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I've had a look at "Burke's Peerage", and if Liddell was a relative of Lord Ravensworth, he wasn't a close enough one to be listed there. A more likely candidate would be Matthew Liddell (1809-1881), son of Cuthbert Liddell of Newcastle, who is mentioned in "Burke's Landed Gentry" (Eighteenth Edition, Volume 2, 1969, p 393). I've just discovered another reference to a mining engineer called Liddell in "The Development and Organization of Lord Dudley's Mineral Estates, 1774-1845" by T J Raybould (Economic History Review XXI (1968), pp 529-544). In 1836 he and another engineer called Smith were commissioned to report on Lord Dudley's pits in Staffordshire. according to a footnote to the article:- "Richard Smith... was the more important of the two, having established himself as a leading mining engineer after managing the General Mining Association's concerns in Nova scotia. He was appointed mineral agent to Lord Dudley in Dec 1836. Liddell was a Northumberland miner engaged... to work on the report with Smith" Keith Ramsey Benton Grange was the Newcastle upon Tyne seat of Matthew Liddell in the mid-19th century. [Ref.: Faulkner & Lowery (1996), "Lost Houses of Newcastle and Northumberland"] I do not know what relation (if any) he was to Sir Thomas Liddell, coal owner, of Ravensworth Castle, near Gateshead, who was created Lord Ravensworth in 1821. Mike Syer