Gerald Cavendish Grosvenor
Major-General Gerald Cavendish Grosvenor, 6th Duke of Westminster, KG, CB, OBE, CD, TD, DL, KJStJ (born 22 December 1951), is the son of Robert George Grosvenor, 5th Duke of Westminster, and his wife Hon. Viola Maud Lyttelton. He is the owner of property company Grosvenor Group. According to the Sunday Times Rich List 2011, the Duke of Westminster is worth lb6.7 billion placing him fourth in the list behind Lakshmi Mittal, Alisher Usmanov and Roman Abramovich and making him the richest British person. He was educated at Harrow School and RMA Sandhurst. In 2005, he was elected Chancellor of the University of Chester.
Via Grosvenor Estates, the Duke is the richest property developer in the United Kingdom and one of the country's largest landowners, with vast estates in Lancashire, Cheshire and Scotland, as well as large areas of Mayfair and Belgravia in central London. The Duke also owns estates in Canada, France and Spain.
After leaving Harrow School with a single O-level, then Earl Grosvenor, he joined the Territorial Army in 1970 as a trooper.
In 1973 he entered Sandhurst and subsequently commanded the North Irish Horse, The Cheshire Yeomanry Squadron, founded by his ancestors, and The Queen's Own Yeomanry. He was also appointed the Honorary Colonel of several Regiments, including the 7th Regt. Army Air Corps, the Royal Mercian and Lancastrian Yeomanry, the Queen's Own Yeomanry, Northumbria Universities Officer Training Corps, Colonel in Chief of the Canadian Royal Westminster Regiment, the North Irish Horse and Colonel Commandant Yeomanry.
The Duke was Grand Prior of the Priory of England for the Military and Hospitaller Order of St. Lazarus of Jerusalem, 1995-2001.
In 2004 the Duke was appointed to the new post of Assistant Chief of the Defence Staff with responsibility for Reserves and Cadets, with promotion to the rank of Major-General.
In March 2007, having served in the Ministry of Defence as Assistant CDS for four years, he handed over responsibility for 50,000 Reservists and 138,000 Cadets to Major-General Simon Lalor. The Duke became Deputy Commander Army Reserves in May 2011.
He was appointed Companion of the Order of the Bath (CB) for his military service in the 2008 Birthday Honours. He is also an Honorary Vice President of the Royal United Services Institute.
As a child the Duke lived on an island in the middle of Lough Erne. His early education was in Northern Ireland before attending Sunningdale School and Harrow School.
The Duke of Westminster married Natalia Ayesha Phillips, the daughter of Lt Col. Harold Pedro Joseph Phillips and his wife Georgina Wernher, in 1978. His wife is a direct descendant of the Russian poet Alexander S. Pushkin and therefore of his African ancestor Ibrahim Hannibal as well as of King George II, making her distantly in line for the British throne. Their children are:
Gerald Cavendish Grosvenor is the 6th Duke of Westminster, a property owner, and the Chancellor of the University of Chester, with an estimated net worth of $11 billion dollars. Gerald Cavendish Grosvenor is the richest man in Britain and owns estates in Lancashire, Cheshire, and Scotland, as well as multiple properties in London, Spain, and Canada.
