List of former pupils of Westminster School

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The following people were educated at Westminster School, and are sometimes listed with OW (Old Westminster) after their name (collectively, OWW) There are over a thousand Old Westminsters listed in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography so these are necessarily a small sample:

All persons are British unless otherwise stated.

Contents 1 15th century 2 16th century 3 17th century 4 18th century 5 19th century 6 20th century

[edit] 15th century

• John Hygdon (c.1472 – 1532), first dean of Cardinal College /Christ Church, Oxford

[edit] 16th century

• Nicholas Udall (1504 – 1556), playwright
• Richard Hakluyt (c. 1552 – 1616), travel writer
• William Alabaster (1567 – 1640), poet
• Robert Bruce Cotton (1570 – 1631), antiquarian
• Ben Jonson (1573 – 1637), poet and dramatist
• Arthur Dee (1579 – 1651), physician
• Richard Corbet (1582 – 1635), poet
• Robert Herrick (1591 – 1674), poet
• Charles Chauncy (1592 – 1672), President of Harvard 1654 – 72
• Henry King (1592 – 1669), poet
• George Herbert (1593 – 1633), public orator and poet

[edit] 17th century

• Jasper Mayne (1604 – 1672), dramatist
• Thomas Randolph (1605 – 1635), poet and dramatist
• Abraham Cowley (1618 – 1667), poet
• Richard Lower (1631 – 1691), pioneering physician
• John Dryden (1631 – 1700), poet and playwright
• John Locke (1632 – 1704), philosopher
• Sir Christopher Wren (1632 – 1723), architect, scientist and co-founder of the Royal Society
• Robert Hooke (1635 – 1703), scientist and co-founder of the Royal Society
• Thomas Gale (c. 1636 – 1702), classical scholar and antiquarian
• Henry Aldrich 1647 – 1710), philosopher
• George Jeffreys, 1st Baron Jeffreys of Wem (1648 – 1689), Lord Chief Justice of the Bloody Assize, Lord Chancellor
• Humphrey Prideaux (1648 – 1724), Dean of Norwich
• Lancelot Blackburne (1658 – 1743), Archbishop of York
• Henry Purcell (1659 – 1695), composer
• Charles Montagu, 1st Earl of Halifax (1661 – 1715), creator of the Bank of England
• James Hamilton, 6th Earl of Abercorn (1661 – 1734), Privy Counsellor
• William King (1663 – 1712), poet
• Matthew Prior (1664 –1771), poet
• Nicholas Rowe (1674 – 1718), Poet Laureate 1715
• William Pulteney, 1st Earl of Bath ( 1684 – 1684), Cabinet Minister
• John Carteret, 2nd Earl Granville (1690 – 1763), statesman and Cabinet Minister
• Thomas Pelham-Holles, 1st Duke of Newcastle-upon-Tyne (1693 – 1768), First Lord of the Treasury 1754 – 1756, Prime Minister
• James Bramston (1694 – 1744), satirist
• Henry Pelham (1696 – 1754), First Lord of the Treasury and Chancellor of the Exchequer 1743 – 1754, Prime Minister
• John, Lord Hervey,(1696 – 1743), statesman and writer
• John Dyer (1699 – 1748), poet

[edit] 18th century

• Charles Wesley (1707 – 1788), Methodist preacher and writer of over 6,000 hymns
• William Beckford (1709 – 1770), politician, twice Lord Mayor of London
• John Cleland (1709 – 1789), author of the first erotic novel
• James Waldegrave, 2nd Earl Waldegrave (1715 – 1763), First Lord of the Treasury, Prime Minister for five days in 1757
• Francis Lewis (1713 – 1803), signatory of the United States Declaration of Independence
• General Thomas Gage (1721 – 1787), C in C North America, Governor of Massachusetts 1774
• John Burgoyne (1723 – 1792), Lieutenant-General who surrendered British Army at Saratoga
• Richard Howe, 1st Earl Howe (1726 – 1799), Admiral of the Fleet
• Frederick Hamilton (1728 – 1811), deacon
• Charles Watson-Wentworth, 2nd Marquess of Rockingham (1730 – 1782), Prime Minister
• William Cowper (1731 – 1800), poet and hymnodist
• Charles Churchill, George Colman the Elder, Bonnell Thornton and Robert Lloyd (1731–1764, 1732–1794, 1725–1768, and 1733–1764), satirists and poets; founders of the satirists' Nonsense Club
• Warren Hastings (1732 – 1818), impeached Governor-General of Bengal
• Nevil Maskelyne (1732 – 1811), Astronomer Royal
• Richard Cumberland (1732 – 1811), dramatist
• Augustus Henry Fitzroy, 3rd Duke of Grafton (1735 – 1811), Prime Minister
• Charles Lennox, 3rd Duke of Richmond (1735 – 1806), reforming politician
• John Horne Tooke (1736 – 1812), politician and philologist
• Edward Gibbon, FRS (1737 – 1794), historian
• William Cavendish-Bentinck, 3rd Duke of Portland (1738 – 1809), Prime Minister
• Arthur Middleton (1742 – 1787), signatory of the United States Declaration of Independence
• Charles Cotesworth Pinckney (1746 – 1825), ADC to Washington 1777, defeated by Jefferson in 1804 in contest for Presidency
• Jeremy Bentham (1748 – 1832), philosopher, lawyer and eccentric
• Archibald James Edward Stewart, 1st Baron Douglas of Douglas (1748 – 1827), Winner of the Douglas Cause. MP and Lord Lieutenant of Forfarshire. [1]
• Henry William Bunbury (1750 – 1811), caricaturist
• Thomas Pinckney (1750 – 1828), American ambassador to Britain
• Richard Bingham, Earl of Lucan (1764 – 1839), Member of Parliament
• Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin (1766 – 1841), ambassador to Constantinople, bringer of the Elgin Marbles to Britain
• Henry William Paget, 1st Marquess of Anglesey (1768 – 1854), cavalry and horse artillery officer at Waterloo, where he lost a leg
• Sir Francis Burdett, 5th Baronet (1770 – 1844), Radical parliamentarian and parliamentary reformer
• Robert Southey (1774 – 1843), Poet Laureate 1813
• Matthew Gregory Lewis (1775 – 1818), dramatist
• Benjamin Hall (1778 – 1817), Welsh industrialist, father of 1st Baron Llanover (below).
• Henry Fynes Clinton (1781 – 1852 ), scholar
• John Hobhouse, 1st Baron Broughton (1786 – 1869), President of the Board of Control
• FitzRoy Somerset, 1st Baron Raglan (1788 – 1855), lost his right arm at Waterloo, C-in-C in the Crimea
• William Sellon (? – 1790), Deacon
• Sir James Graham (1792 – 1861), politician
• John Russell, 1st Earl Russell (1792 – 1878), Prime Minister
• William Mure (1799 – 1860), scholar and politician

[edit] 19th century

• John Nelson Darby (1800 – 1882), Irish clergyman
• Thomas Henry Lister (1800 – 1842), novelist and first Registrar General
• Benjamin Hall, 1st Baron Llanover (1802 – 1867), Commissioner of Works and Public Buildings responsible for, amongst others, the current Palace of Westminster, likely to have given his name to Big Ben
• Zerah Colburn (1804 – 1840), Canadian child mathematics prodigy
• Sir Robert Joseph Phillimore (1810 – 1885), Judge of the Arches
• Gilbert Abbott à Beckett (1811 – 1856), writer
• Sir Charles Dilke, 1st Baronet (1811 – 1869) reformer, instigator of the Great Exhibition
• Henry Mayhew (1812 – 1887), reforming and satirical journalist, chronicler of London's poor and founder of Punch
• George Henty (1832 – 1902), author of more than 80 popular books for boys
• Sir Edward Poynter (1836 – 1919), painter
• Sir Charles Dilke, 2nd Baronet (1843 – 1911), Liberal statesman
• William Knox D'Arcy (1849 – 1917), entrepreneur
• Sir Guy Francis Laking (1875-1919), art historian and Keeper of the London Museum
• Sir K. A. C. Creswell (1879 – 1974), architectural historian specialising in Egyptian Islamic architecture
• A. A. Milne (1882 – 1956), author and journalist
• Hussein Ala (1883-), Prime Minister of Iran
• Henry Tizard (1885 – 1959), scientist and inventor
• Sir Adrian Boult (1889 – 1984), conductor
• Edgar Adrian (1889 – 1977), scientist and Nobel Prizewinner
• Oliver Lyttelton, 1st Viscount Chandos (1893 – 1972), Cabinet Minister during World War II, chaiman of the National Theatre Board

[edit] 20th century

• Gregory Dix (1902-1952), liturgical scholar
• Patrick Hamilton (1904 – 1962), novelist and playwright
• Sir John Gielgud (1904 – 2000), actor and director
• Sir John Aitken ( 1910 – 1985), Conservative newspaper owner
• H. A. R. "Kim" Philby (1912 – 1988), agent who defected to USSR 1963
• Professor Sir Richard Doll, CH FRS (1912 – 2005), epidemiologist
• Sir Richard Stone (1913 – 1991), Nobel prizewinner
• Angus Wilson (1913 - 1991), novelist
• Norman Parkinson, (1913 - 1990), photographer
• Sir William Deakin ( 1913 – 2005), historian and literary assistant to Winston Churchill
• John Freeman (b. 1915), Labour politician, broadcaster, diplomat and television chairman
• Sir Andrew Huxley FRS (b. 1917), scientist
• Cecil Gould (1918 – 1994), art historian
• Brian Urquhart (b. 1919) UN undersecretary-general and pioneer of peacekeeping
• Sir Peter Ustinov (1921 – 2004), actor, writer and director
• Michael Flanders and Donald Swann (1922 – 1975 and 1923 – 1994), performers, writers and musicians
• Michael Havers (1923 – 1992), lord chancellor
• Neville Sandelson (1923 – 2002), founder member of the SDP
• Richard Wollheim (1923 – 2003), philosopher
• Michael Hamburger (b. 1924), literary critic
• Colin Turnbull (1924 – 1994), anthropologist
• Tony Benn (b. 1925), politician
• Peter Brook (b. 1925), theatre director
• Anthony Sampson (1926 – 2004) , author, founder member of the SDP
• Sir Crispin Tickell (b. 1930), environmentalist, diplomat and academic
• Nigel, Lord Lawson (b. 1932), former Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer
• Anthony Howard (b. 1934), journalist
• Sir Roger Norrington (b. 1934), musician
• Simon Gray (b. 1936), playwright
• William Cookson (1939 – 2004), literary critic
• Julian, Lord Hunt,(b. 1942), climate change authority and Labour peer
• Peter Bottomley (b. 1944), Conservative politician
• Peter Asher and Gordon Waller (b. 1944 and 1945), musicians
• Andrew, Lord Lloyd-Webber (b. 1948), musician and producer
• Martin Amis (b. 1949), novelist
• Stephen Poliakoff (b. 1952), playwright
• Michael Attenborough (b.1952), theatre director
• Chris Huhne (b. 1954), Liberal Democrat politician
• Adam Mars-Jones (b. 1954), novelist and critic
• Nigel Planer (b. 1955), novelist and actor
• James Robbins (b.1955), BBC diplomatic correspondent
• Tim Gardam (b. 1955), journalist and educator, former director of Channel 4
• Tim Sebastian (b. 1956) , television correspondent and interviewer
• Andrew Graham-Dixon (b. 1956), broadcaster and art historian
• Dominic Grieve (b. 1956), shadow Attorney-General
• Robin Griffith Jones (b. 1956), Anglican
• Dominic Lawson (b. 1956), journalist
• Shane McGowan (b. 1957), musician
• James Lasdun (b. 1957), novelist
• Timothy Winter (b. 1960), islamic scholar
• Imogen Stubbs (b. 1961), actress
• Matt Frei (b. 1963), foreign correspondent for BBC News
• Ian Bostridge (b. 1964), tenor singer
• Helena Bonham Carter (b. 1966), actress
• Noreena Hertz (b. 1967), economist and author
• Gavin Rossdale (b. 1967), musician and actor
• Julian Anderson (b. 1967), composer
• Nick Clegg (b.1967), Liberal Democrat politician
• Ruth Kelly MP (b. 1968), former Education Secretary
• Adam Buxton and Joe Cornish (b. 1968 and 1969), TV performers and journalists
• Marcel Theroux (b. 1969), novelist
• Louis Theroux (b. 1970), broadcaster
• Tobias Hill (b. 1970), poet and novelist
• Dido Armstrong (b. 1971), musician under the name of "Dido"
• Paul Roffman (b. 1972), actor
• Martha Lane Fox (b. 1973), dot.com entrepreneur
• James Reynolds (b. 1974), Middle East correspondent for BBC News
• Conrad Shawcross (b. 1977), artist
• Christian Coulson (b. 1978), actor
• Pinny Grylls (b. 1978), filmmaker
• Benjamin Yeoh (b. 1978), playwright
• James Brandon (b. 1980), journalist
• Clemency Burton-Hill (born 1981), actress and writer
• Alice Eve (b. 1982), actress
• Mica Penniman (b. 1983), musician under the name "Mika"