first governor-general of the Dominion of Canada (1866–68).

Monck was educated at Trinity College in Dublin and was called to the bar in 1841. On the death of his father he succeeded to the peerage of Ireland in 1849 and was elected to the House of Commons as a Liberal member from Portsmouth in 1852. He was a lord of the treasury (1855–58) and in 1861 was named governor-general of British North America, serving in that post throughout the American Civil War (1861–64) and winning distinction for the deftness of his efforts to avoid British or Canadian involvement in that war. Monck was also noted for the impact that his governorship had upon the move toward Canadian federation.

His term expired just as the Dominion of Canada was being created, and Queen Victoria elevated him to the peerage of the United Kingdom as Baron Monck of Ballytrammon and extended his term in Canada so that he might be the first governor-general of the new Dominion. In 1869 he was knighted (Grand Cross of the Order of St. Michael and St. George) and appointed to the privy council.