Sir Alexander Cray Grant 8th Bart.

Born 30 November 1782 at Bowring's Leigh, Devon. Eldest son of Sir Alexander Grant, 7th bt. (d. 1825), and his wife, Sarah, the daughter and heir of Jeremiah Cray of Ibsley, Hampshire. Became 8th bt. on death of his father, 26 July 1825. Heir to Jamaican plantations with 1,200 enslaved & a partner in a London West India agency. Member of the Jamaican colonial assembly, 1810-1811. Subsequently (1812-43) MP. On return to England, 1812, recommended by Andrew Cochrane Johnstone to  William Beckford, as a person to take charge of Beckford's Jamaican estates. Continued as active and prominent planter in Jamaica though he never returned there after 1812. As an MP an active spokesman for planter interests; slavery had been 'forced' on them by Britain; blamed emancipation and increased sugar duty for decline of income from his estates. Prominent Tory. Member of the Carlton Club and 'a close associate' of Peel. (Oxford DNB). Member of the Board of Control (of the East India Company) 1834; 1843-1854 a commissioner for public accounts, with a salary of £1,200. Never married.

Member of the West India Committee and the 'Committee of April 25, 1823' formed to press the government for ameliorationist measures for the Crown colonies and to resist moves towards emancipation.

Entry by John C. Appleby, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography; R. G. Thorne (ed.), The House of Commons, 1790-1820 (5 vols., London, Secker & Warburg for the History of Parliament Trust, 1986), vol. 4.

Alexandra Franklin, Enterprise and advantage: The West India interest in Britain, 1774-1840 (University of Pennsylvania, Unpub. PhD, 1992), p. 214 citing West India Committee Minute Books, 25 April 1823.