Preceded by Robert Banks Jenkinson (1812-1827) |
23rd Prime Minister of Great Britain 1827 |
Succeeded by Frederick John Robinson (1827-1828) |
Contents |
George Canning was born on 11 Apr 1770 at Queen Anne Street, Marylebone, London, England.
He was the son of George Canning and Mary Ann Costello. Mary was the daughter of Jordan Costello of Connaught, Ireland. She was the niece of General Guydickens.
George's father, also named George Canning had been disinherited by his father, Stratford Canning. before he married Mary Ann Costello.
The Right Hon. George Canning passed away on 8 Aug 1827 at Chiswick, Middlesex, England, United Kingdom. He was buried at Westminster Abbey , Westminster, London, England. [1]
"INEDITED AND UNPUBLISHED MANUSCRIPTS.
CANNING. -- Autograph Manuscript of the early life of the Right Honble. GEORGE CANNING, by THOMAS MULOCH, containing many curious Anecdotes, etc., ready for printing."
(unidentified newspaper or magazine cutting, 1878, from family scrapbook) Canning-229 19:39, 24 June 2015 (EDT)
Thomas Mulock, born in Dublin from a family of minor Irish gentry, was a merchant in Liverpool while George Canning was MP, and may have served as Canning's private secretary.Canning-229 19:39, 24 June 2015 (EDT)
At the sale by auction last week, of some of the late Mr. [George] Canning's chattels, 'a bust of the Right Hon. W. Huskisson, and a ditto of General Gascoyne' were knocked down at eighteen shillings. This is a valuable proof o the estimation which the two Members for Liverpool enjoy among the public. . ." (1828) (unidentified newspaper cutting, from family scrapbook)Canning-229 14:14, 26 June 2015 (EDT)
"406 [George Canning's] estate consisted of approximately 250 acres at Kilbraghan in the barony of Cranagh, co. Kilkenny. * * * Mr. Bradish has not been identified."
Rt. Hon. George Canning was a brilliant orator who was a strong Foreign Secretary, he served as a Chancellor of the Exchequer, and for three months unitl his unexpected death, he held the office of Prime Minister and First Lord of the Treasury between 10 April 1827 and 8 August 1827.
— the following biography and sources for George Canning focus primarily on his relationship to William Gifford and John Murray, editor and publisher, respectively, of the influential conservative periodical the Quarterly Review. The biography and sources are by Jonathan Cutmore, author of John Murray's Quarterly Review: Letters 1807-1843 (Liverpool University Press, 2019), from his Writing and Reading the Quarterly Review (manuscript, 2015), used by permission. Jonathan Cutmore (c) 2021
Raised in the home of his cousin Stratford Canning, George Canning was educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford. A brilliant student, he gathered about himself a group of admirers, some of whom later became members of the Canningite parliamentary faction. His family was Whig, so when he was pulled into Pitt’s orbit suspicions were raised about his integrity that he never dispelled. Pitt became his mentor and political patron: he appointed Canning as Undersecretary of State for Foreign Affairs (1796-1799); Commissioner of the Board of Control (1799-1801); and Paymaster General (1800-1801). When Pitt resigned the premiership, in 1801, Canning at first vacillated and then pledged to support Addington. In 1804, when Pitt returned to power, he appointed Canning Treasurer of the Navy. Canning was out of office during the Whig-dominated Ministry of all the Talents but came back in with Portland.
When in Sept. 1807 John Murray wrote to Canning to solicit his support for a new journal to combat the ‘pernicious influence’ of the Edinburgh Review, Canning was Foreign Secretary and the strongest man in Cabinet. Murray wrote to Canning for three reasons. He was known to take an interest in journalism; in 1797 to 1798 Canning had with his friends John Hookham Frere and George Ellis, and with William Gifford as editor, conducted the brilliant newspaper The Anti-Jacobin; or, Weekly Examiner. Secondly, Murray had a significant, if indirect, association with Canning. A couple of years earlier, Murray had rescued Stratford Canning from financial complications that had arisen over the publication of an Etonian journal, ‘The Miniature’. Finally, Murray, who did not like to see himself as a political publisher but who wished to support the constitutional status quo, felt comfortable with Canning’s meliorist brand of conservatism. Canning did not reply to Murray’s letter but instead opened a back channel through his cousin Stratford who then introduced Murray to men who might help start a journal, the old Anti-Jacobin group.
Canning became directly involved in the effort to establish the Quarterly Review a few days after John Murray’s early Oct. 1808 visit to Walter Scott at Ashiestiel. At the beginning of the week of 9 Oct., Canning received a letter from the Scottish Lord Advocate, Archibald Campbell-Colquhoun. The Lord Advocate invited Canning to support Walter Scott’s intention of setting up a new conservative journal to rival the Edinburgh Review. Canning immediately returned a positive reply and then within a day or so showed the Lord Advocate’s letter to William Gifford. He asked Gifford to take up the editorship should Walter Scott finally refuse the post. (On 12 Oct., Gifford reluctantly agreed.). Later in the same month, Canning showed George Ellis the Lord Advocate’s letter and asked him to become involved.
Given Canning’s heavy responsibilities at the Foreign Office, it is impressive how active he was in planning the new periodical. In early Nov. he further communicated with Gifford and Ellis on the matter. The three men met to discuss strategy on 27-29 Nov. at Claremont, the country residence of Ellis’s cousin Charles Rose Ellis. Gifford then arranged a pro forma interview between Canning and Murray, to permit the publisher to pay fealty to the great man. On 18 Dec. Canning again brought ‘down little Gifford’ to Claremont where Ellis and Canning encouraged the newly minted editor to work with greater alacrity and where the three men offered mutual congratulations for the progress already made.
Though Canning wrote very little for the Quarterly, he still profoundly influenced the journal’s direction. He exercised his influence in discrete ways, by feeding privileged government information to Gifford and by being at Ellis’s elbow when he produced economics articles and articles on domestic and foreign policy. More substantially, Gifford in his editorial conduct of the journal aspired to reflect Canning’s principles and policies -- especially in articles on State affairs and domestic politics. To that extent, throughout Gifford’s tenure the Quarterly Review may properly be called a Canningite journal.
Gifford was editor because Canning was his sponsor. The first editor’s status and independence, with Murray in particular, waxed and waned as Canning came in and out of power. All of the journal’s principals, including Murray, acknowledged that the Quarterly existed primarily as a bulwark in defence of a nationalist vision of Great Britain and a conservative view of its unwritten constitution and, if only in a general way, to represent the Ministry. When Canning lost office in the wake of his Sept. 1809 duel with Castlereagh, his influence over the journal and his ability to prop up Gifford became residual. Now no member of Cabinet took an active interest in the Quarterly Review. Gifford’s position was further weakened and Murray’s strengthened when on 21 July 1813 Canning ‘formally and with some solemnity disbanded his party’ (quoted in Letters to Ivy, p.208). By the time he returned to significant power, in 1822, as Foreign Secretary, Murray and Gifford had reached an accommodation and it was now not as important that the editor have a specific patron in government.
When on 23 Apr. 1824 Canning received Gifford’s letter of resignation, he forwarded it to the prime minister along with a note in which he alerted Liverpool to the importance of keeping the journal going. Upon Gifford’s retirement, Canning’s association with the Quarterly Review effectively ceased. That autumn, Murray consulted Canning about the appointment of John Taylor Coleridge to the editorship, but only after the fact; the decision had already been taken. Sir Walter Scott and William Wright, John Murray’s lawyer, later told the story that when at the end of 1825 Murray appointed John Lockhart to the editorship, ‘the choice was made on the recommendation of Canning and Gifford’ (Shattock, Politics and Reviewers, p.51. SL IX, p.335, Scott to Morritt). There is no known evidence, however, to support the claim.
See also:
See also for hints:
fn. 406
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By Joan Scott George Canning had three sons and one daughter: George Charles Canning (1802-1828) Capt. the Hon. William Pitt Canning Charles John, 2nd Viscount Canning and 1st Earl Canning Harriet Canning, Marchioness of Clanricarde