Henry Dillon, 11th Viscount Dillon

Who was Henry Dillon, 11th Viscount Dillon?

Henry Dillon, 11th Viscount Dillon of Costello-Gallen was an Irish peer.

Henry's father was the Hon. Arthur Dillon, a son of the 7th Viscount, who was Colonel and founder of the Dillon Regiment in 1688. In 1711, Arthur was created Count Dillon in France, and Earl of Dillon in 1721, by the "Old Pretender" James Francis Edward Stuart. Henry's mother was Catherine, or perhaps Christina, a daughter of Ralph Sheldon, who served as a maid of honor to Queen Mary of Modena, consort to James II.

On 26 October 1744 Henry married Lady Charlotte Lee, the great-granddaughter of Charles II and Barbara Villiers. From 1767 Henry adopted Anglicanism to regularise his position in England. As the eldest surviving child of the second Earl of Lichfield, Charlotte Lee inherited the estate of her uncle, the fourth Earl, when he died childless in 1776. Therefore, Lord Dillon's wife was collateral heiress of Sir Henry Lee, who built the original Lodge in Wychwood Forest in Oxfordshire. From his mother, Charles Dillon-Lee, their son, inherited the estate of Ditchley but not the title of Lichfield. Ditchley remained the home of the Viscounts Dillon until 1934.