Revd Harry Grey, 8th Earl of Stamford (26 February 1812 – 19 June 1890) was an English peer.
Harry Grey was born in England, the son of Revd. Harry Grey (1783-1860) and Frances Elizabeth Ellis.[1] He took Holy Orders in the Anglican church.
He was married in Devon in 1844 to Susan Gaydon, but developed a serious drink and gambling problem and was sent to the Cape Colony as a remittance man, leaving his wife behind. There he worked as a farm labourer. After his wife died in Devon in 1869, he remarried in 1872 in Cape Colony Ann McNamara . His second wife, however, was suffering from tuberculosis so he engaged Martha Solomon, the daughter of a black slave, as a nursemaid. When his second wife died in 1874 he entered into a relationship with Martha which led to the birth of a son and a daughter. He married her in 1880 to legitimise the existing two children and than had a further daughter.
On the death of his third cousin George Grey, 7th Earl of Stamford in 1883 he inherited the titles of Earl of Stamford and Baron Grey of Groby and the estate at Dunham-Massey in Cheshire. In 1885 he gave up 250 acres of the land to develop the industrial estate of Broadheath in Altrincham. On his death in 1890 his wife and son travelled to England to claim his earldom and seat in the Lords. The House of Lords considered their claim to the titles but decided that, although under the law in Cape Colony the claim was valid, under English law (of primogeniture) it was not. The titles therefore passed to his first cousin William Grey, 9th Earl of Stamford who resided in the New World.