Phipps was Lieutenant Governor of
Nova Scotia from
January 1858 until his resignation in September 1863 when, due to the death of his father, he inherited the title of Earl of Mulgrave. Prior to this, he had also held the title of Viscount Normanby from
1831 to 1838. In the minutes of
this despatch,
Blackwood mentions Phipps' belief that
Shrapnel was unlikely to find employment in the British colonies.
Phipps, the only son of Constantine Henry Phipps and nephew of
Sir Charles Beaumont Phipps, was born
23 July 1819. He served in the Scots Fusilier Guards from
1838 to 1843 and the North Riding Yorkshire militia from
1846 to 1853, and enjoyed a political career as Whig MP for Scarborough from
1847 to 1851 and again from
1852 to 1857. He was also a Liberal whip in the House of Commons. In his position as Lieutenant Governor of
Nova Scotia, Phipps was entangled in the political struggle between Conservative and Liberal
parties, particularly after the
May 1859 election when the Conservative ministry refused to resign. After his resignation in
1863, Phipps spent seven years as Lord-in-Waiting to
Queen Victoria, then was appointed Governor of Queensland, Australia, in
1871 and Governor of New Zealand in
1874. He died on
3 April 1890, in Brighton and was buried at St Oswald's Church in Yorkshire.