He served as Liberal Member of Parliament for Orkney and Shetland from 1885 to 1900, and was commissioned a deputy lieutenant for Forfarshire in December 1901.

[1] He was created a baronet in 1894[2] and raised to the peerage as Baron Lyell of Kinnordy in the County of Forfar, on 8 July 1914.

His only son Charles Henry Lyell was also a Liberal MP but as he died in 1918 his son Charles Anthony Lyell succeeded to both the baronetcy and barony.

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