George Berkeley MP (abt. 1693 - 1746)

Born about 1693 in England

Ancestors

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Biography

George Berkeley MP is Notable.

The Honourable George Berkeley (1693? - 29 October 1746) was a member of Parliament for Dover in 1720 and in the following two parliaments, and for Hedon, Yorkshire in 1734

He was the fourth and youngest son of Charles Berkeley, 2nd Earl of Berkeley and Elizabeth Noel.[2] (Elizabeth was the daughter of Baptist Noel, Viscount Campden, and the sister of Edward, first earl of Gainsborough.) He attended Westminster School from its foundation in 1708 and Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1711, graduating MA there in 1713.

He married Henrietta Howard, Countess of Suffolk on 26 June 1735, as her second husband and nine months after she ceased to be George II's mistress and - though they had no surviving children - the marriage was far happier than her first. He had probably met her through his sister Lady Elizabeth Germain, a friend of Henrietta, but the reasons for Henrrietta's choice of second husband were far from clear to court commentators. One of them, Lord Hervey, described him as:

George Berkeley (1693 – 29 October 1746) was a British politician who sat in the House of Commons for 26 years from 1720 to 1746. The fourth son of Charles Berkeley ^[1]and his wife, Elizabeth Noel. He attended Westminster School from its foundation in 1708 and Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1711, graduating MA there in 1713. ^[1]

Berkeley was returned as Member of Parliament for Dover at a by-election on 20 December 1720. He was returned unopposed at the general election of 1722. On 28 May 1723 he received an appointment as master keeper and governor of St Katharine's Hospital in London, and filled that post until his death. He was elected in a contest at Dover in 1727. At the 1734 general election he was returned unopposed as MP for Hedon, Yorkshire. On 26 June 1735 he married Henrietta Howard, Dowager Countess of Suffolk, daughter of Henry Hobart and his wife, Elizabeth Maynard, widow of Charles Howard Earl of Suffolk, and lately mistress of King George II. They had no children. Note that History of Parliament dates the marriage to 1 July 1735.^[1] At the 1741 general election, he was initially defeated, but was seated on petition on 4 March 1742. Pro Walpole at first, Berkeley was alienated from him by his brother Lord Berkeley's dismissal from the post of First Lord of the Admiralty on the accession of George II, and switched loyalties to Pulteney. ^[1]

George died 29 October 1746. ^[2][1]

Sources

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4} History of Parliament online: BERKELEY, Hon. George (?1692-1746), of Marble Hill, Twickenham, Mdx
2. ↑ Venn: Cambridge Alumni: The Hon. George Berkeley

• Charles Mosley, Burke's Peerage and Baronetage, 107th edition, volume 1, page 576.
• Wikipedia: George Berkeley (died 1746)

• John, Lord Hervey, Some materials towards memoirs of the reign of King George II, ed. R. Sedgwick, new edn, 3 vols. (1952), 2.10

• Oxford Dictionary of National Biography entry

* John Wilson Croker, ed., Letters to and from Henrietta, countess of Suffolk, and her second husband, the Hon. George Berkeley: from 1712 to 1767, (London: J. Murray), 1824. Google Books: Vol. 1, Vol. 2.