George Anson

Anson was the second son of Thomas Anson, 1st Viscount Anson, and his wife Lady Anne Margaret Coke, daughter of Thomas Coke, 1st Earl of Leicester of Holkham Hall, Norfolk. Thomas Anson, 1st Earl of Lichfield was his elder brother.

He was educated at Eton College.

Anson married The Hon. Isabella Elizabeth Annabella Weld-Forester, daughter of Cecil Weld-Forester, 1st Baron Forester, and wife Lady Katherine Mary Manners, in 1830. They had three daughters: the first was Isabella Maria Katherine Curzon-Howe, Countess Curzon, the second was Alice Louisa, The Hon. Mrs. Wentworth-Fitzwilliam and the third Geraldine Georgiana Mary Hervey, Marchioness of Bristol, Isabella survived her husband by only a year and died in December 1858.

Anson was a prominent owner of racehorses: he won The Derby with Attila in 1842 and The Oaks two years later with The Princess.

Anson entered the Army in 1814 as an ensign in the 3rd (Scots Fusiliers) Guards and served at an early age in the Napoleonic Wars and fought at the Battle of Waterloo.

He later sat as a Member of Parliament (MP) for Great Yarmouth from 1818 to 1835, for Stoke-upon-Trent from 1836 to 1837, and for Staffordshire South from 1837 to 1853 and served as Storekeeper of the Ordnance under Lord Melbourne from 1835 to 1841 and as Clerk of the Ordnance under Melbourne in 1841 and under Lord John Russell from 1846 to 1852.