John Mount Batten

Who was John Mount Batten?

Colonel John Mount Batten CB JP was a British soldier and landowner.

He was the eldest son of John Batten JP FSA, of Aldon in Somerset, by his wife Grace Eleanor, daughter of John White of Upcerne, and was educated at Winchester. He married firstly, in 1873, Margaret Annie, eldest daughter of the Rev. John Brooks; she died in 1893. He married secondly, in 1895, Mary Edith, eldest daughter of James Sant RA and widow of H.F. Nalder; they had one son and four daughters.

Batten served in the British Army with The King's, and was a member of the Army and Navy Club. He was High Sheriff of Dorset in 1903, a Justice of the Peace for Somerset and Dorset, an Alderman of Dorset County Council, and from 1905 also served as Lord Lieutenant for Dorset and Poole. He was also patron of two livings. In 1908 he was made a Companion of the Order of the Bath.

Colonel Batten lived at Upcerne, Cerne Abbas, Dorset and at Mornington Lodge, West Kensington, London W.

Despite the similarity of name, he was unrelated to the Princes of Battenberg, a morganaut branch of the House of Hesse who changed their name to Mountbatten in 1917. There is also a place in Devon called Mount Batten, near Plymouth.