, were recognised on 16 November 1866 when Lampson was created a

baronet A baronet ( or ; abbreviated Bart or Bt) or the female equivalent, a baronetess (, , or ; abbreviation Btss), is the holder of a baronetcy, a hereditary title awarded by the British Crown. The title of baronet is mentioned as early as the 14th ...

. He is said to have been the first former US citizen to have been so honoured. His other appointments included as deputy governor of the

Hudson's Bay Company The Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), originally the Governor and Company of Adventurers of England Trading Into Hudson’s Bay, is a Canadian holding company of department stores, and the oldest corporation in North America. It was the owner of the ...

and as one of the trustees of the Peabody Donation Fund. He died at his London house, 80 Eaton Square,

Westminster Westminster is the main settlement of the City of Westminster in Central London, Central London, England. It extends from the River Thames to Oxford Street and has many famous landmarks, including the Palace of Westminster, Buckingham Palace, ...

, on 12 March 1885 and was buried at Worth in the parish church of his country home at Rowfant.

Family

He was married in 1827 to Jane Walter Sibley, of

Sutton, Massachusetts Sutton, officially the Town of Sutton, is a town in Worcester County, Massachusetts, Worcester County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 9,357 in the 2020 United States census. Located in the Blackstone Valley, the town was design ...

,''Vermont History''
Vermont Historical Society, Vol. XXVIII No. 1, January 1960. Retrieved 15 July 2021. a relative of Judge

Solomon Sibley Solomon Sibley (October 7, 1769 – April 4, 1846) was an American politician and jurist in the Michigan Territory who became the first mayor of Detroit. Early life: 1769–1815 Sibley was born in Sutton, Massachusetts, the son of Ruth and Reube ...

and a distant relation of the Confederate general

Henry Hopkins Sibley Henry Hopkins Sibley (May 25, 1816 – August 23, 1886) was a career officer in the United States Army, who commanded a Confederate cavalry brigade in the Civil War. In 1862, he attempted to forge a supply route from California, in defiance ...

. He was succeeded in the baronetcy by his eldest son George. His second son Henry pre-deceased him. His youngest son Norman George was the father of the prominent diplomat Miles Wedderburn Lampson, who was elevated to the peerage as

Baron Killearn Baron Killearn, of Killearn in the County of Stirling, is a title in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. It was created in 1943 for the diplomat Sir Miles Lampson. He was the second son of Norman Lampson, the youngest son of Sir Curtis Lampson, 1 ...

in 1943. His only daughter, Hannah Jane, was married to the poet

Frederick Locker Frederick Locker-Lampson (May 29, 1821 – May 30, 1895) was an English man of letters, bibliophile and poet. Overview He was born at Greenwich Hospital. His father, who was Civil Commissioner of the Hospital, was Edward Hawke Locker, young ...

. Their children included the British Conservative MPs,

Godfrey Locker-Lampson Godfrey Lampson Tennyson Locker-Lampson (19 June 1875 – 1 May 1946) was a British Conservative politician, poet and essayist. Birth and education The elder son of the poet Frederick Locker and his second wife Hannah Jane Lampson, daughter of ...

and

Oliver Locker-Lampson Lieutenant Commander Oliver Stillingfleet Locker-Lampson, (25 September 1880 – 8 October 1954) was a British politician and naval reserve officer. He was Member of Parliament (MP) for Ramsey, Huntingdonshire and Birmingham Handsworth from ...

. His son-in-law Frederick Locker-Lampson included this pen portrait of Sir Curtis in his posthumously published memoirs, ''My Confidences'' (1896): "I am told that as a youth he was wise beyond his years and intelligent in advance of his experience ... He has foresight, judgment, a clear apprehension of men and affairs, a strong will and a sweet temper, and his success in life may be attributed to his own and sole exertions - ''Sapientia duce, fortuna permittente''." His grandson, Godfrey Locker-Lampson, wrote of him:

Notes

References

*''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...

'', March 13, 1885, 10a *''

Illustrated London News ''The Illustrated London News'', founded by Herbert Ingram and first published on Saturday 14 May 1842, was the world's first illustrated weekly news magazine. The magazine was published weekly for most of its existence, switched to a less freq ...

'', March 21, 1885, 300 *Wilson, J.G. & Fiske, J. (eds) (1887) ''Appletons' Cyclopaedia of American Biography'', 3, 602 * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Lampson, Curtis Miranda, 1st Baronet 1806 births 1885 deaths American emigrants to the United Kingdom Baronets in the Baronetage of the United Kingdom Naturalised citizens of the United Kingdom People from New Haven, Vermont 19th-century English businesspeople