Somerset was the third son of
Henry Somerset, 5th Duke of Beaufort, and elder brother of
Lord Raglan. Joining the
15th Light Dragoons in 1793, he became captain in the following year, and received a majority after serving as
aide-de-camp to
Prince Frederick, Duke of York in the
Dutch expedition of 1799. At the end of 1800 he became a lieutenant-colonel, and in 1801 received the command of the
4th Dragoons. From 1799 to 1802 he represented the
Borough of Monmouth in the
House of Commons, from 1803 to 1823 and from 1830 sat for
Gloucestershire and from 1834 to 1837 was MP for
Cirencester. He commanded his regiment at the battles of
Talavera and
Buçaco, and in 1810 received a colonelcy and the appointment of
aide-de-camp to the king. In 1811, along with the 3rd Dragoon Guards, the 4th Dragoons fought a notable cavalry action at Usagre, and in 1812 Lord Edward Somerset was engaged in the great charge of
Le Marchant's heavy cavalry at
Salamanca. His conduct on this occasion (he captured five guns at the head of a single squadron) won him further promotion, and he made the remaining campaigns as a major-general at the head of the Hussar brigade (7th, 10th and 15th Hussars). which distinguished itself not less by its stern and patient endurance of the enemy's fire than by its celebrated charge on the
cuirassiers of
Milhaud's corps. At
Waterloo in 1815 he lost his hat during the first cavalry charge and in the subsequent search for it a cannonball tore off the flap of his coat and killed his horse. He was awarded a
GCB in 1834. After a short illness he died in London on 1 September 1842 and was interred in the church of
St. George's, Hanover Square. A memorial tablet to Lord Robert Edward is on the south wall of the nave at
St. Michael and All Angels, Great Badminton, which is attached to the family seat,
Badminton House. The '
Somerset Monument' stands high on the
Cotswold Edge at
Hawkesbury, Gloucestershire (), near the family's ancestral home of
Badminton, Gloucestershire. It was erected in 1846 and has an inscription in memory of General Lord Robert Somerset. ==Family==