Robert Edward de Vere Capell, 10th Earl of Essex (13 January 1920 – 5 June 2005) was Earl of Essex from 1981, but was only recognized as such in 1989. He was then a member of the House of Lords until the slimming down of the house in 1999.
His father died when he was three, and he spent some time in an orphanage, where he was bewildered when the head told him he would be the Earl of Essex one day. Many years later, he received a newspaper clipping from a friend saying that the heir to the Earls of Essex might be an American, Bladen Horace Capell. This led Capell to correspond with distant and formerly unknown relations. Eventually, he was able to prove that his great-grandfather Algernon Capell had been the elder brother of Bladen Capell's great-great-grandfather, Adolphus Capell.[1]
When the 9th Earl died in 1981, Robert Capell was a grocer in Lancashire. It took him eight years to prove his right to take his seat in the House of Lords, which he did in 1989. However, this right came to an end with the reforms of the House of Lords Act 1999.[1]
Essex is not recorded in Hansard as having ever spoken in parliament.[2]
He died in 2005 and was succeeded as Earl of Essex by his son Paul Capell,[1] described by The Daily Telegraph as an "ever so humble" schoolteacher.[4]
