Herbert family, Earls of Powis

Edward Herbert (1583-1648), of Chirbury (Shropshire) and Montgomery Castle (Montgomeryshire), was a great-grandson of Sir Richard Herbert of Montgomery, a Gentleman Usher to King Henry VIII, and a great-great-grandson of Sir Richard Herbert, brother of the 1st Earl of Pembroke (so created 1468) (see Herbert, Earls of Pembroke). Edward Herbert married in 1589 Mary, daughter and heir of Sir William Herbert of St. Julians (Monmouthshire), who brought estates in Monmouthshire, Caernarvonshire, Anglesey and Co. Kerry. He was created Baron Herbert of Chirbury in 1629.

Florentia, sister and co-heir of the 4th Baron (d. 1691), married her kinsman Richard Herbert, a younger son of Matthew Herbert of Dolegeiog (Monmouthshire) by Anne, daughter of Charles Foxe of Bromfield (Shropshire). Their son Francis Herbert (d. 1719) married Dorothy, daughter and co-heir of John Oldbury (d. 1702), a London merchant. Henry Arthur Herbert (c.1703-72), of Oakly Park (near Bromfield), son of Francis and Dorothy, succeeded in 1748 to the estates of his distant kinsman the Marquess of Powis. He ws later created Baron Herbert of Chirbury in 1743 and Earl of Powis in 1748.

The Herberts of Powis Castle, like the Herberts of Chirbury, owned estates in both Montgomeryshire and Shropshire. Sir Edward Herbert, second son of the 1st Earl of Pembroke of the 1551 creation, purchased Red Castle, later Powis Castle, near Welshpool (Montgomeryshire) in 1587. His son was created Baron Powis in 1629 and his great-grandson Earl (1674) and Marquess (1687) of Powis. The family also owned property in Shropshire (Oswestry etc., formerly a property of the Earl of Craven), Middlesex (Hendon, originally granted to the 1st Earl of Pembroke) and Northamptonshire (Heyford etc., inherited from the Parr family). The 1st Earl of Powis of the 1748 creation sold the Middlesex and Northamptonshire properties in the 1750s, and other outlying properties were disposed of in the 1820s, leaving the Powis estates concentrated in Montgomeryshire and Shropshire.

On the death of the 2nd Earl without issue in 1801 his estates were inherited by his nephew, the son of his sister Henrietta, who in 1784 had married the 2nd Baron Clive. The 1st Baron Clive, a descendant of the Clive family of Styche (Shropshire), had made extensive purchases in Shropshire and elsewhere, including Montford, near Shrewsbury, in 1761, Walcot, near Bishops Castle, in 1763, and Oakly, from the Earl of Powis, in 1771. The 2nd Baron Clive was created Earl of Powis in 1804, and the Clive estates were soon afterwards divided: the Montford, Walcot and other estates in Shropshire remained with the Earls of Powis, but the Oakly estate was passed to a younger son, Robert Henry Clive, who in 1819 married Harriet, Baroness Windsor, sister and co-heir of the 6th Earl of Plymouth.

Estates in 1883: 33,545 acres in Montgomeryshire; 19 acres in Radnorshire; 9 acres in Denbighshire; 26,986 acres in Shropshire; worth a total of £57,024 a year.