The Russell dukes of Bedford once held 86,335 acres, not counting London
In 1883 the 9th Duke of Bedford's country estates covered 86,335 acres across England, from 32,269 in Bedfordshire to a single acre in Lincolnshire, bringing in £141,793 a year. That figure left out the family's lucrative Bedford Estate in central London, which the Russells still own today.
The title has been created six times for five different people. The first went in 1414 to John of Lancaster, third son of Henry IV and later regent of France, who surrendered and regained it before dying in 1435. George Neville, nephew of Warwick the Kingmaker, lost it by act of Parliament in 1478; Edward IV's infant son George held it until his death at two; and Jasper Tudor, uncle of Henry VII, took it in 1485 but left no legitimate heirs.
The current line began with John Russell, an adviser to Henry VIII and Edward VI, made Earl of Bedford in 1551. His descendant William, the 5th Earl, became duke in 1694 after the Glorious Revolution. The family can be traced with certainty only to Sir Stephen Russell; his son Henry was a Weymouth wine merchant also known as Gascoigne, probably because of his trade with France. A cherished claim of descent from the Russells of Kingston Russell was later judged unproven.
Woburn Abbey in Bedfordshire is the family seat, and the heir carries the courtesy title Marquess of Tavistock. In London the dukes moved through a string of grand houses: the Bloomsbury Square mansion was demolished in 1800 on the 5th Duke's orders, the 6th Duke enlarged a Kensington villa until it was rated higher than Holland House, and later dukes leased homes in Belgrave and Eaton Squares.
Wartime taxes ended that. When the 11th Duke died in 1940, well over £2 million in death duties followed on his settled lands alone, and his son told the Daily Mirror in 1941 that his income had shrunk to a quarter of his father's. After the 1940s the family kept no permanent London house.
Source: Duke of Bedford
