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 won him further promotion, and he made the remaining campaigns as a major-general at the head of the Hussar brigade. At Orthes he won further distinction by his pursuit of the enemy; he was made KCB, and received the thanks of parliament. At Waterloo he was in command of the Household Cavalry Brigade, 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. The brigadier was particularly mentioned in Wellington's despatches, and received the thanks of parliament as well as the Army Gold Cross with one clasp for his services at Talavera, Salamanca, Vitoria, Orthez, and Toulouse. He also received the Military Order of Maria Theresa and was made an honorary Knight Commander of the Royal Portuguese Military Order of the Tower and Sword. 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 10December 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
On 17 October 1805 he married Lady Louisa Augusta Courtenay, a younger daughter of William Courtenay, 8th Earl of Devon, with whom he had several children, three sons and five daughters:
Robert Henry Somerset
Louisa Isabella Somerset who died unmarried.
Frances Caroline Somerset, later Mrs Theophilus Clive who married 1840 Theophilus Clive, and had issue 1 son who left descendants.
Matilda Elizabeth Somerset, later Mrs Horace Marryat who married 1842 Horace Marryat, and had issue two sons: Adrian Somerset Marryat and Frederick Marryat, and one daughter Ida Horatia Charlotte Marryat who married 19 September 1863 Count Gustavus Frederick Bonde, a Swedish nobleman, with issue. The three Marryat children were painted in 1851–2 in Rome by the young Frederick Leighton. Horace Marryat was a much younger brother of the naval officer and writer Frederick Marryat
