12 Facts About William Waddington

William Henry Waddington was a French statesman who served as Prime Minister in 1879, and as an Ambassador of France to London.

William Waddington was then sent to Repton School and then Rugby School in Britain, supervised by his uncle Walter Shirley.

William Waddington rowed in the victorious Cambridge eight in the Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race on the Thames in race of March 1849; he did not take part in the repeat race in December that year, which Oxford won.

William Waddington travelled throughout Asia Minor, Greece and Syria, and his experiences and discoveries are detailed in two Memoires, the first produced by the French Institute and subsequently in his Melanges de numismatique et de philologie.

William Waddington was charged with devising a Bill transferring extra powers to the State, a tricky task which he negotiated through the Chamber, but was defeated in the Senate.

William Waddington continued to hold office under Jules Simon's premiership until being thrown out during the Seize mai constitutional crisis.

William Waddington was one of the French plenipotentiaries at the Berlin Congress.

Early in 1879 William Waddington agreed to take over from Jules Dufaure as a caretaker Prime Minister with the agreement of Leon Gambetta.

William Waddington kept peace between the radicals and the reactionaries till the delay of urgent reforms lost him the support of all parties.

William Waddington refused the immediate offer of ambassadorship to London, preferring to take up the role in 1880 of rapporteur to the parliamentary committee for the Scrutin de liste ; he delivered an adverse judgment.

In 1883 William Waddington accepted the appointment and dignity of Ambassadeur de France to London.

In Paris in 1874, William Waddington married his second wife, Mary Alsop King, an American-born author from New York City, daughter of Congressman Charles King, 9th President of Columbia College.