The 17th Earl of Shrewsbury left his estates to the Duke of Norfolk's baby son; a distant cousin won the earldom and Alton Towers

Bertram Talbot, 17th Earl of Shrewsbury, was a Catholic. He died unmarried on 10 August 1856, aged 23. He believed the earldom died with him. His will left the estates, including Alton Towers in Staffordshire, to Edmund Bernard Howard, the infant second son of the Duke of Norfolk, on condition that he take the name Talbot. Three distant relatives contested the succession. The strongest was Henry Chetwynd-Talbot, 3rd Earl Talbot, a rear-admiral. The earldom of Shrewsbury was one of the few whose estates were bound to the title. If Talbot proved his claim, the will failed. The contents were not covered by the dispute and were sold in 1857 in a 29-day auction of 4,000 lots^†. The House of Lords accepted Talbot's claim, and on 10 June 1858 he took his seat as Earl of Shrewsbury "after the Death of his Cousin". The estate litigation continued. On 13 April 1860 the new earl held a procession that ended with up to 40,000 people at Alton Towers^†. Edmund Howard kept only scattered lands outside the entail. In 1907 Gerald Brenan's history of the Howards recorded that three quarters of the main drive to Alton Towers belonged to him and that he refused the earl access. He later became the last Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and died in 1947. The Talbots sold Alton Towers in 1924. In 2026 it is a theme park operated by Merlin Entertainments, and the 22nd Earl of Shrewsbury lives in Staffordshire^†.