Edward Walpole

Sir Edward Walpole

Sir Edward Walpole KB PC (Ire) (1706 – 12 January 1784) was a British politician, and a younger son of Sir Robert Walpole, Prime Minister from 1721 to 1742.

Political career

Walpole first entered Parliament as Member for Lostwithiel in a by-election on 29 April 1730, following the death of Sir Edward Knatchbull earlier that month. He was appointed junior Secretary to the Treasury the same year.

On 2 May 1734, in the next general election, he succeeded his uncle Horatio Walpole as Member of Parliament for Great Yarmouth in Norfolk, retaining the seat for nearly 34 years until the 1768 election, when his first cousin the Hon. Richard Walpole (son of Lord Walpole of Wolterton) replaced him.

On 7 September 1737 the Duke of Devonshire was named Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and Walpole his Chief Secretary, though he also continued as Secretary to the Treasury. Walpole was sworn of the Privy Council of Ireland on 8 October that year and stood for Ballyshannon in the Irish House of Commons, a seat he held until 1760.

On 9 May 1739 Edward Walpole's elder brother Robert, Lord Walpole resigned his post of Clerk of the Pells in order to become an Auditor of the Exchequer, and Edward was appointed to succeed him, holding the office until his death. On 27 August 1753 Walpole was made a Knight Companion of the Order of the Bath, the order re-founded by his father in 1725.

Family

Walpole lived at Frogmore House in Windsor in Berkshire. He never married, but left three daughters by his mistress Dorothy Clement:

• Laura, who married 13 September 1758 the Hon. and Rev. Frederick Keppel (later Bishop of Exeter) and died 27 July 1813, leaving issue;
• Maria, who married firstly 15 May 1759, the Earl Waldegrave, and secondly 6 September 1766, the Duke of Gloucester and died 22 August 1807, leaving issue by both marriages;
• Charlotte, who married 2 October 1760 Lionel Tollemache, Lord Huntingtower (later Earl of Dysart) and died 5 September 1789, without issue.

References

• John Burke, A general and heraldic dictionary of the peerages of England, Ireland and Scotland, extinct, dormant and in abeyance, Colburn and Bentley, 1831
• Joseph Haydn and Horace Ockerby (ed.), The Book of Dignities, 3rd edition, W.H. Allen and Co. Ltd, 1894, reprinted 1969
• thepeerage.com