Biography

I am happy that you are using this web site and hope that you found it useful. Unfortunately, the cost of making this material freely available is increasing, so if you have found the site useful and would like to contribute towards its continuation, I would greatly appreciate it. Click the button to go to Paypal and make a donation.

Charles Watson-Wentworth, second Marquis of Rockingham (1730-82)

Charles Watson-Wentworth was born on 13 May 1730 (Old Style), the fifth son and eighth child in a family of ten. He was the only son to survive childhood. He was brought up at the family home of Wentworth Woodhouse near Rotherham, Yorkshire. By 1739 he was heir to the vast estates (his two older brothers had died) and was given the courtesy title of Lord Higham. He was educated briefly (1738) at Westminster School but was withdrawn because of illness. Later he attended St John's College, Cambridge.

In 1745 he became a colonel in a regiment of volunteers formed by his father to fight off the threat of an invasion by Bonnie Prince Charlie. He was stationed at Pontefract but decided to join the Duke of Cumberland in Carlisle, riding alone in winter across the moors to the duke's camp. This marked the start of a lifelong friendship between the two men. In 1746 the 15-year old , now Lord Malton since his father's elevation to the marquisate, was sent off on a short tour of Europe in an attempt to distract him from joining the army as a career. From 1748-50 he undertook the Grand Tour proper, returning to England on the death of his father.

Wentworth Woodhouse

The new Marquis of Rockingham celebrated his coming of age in great style on 13 May 1751 and took up his seat in the House of Lords. He also became a Lord of the Bedchamber to George II. Rockingham married the 16-year old Mary Bright on 26 February 1752. The couple were extremely close: it seems to have been a love-match rather than an arranged marriage. They had no children and on Rockingham's death in 1782 the estates went to his nephew, the third Earl Fitzwilliam.

In 1753 the Whig Club in York renamed itself the "Rockingham Club": from then on the marquis virtually controlled political life in Yorkshire. In 1760 he was made a Knight of the Garter; in 1762 he became a victim of the Massacre of the Pelhamite Innocents, losing all his county appointments. The following year he became a Governor of Charterhouse, winning more votes than George Grenville.

After the resignation of Grenville, the Duke of Cumberland accepted the king's commission to head a new ministry and appointed Rockingham as First Lord of the Treasury in July 1765. Rockingham inherited the colonial problems in America that had been provoked by Grenville's administration and successfully brought the civil unrest to a halt by repealing the Stamp Act and revising the Sugar Act. Although his ministry passed the Declaratory Act, he differentiated between having the right to legislate for the colonies and actually exercising that right. His first ministry lasted only a year because the king negotiated behind Rockingham's back to bring in Pitt the Elder.

 Rockingham spent most of the rest of his life in parliamentary opposition. He supported the colonies against parliament, maintaining that the colonists were demanding their constitutional rights against a 'revolutionary' parliament. In 1769 it was the Rockinghamites and Yorkshire that led the Petitioning Movement demanding the dissolution of parliament after the Middlesex election fiasco. The Rockinghamites also formed the core of the Yorkshire Association established by Christopher Wyvill in 1779 to demand a reform of parliament and were at the forefront of demands for religious toleration and increased civil liberties for Catholics.

As the owner of vast estates in Ireland, Rockingham showed himself to be exemplary. He granted long leases to Catholics and kept a watchful eye on his estate steward. In times of hardship he remitted and/or reduced rents and was always accessible to his tenants. He ordered improvements to be made to his tenants' houses and to the infrastructure there. He made substantial payments to the Wicklow Volunteers, a militia that was established to defend that part of Ireland against any French attack during the American War of Independence.

As Lord Lieutenant of Yorkshire he was responsible for the maintenance of law and order and played a direct part in the defence of Hull and the east coast against American privateers, particularly John Paul Jones. He made large charitable payments for the relief of poverty in times of distress and successfully terminated the activities of a coining and clipping gang in Halifax.

Rockingham enjoyed being at home at Wentworth Woodhouse. He was a caring employer who took an interest in the affairs of his tenants, servants and estates. His presence helped the local economy greatly: for example, he spent over £85,000 on building the stables at Wentworth which kept substantial numbers of men employed for many years. There were almost a hundred house servants at Wentworth besides all those who worked on the farmland. The village of Wentworth owed its existence to the 'great house'.

In March 1782, on the resignation of Lord North, the king had no choice but to appoint Rockingham as Prime Minister for the second time. Rockingham still led t4 August, 2014iation prepared. He had stated as early as 1779 that the colonists should be given their independence and his first act as PM was to acknowledge the existence of a new country. The ministry lasted only fourteen weeks: the marquis died on 1 July 1782.

SEE the review of the Memoirs of the Second Marquis of Rockingham