Arthur Wellesley was born in Dublin on 1st May 1769. He entered the army in 1787. By 1796 he was a Colonel of the 33rd Foot Regiment (now the Duke of Wellington's Regiment) and spent the next nine years in India campaigning against a coalition of Princes who were friendly to Napoleon.

In 1806 he married Catherine (Kitty) Pakenham, daughter of Lord Longford, and was appointed Chief Secretary of Ireland. In 1808 he was promoted to Lieutenant-General and went in command of 14,000 troops to the Spanish Peninsula, fighting the French at the Battle of Vimeiro, north of Lisbon. He returned home briefly, but was back in Portugal in 1809, campaigning against the French there and in Spain until 1813, earning the title Earl of Wellington in 1811. He was created Duke of Wellington in 1814 after Napoleon's abdication.

Napoleon escaped from exile in Elba in February 1815 and the Duke of Wellington was asked to save the situation. He watched Napoleon's army march towards his headquarters in Brussels. The forces met at several battles leading up to the Battle of Waterloo on 18th June 1815, which defeated Napoleon.

In the 1820s the Duke of Wellington entered serious politics, with mixed results. He became Prime Minister in 1827, but resigned three years later over the subject of Parliamentary Reform. He continued to serve his country until the end of his life, dying at Walmer Castle, his residence as Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, on 14th September, 1852.