22 Facts About Henry Addington

Henry Addington, 1st Viscount Sidmouth, was a British Tory statesman who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1801 to 1804.

Henry Addington was forced from office in favour of William Pitt the Younger, who had preceded Addington as Prime Minister.

Henry Addington is known for his reactionary crackdown on advocates of democratic reforms during a ten-year spell as Home Secretary from 1812 to 1822.

Henry Addington is the longest continuously serving holder of that office since it was created in 1782.

Henry Addington was the son of Anthony Addington, Pitt the Elder's physician; and Mary Addington, the daughter of the Rev Haviland John Hiley, headmaster of Reading School.

Henry Addington studied at Reading School, Winchester, and Brasenose College, Oxford, and then studied law at Lincoln's Inn.

Ursula Henry Addington died in 1811; in 1823 Henry Addington married a widow, Marianne Townsend, daughter of William Scott, 1st Baron Stowell.

Henry Addington was elected to the House of Commons in 1784 as one of the Members of Parliament for Devizes, and became Speaker of the House of Commons in 1789.

At the time and ever since, Henry Addington has been criticised for his lacklustre conduct of the war and his defensive posture.

Henry Addington increased the forces, provided a tax base that could finance an enlarged war and seized several French possessions.

Henry Addington strengthened British defences against a French invasion through the building of Martello towers on the south coast and the raising of more than 600,000 men at arms.

In 1802, Henry Addington accepted an honorary position as vice-president for life on the Court of Governors of London's Foundling Hospital for abandoned babies.

Henry Addington's greatest failing was his inability to manage a parliamentary majority by cultivating the loyal support of MPs beyond his own circle and the friends of the King.

Henry Addington remained an important political figure because he had gained a large following of MPs who supported him loyally in the Commons.

Henry Addington was reconciled with Pitt in December 1804, with the help of Lord Hawkesbury as an intermediary.

Henry Addington was appointed Lord Privy Seal in 1806 in the Ministry of All the Talents that succeeded Pitt.

Henry Addington returned to government again as Lord President in March 1812, and, in June of the same year, became Home Secretary.

Henry Addington left office in 1822, succeeded as Home Secretary by Sir Robert Peel, but Addington remained in the Cabinet as Minister without Portfolio for the next two years, opposing, along with the Duke of Wellington, other members of Cabinet, and King George IV, British recognition of the South American republics.

Henry Addington remained active in the House of Lords for the next few years, making his final speech in opposition to Catholic Emancipation in 1829 and casting his final vote against the Reform Act 1832.

Henry Addington maintained homes at Upottery, Devon and Bulmershe Court, in what is the Reading suburb of Woodley, but moved to the White Lodge in Richmond Park when he became Prime Minister.

Henry Addington donated to the town of Reading the four acres of land that is today the site of the Royal Berkshire Hospital, and his name is commemorated in the town's Sidmouth Street and Addington Road as well as in Sidmouth Street in Devizes.

Henry Addington died in London on 15 February 1844 at the age of 86, from influenza, and was buried in the churchyard at St Mary the Virgin, Mortlake on Mortlake High Street, now in Greater London.