of successful efforts at this juncture". He had also spoken with Lord Kenyon (his then house guest, who had led opposition to Catholic Emancipation) and had "no doubt" he would "convince his Royal Highness" (the Duke of Cumberland), as well as Fairman, "that the present moment is not the time when the object can be forwarded." Industrialist and landlord Mines and Collieries Act Londonderry led the opposition to the Mines and Collieries Act of 1842 in the House of Lords. He is reported to have raged furiously against any attempt to deny the collieries the use of child labour. Speaking on behalf of the Yorkshire Coal-Owners Association, Londonderry said "With respect to the age at which males should be admitted into mines, the members of this association have unanimously agreed to fix it at eight years... In the thin coal mines it is more especially requisite that boys, varying in age from eight to fourteen, should be employed; as the underground roads could not be made of sufficient height for taller persons without incurring an outlay so great as to render the working of such mines unprofitable". Irish famine By the time of the outbreak of the Great Irish Famine in 1845, Londonderry was one of the ten richest men in the United Kingdom. While many landlords made efforts to mitigate the worst effects of the famine on their tenants, Londonderry was criticised for meanness: he and his wife gave only £30 to the local relief committee but spent £15,000 renovating Mount Stewart, their Irish home, and on grounds of "personal inconvenience" rejected rent reductions (for which he was excoriated by James MacKnight in the Presbyterian weekly, the Banner of Ulster). During the tenant right campaign of the early 1850s, Londonderry insisted on his full rights and this alienated many of his tenants. He was in disagreement over this question with his eldest son and heir Frederick, who was more liberally inclined. Napoleon and Abd-el-Kader Back in England, Londonderry befriended Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte (later Napoleon III) while the latter was exiled in London between 1836 and 1840. After Bonaparte had been elected president of France in 1851, Londonderry asked him to free Abd-el-Kader. Late honours Governor of County Londonderry from 1823, Londonderry was appointed Lord Lieutenant of Durham in 1842 and the following year became Colonel of the 2nd Regiment of Life Guards. When Wellington, whom he admired greatly, died in