| Honorific Prefix: | The Right Honourable |
| The Earl of Roden | |
| Birth Date: | 5 June 1823 - 3 July 1897 |
| Birth Place: | Tollymore Park House, Bryansford, County Down, Ireland |
| Death Place: | London, England |
| Occupation: | Soldier, representative peer |
| Education: | Harrow School |
| Spouse: | Sophia Hobhouse |
| Children: | Lady Violet Jocelyn |
| Awards: | Legion of Honour Order of the Medjidie |
John Strange Jocelyn, 5th Earl of Roden (5 June 1823 – 3 July 1897), was an Anglo-Irish soldier and representative peer. He was the son of Robert Jocelyn, 3rd Earl of Roden, and inherited the title after the death of his nephew Robert Jocelyn, 4th Earl of Roden, in 1880.
Lord Roden was born at Tollymore Park House in Bryansford, County Down.
Jocelyn was educated at Harrow. A lieutenant colonel in the Scots Guards, Jocelyn served in the Crimean War, being present at the battles of Alma, Balaclava, and Inkerman. He later commanded the 2nd Jäger Corps, British German Legion. He received the French Legion of Honour and the Turkish Order of the Medjidie.[1] He held the office of Deputy Lieutenant of County Down.
He sat in the House of Lords as Baron Clanbrassil, a title his father had obtained in 1821, from 1880 until his death, although he made no contributions there.[2] At his death the title of Baron Clanbrassil became extinct, and the Roden earldom passed to his half-first cousin William Henry Jocelyn (1842-1910), a grandson of the 2nd Earl and his second wife.
The Jocelyns were large landowners, principally in County Down and County Louth.
Jocelyn married Sophia Hobhouse (1832-1916) in 1851; they had one daughter:
Lord Roden died in London in 1897 and is buried in Great St. Mary's church in Sawbridgeworth, Hertfordshire.
There is a pencil drawing of Jocelyn in the National Portrait Gallery by Frank Sargent.
Jocelyn was a friend of John Spencer-Churchill, a prominent Conservative politician and Winston Churchill's grandfather. Winston Churchill's brother John Strange Spencer-Churchill (known as "Jack") was born shortly after Jocelyn had inherited the Roden estate and was named in his honour. A 1969 biography of Jennie Churchill (Jennie: The Romantic Years 1854-1895 by Ralph Martin) claimed that John may have received his name because he was actually the result of an affair between Jocelyn and Jack's mother, but the evidence was strongly against the claim and one of Jack's sons sued the author successfully for libel.[6]