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Henry Thurstan Holland, 1st Viscount Knutsford (3 August 1825 - 29 January 1914) was a British politician, best known for serving as Secretary of State for the Colonies from 1887 to 1892.
The son of Sir Henry Holland, 1st Baronet, a prominent physician, Holland was educated at Harrow School, Durham University, and Trinity College, Cambridge, and took his degree in 1847. He studied law, and was called to the bar at the Inner Temple in 1849. He practiced law privately until 1867, when he became legal advisor to the Colonial Office. In 1870 he became assistant colonial undersecretary, serving until 1874, and in 1873, having succeeded his father as 2nd Baronet, he was elected to the House of Commons as a Conservative.
In Lord Salisbury's first administration (1885-1886), Holland served as Financial Secretary to the Treasury and then as Vice President of the Committee of Council on Education. He served in this role again at the beginning of Salisbury's second ministry (1886-1887), but was soon promoted to Colonial Secretary (in January 1887).
As Colonial Secretary, Knutsford (as he became when he was raised to the House of Lords as Baron Knutsford in 1888) was largely concerned with South African affairs, being the Colonial Secretary who granted the charter for Cecil Rhodes's British South Africa Company in 1887.
In 1895, Knutsford was not included in Salisbury's new government, and was instead raised to a viscount.
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