Each month No 10 invites a professional historian to contribute a short article to this series.
In June 1850 the House of Commons began what A. J. P. Taylor would later describe as ‘the greatest debate on the principles of foreign policy in our parliamentary records’. The challenges facing Britain in the middle of the nineteenth …
William Pitt the Elder, first Earl of Chatham, was an important war leader who found it harder to govern in peace time. Born in November 1708, Pitt’s grandfather and father were both MPs and his grandfather, Thomas, had been governor …
Charles Watson-Wentworth, second Marquess of Rockingham, emerged as one of the leading opposition figures during George III’s reign but also managed to head two short administrations himself. He was born in May 1730 at the family seat of Wentworth Woodhouse …
George Grenville came from a political family and ultimately emerged as an important political figure in his own right. He was born in October 1712 at Wotton, Buckinghamshire. His father, Richard, sat as an MP for Wendover and Buckingham but …
John Stuart, third Earl of Bute, was a Scottish aristocrat who rose, through his royal connections to a position of political pre-eminence. Bute was born in Edinburgh on 25 May 1713. Bute’s grandfather had been an MP for Buteshire in …
100 years ago today saw the first German airship raids on Britain when two Zeppelins attacked the coastal towns of Great Yarmouth and King's Lynn, Norfolk. In this post, Professor Edgar Jones discusses the effects of air raids over the …
William Cavendish, fourth Duke of Devonshire, served as a stop-gap First Lord of the Treasury during a period of intense political crisis. He was born in 1720, the eldest son of William Cavendish, third Duke of Devonshire, and his wife …
It has often been a matter of great regret to me that, in all the years that I have been married and from circumstances have been living so much among the leading men of the day, it had never occurred …
Thomas Pelham-Holles, Duke of Newcastle, was one of the eighteenth century’s great political survivors and served as First Lord of the Treasury through peace and war. Born in Sussex in July 1693, he was the eldest son of Thomas Pelham, …
Henry Pelham’s tenure as First Lord of the Treasury continued the direction and style of politics inaugurated by his mentor, Robert Walpole. Pelham was the second surviving son of Thomas Pelham, first Baron Pelham of Laughton, and his second wife …