by his son Roger, the fifth earl, who dying without issue, his brother
Francis was nominated his heir, and made the sixth earl. He married
two wives, by the first of whom he had only one child, named
Catherine, who married George Villiers, the first Duke of Buckingham.
Her issue, George, the second Duke of Buckingham, dying without an
heir, the title of Lord Ros of Hamlake again reverted to the Rutland
family. By a second marriage he had two sons, who, according to the
monument, were murdered by wicked practice and sorcery.[3] George
was created seventh earl in 1632; and was honoured with a visit from
Charles I. at Belvoir castle, in 1634. The eighth earl was John
Manners, who attaching himself to the Parliamentarians, the castle was
attacked by the royal army, and lost and won again and again by each
party, till the earl being "put to great streights for the maintenance
of his family," petitioned the house of peers for relief, and Lord
Viscount Campden having been the principal instrument in the ruin of
the "castle, lands, and woods about Belvoyre," parliament agreed that
1,500l a year be paid out of Lord Campden's estate, until 5,000l
be levied, to the earl of Rutland. In the civil wars the castle was
defended for the king by the rector of Ashwell, co. Rutland. In 1649,
the parliament ordered it to be demolished; satisfaction was, however,
made to the earl, whose son rebuilt the castle after the Restoration.
John, the ninth earl, succeeded his father in 1679. He preferred the
baronial retirement and rural quiet of Belvoir, to the busy court;
though he was created Marquess of Granby, in the county of Nottingham,
and Duke of Rutland. He died in 1710-11, and was succeeded by his son
John;[4] whose eldest son became the third Duke of Rutland, and was
the last of the family who resided at Haddon, Derbyshire. He died in
1779, and was succeeded by his grandson, Charles, Lord Ros, fourth
duke, who died lord lieutenant of Ireland in 1787, when his son John
Henry, the present and fifth duke succeeded to the titles and estates.