Robert Walpole

[start]

Whig. Holds the record as the longest-serving British prime minister. Walpole was a Whig from the gentry class who was first elected to Parliament in [1701] and held many senior positions. He was a country squire and looked to country gentlemen for his political base.

Spencer Compton

[start]

Whig. 1st Earl of Wilmington.

Henry Pelham

[start]

Whig. He was the younger brother of Thomas Pelham-Holles, 1st Duke of Newcastle, who served in Pelham's government and succeeded him as prime minister. Pelham is generally considered to have been Britain's third prime minister, after Robert Walpole and the Earl of Wilmington. Pelham's premiership was relatively uneventful in terms of domestic affairs, although it was during his premiership that Great Britain experienced the tumult of the [1745] Jacobite uprising.

Thomas Pelham-Holles (1st term)

[start]

Whig. 1st Duke of Newcastle. A protégé of Robert Walpole, he served under him for more than 20 years until [1742]. He held power with his brother, prime minister Henry Pelham, until [1754]. He had then served as a Secretary of State continuously for 30 years and dominated British foreign policy.

William Cavendish

[start]

Whig. 4th Duke of Devonshire. Devonshire was given the Garter and appointed First Lord of the Treasury (most historians consider him Prime Minister during this service) in November [1756], and he served as First Lord until May [1757] in an administration effectively run by William Pitt. He is also a great-great-great-great-great-grandfather of King Charles III through the king's maternal great-grandmother.

Thomas Pelham-Holles (2nd term)

[start]

Whig. 1st Duke of Newcastle. A protégé of Robert Walpole, he served under him for more than 20 years until [1742]. He held power with his brother, prime minister Henry Pelham, until [1754]. He had then served as a Secretary of State continuously for 30 years and dominated British foreign policy.

John Stuart

[start]

Tory. 3rd Earl of Bute. He was arguably the last important royal favourite in British politics. He was the first prime minister from Scotland following the Acts of Union in [1707].

George Grenville

[start]

Whig. His government tried to bring public spending under control and pursued an assertive foreign policy. His best-known policy is the Stamp Act, a long-standing tax in Great Britain which Grenville extended to the colonies in America, but which instigated widespread opposition in Britain's American colonies and was later repealed. Grenville had increasingly strained relations with his colleagues and the King, who eventually dismissed him.

Charles Watson-Wentworth (1st term)

[start]

Whig. 2nd Marquess of Rockingham. His administration was dominated by the American issue. He wished for repeal of the Stamp Act and won a Commons vote on the repeal resolution.  He also passed the Declaratory Act, which asserted that the British Parliament had the right to legislate for the American colonies in all cases whatsoever. Internal dissent within the cabinet led to his resignation.

William Pitt the Elder

[start]

Whig. Pitt is best known as the wartime political leader of Britain in the Seven Years' War, especially for his single-minded devotion to victory over France, a victory which ultimately solidified Britain's dominance over world affairs. He is also known for his popular appeal, his opposition to corruption in government, his support for the American position in the run-up to the American Revolutionary War, his advocacy of British greatness, expansionism and empire, and his antagonism towards Britain's chief enemies and rivals for colonial power, Spain and France.

Augustus FitzRoy

[start]

Whig. He struggled to demonstrate an ability to counter increasing challenges to Britain's global dominance following the nation's victory in the Seven Years' War, and was widely attacked for allowing France to annex Corsica, leading to his resignation.

Frederick North

[start]

Tory. Better known by his courtesy title Lord North. He led Great Britain through most of the American War of Independence. In his first year as Prime Minister, North's ministry had an early success during the Falklands Crisis, in which Great Britain faced down a Spanish attempt to seize the Falkland Islands, nearly provoking a war.

Charles Watson-Wentworth (2nd term)

[start]

Whig. 2nd Marquess of Rockingham. In his 2nd term, pushed for an acknowledgement of the independence of the United States, initiating an end to British involvement in the American War of Independence. His second term was short-lived, as he died fourteen weeks later at the beginning of July from an influenza epidemic.

William Petty

[start]

Whig. 2nd Earl of Shelburne. Was prime minister during the final months of the American War of Independence. He succeeded in securing peace with America and this feat remains his most notable legacy.

William Cavendish-Bentinck (1st term)

[start]

Whig. 3rd Duke of Portland. Acted as titular head of a coalition government, whose real leaders were Charles James Fox and Lord North. During his tenure, the Treaty of Paris was signed, which formally ended the American Revolutionary War. The government was brought down after it had lost a vote in the House of Lords on its proposed reform of the East India Company after George III had let it be known that any peer voting for the measure would be considered his personal enemy.

William Pitt, the Younger (1st term)

[start]

Tory. Served two terms. The youngest and last prime minister of Great Britain (before the Acts of Union 1800) and then first prime minister of the United Kingdom (of Great Britain and Ireland).

Henry Addington

[start]

William Pitt, the Younger (2nd term)

[start]

Tory. Served two terms. The youngest and last prime minister of Great Britain (before the Acts of Union 1800) and then first prime minister of the United Kingdom (of Great Britain and Ireland).

William Wyndham Grenville

[start]

Tory. 1st Baron Grenville.

William Henry Cavendish-Bentinck (2nd term)

[start]

Tory. 3rd Duke of Portland. Portland's second government saw the United Kingdom's complete isolation on the continent but also the beginning of its recovery with the start of the Peninsular War.

Spencer Perceval

[start]

Robert Banks Jenkinson

[start]

George Canning

[start]

Tory.

Frederick John Robinson

[start]

1st Earl of Ripon. Viscount Goderich.

Arthur Wellesley (1st term)

[start]

Tory. 1st Duke of Wellington.

Charles Grey

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Whig. 2nd Earl Grey.

William Lamb (1st term)

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Whig. 2nd Viscount Melbourne.

Arthur Wellesley (2nd term)

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Tory. 1st Duke of Wellington.

Robert Peel (1st term)

[start]

Conservative. He is regarded as the father of modern British policing, owing to his founding of the Metropolitan Police Service. Peel was one of the founders of the modern Conservative Party.

William Lamb (2nd term)

[start]

Whig. 2nd Viscount Melbourne.

Robert Peel (2nd term)

[start]

Conservative. He is regarded as the father of modern British policing, owing to his founding of the Metropolitan Police Service. Peel was one of the founders of the modern Conservative Party.

John Russell (1st term)

[start]

Whig and Liberal statesman. 1st Earl of Russell.

Edward Smith-Stanley (1st term)

[start]

Conservative. 14th Earl of Derby.

George Hamilton-Gordon

[start]

He served as Prime Minister from 1852 until 1855 in a coalition between the Whigs and Peelites, with Radical and Irish support. 4th Earl of Aberdeen

Henry John Temple (1st term)

[start]

3rd Viscount Palmerston.

Edward Smith-Stanley (2nd term)

[start]

Conservative. 14th Earl of Derby.

Henry John Temple (2nd term)

[start]

3rd Viscount Palmerston.

John Russell (2nd term)

[start]

Whig and Liberal statesman. 1st Earl of Russell.

Edward Smith-Stanley (3rd term)

[start]

Conservative. 14th Earl of Derby.

Benjamin Disraeli (1st term)

[start]

Conservative. 1st Earl of Beaconsfield.

William Ewart Gladstone (1st term)

[start]

Liberal. Served 4 terms.

Benjamin Disraeli (2nd term)

[start]

Conservative. 1st Earl of Beaconsfield.

William Ewart Gladstone (2nd term)

[start]

Liberal. Served 4 terms.

Robert Gascoyne-Cecil (1st term)

[start]

Conservative. Was 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, and held the prime minister position three times for a total of over thirteen years. He was also known as Lord Salisbury. He led Britain to victory in a bitter, controversial war against the Boers.

William Ewart Gladstone (3rd term)

[start]

Liberal. Served 4 terms.

Robert Gascoyne-Cecil (2nd term)

[start]

Conservative. Was 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, and held the prime minister position three times for a total of over thirteen years. He was also known as Lord Salisbury. He led Britain to victory in a bitter, controversial war against the Boers.

William Ewart Gladstone (4th term)

[start]

Liberal. Served 4 terms.

Archibald Primrose

[start]

Liberal. 5th Earl of Rosebery. Rosebery became a leader of the Liberal Imperialist faction of the Liberal Party and when Gladstone retired, in 1894, Rosebery succeeded him as Prime Minister, much to the disgust of Sir William Harcourt, the Chancellor of the Exchequer and leader of the more left-wing Liberals. Rosebery's selection was largely because Queen Victoria disliked most of the other leading Liberals.

Robert Gascoyne-Cecil (3rd term)

[start]

Conservative. Was 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, and held the prime minister position three times for a total of over thirteen years. He was also known as Lord Salisbury. He led Britain to victory in a bitter, controversial war against the Boers.

Arthur James Balfour

[start]

Conservative. He succeeded his uncle, Robert Gascoyne-Cecil (Lord Salisbury), as prime minister/ He passed the Land Purchase (Ireland) Act, which bought out most of the Anglo-Irish land owners. The Education Act had a major long-term impact in modernising the school system in England and Wales and provided financial support for schools operated by the Church of England and by the Catholic Church. Nonconformists were outraged. He secured the Entente Cordiale with France, an alliance that ended centuries of intermittent conflict between the two states and their predecessors. He faced public anger at the handling of the later stages of the Boer War.

Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman

[start]

Liberal. He firmly believed in free trade, Irish Home Rule and the improvement of social conditions, including reduced working hours. His government passed legislation to ensure trade unions could not be liable for damages incurred during strike action, introduced free school meals for all children, and empowered local authorities to purchase agricultural land from private landlords. The last Liberal leader to gain a UK parliamentary majority.

Herbert Henry Asquith

[start]

Liberal. Asquith took Great Britain and the British Empire into the First World War. In the second year of the war, his government was attacked for a shortage of munitions and the failure of the Gallipoli Campaign. He formed a coalition government with other parties but failed to satisfy critics, was forced to resign the following year. His role in creating the modern British welfare state has been celebrated, but his weaknesses as a war leader and as a party leader have been highlighted by historians.

David Lloyd George

[start]

Liberal. From Wales, known for leading the United Kingdom during the First World War, for social-reform policies (including the National Insurance Act), for his role in the Paris Peace Conference, and for negotiating the establishment of the Irish Free State. Early in his career, he was known for his support of Welsh devolution. He was the last Liberal Party prime minister.

Andrew Bonar Law

[start]

Conservative. Law was born in the British colony of New Brunswick (now a Canadian province). As Leader of the Conservative Party and Leader of the Opposition, Law focused his attentions in favour of tariff reform and against Irish Home Rule. His campaigning helped turn Liberal attempts to pass the Third Home Rule Bill into a three-year struggle eventually halted by the start of the First World War, with much argument over the status of the six counties in Ulster which would later become Northern Ireland, four of which were predominantly Protestant.

Stanley Baldwin (first term)

[start]

Conservative. Served 3 terms. Upon Bonar Law's resignation for health reasons, Baldwin became prime minister and leader of the Conservative Party. His government also saw the General Strike and introduced the Trade Disputes and Trade Unions Act to curb the powers of trade unions. He dominated the government between the world wars. For the final decade of his life and for many years afterwards he was vilified for having presided over high unemployment and as one of several British public figures who had tried to appease Adolf Hitler.

James Ramsay MacDonald (first term)

[start]

Labour. Served two terms. MacDonald, along with Keir Hardie and Arthur Henderson, was one of the three principal founders of the Labour Party. Later, he headed a National Government dominated by the Conservative Party and supported by only a few Labour members. MacDonald was expelled from the Labour Party as a result.

Stanley Baldwin (second term)

[start]

Conservative. Served 3 terms. Upon Bonar Law's resignation for health reasons, Baldwin became prime minister and leader of the Conservative Party. His government also saw the General Strike and introduced the Trade Disputes and Trade Unions Act to curb the powers of trade unions. He dominated the government between the world wars. For the final decade of his life and for many years afterwards he was vilified for having presided over high unemployment and as one of several British public figures who had tried to appease Adolf Hitler.

James Ramsay MacDonald (second term)

[start]

Labour. Served two terms. MacDonald, along with Keir Hardie and Arthur Henderson, was one of the three principal founders of the Labour Party. Later, he headed a National Government dominated by the Conservative Party and supported by only a few Labour members. MacDonald was expelled from the Labour Party as a result.

Stanley Baldwin (third term)

[start]

Conservative. Served 3 terms. Upon Bonar Law's resignation for health reasons, Baldwin became prime minister and leader of the Conservative Party. His government also saw the General Strike and introduced the Trade Disputes and Trade Unions Act to curb the powers of trade unions. He dominated the government between the world wars. For the final decade of his life and for many years afterwards he was vilified for having presided over high unemployment and as one of several British public figures who had tried to appease Adolf Hitler.

Neville Chamberlain

[start]

Conservative. He is best known for his foreign policy of appeasement, and in particular for his signing of the Munich Agreement, ceding the German-speaking Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia to Nazi Germany led by Adolf Hitler. Following the German invasion of Poland, which marked the beginning of the Second World War, Chamberlain announced the declaration of war on Germany two days later and led the United Kingdom through the first eight months of the war.

Sir Winston Churchill (first term)

[start]

Conservative

Clement Attlee

[start]

The Labour Party, led by Attlee, won a landslide victory in the post-WWII general election, on their post-war recovery platform. His government's Keynesian approach to economic management aimed to maintain full employment, a mixed economy and a greatly enlarged system of social services provided by the state. It undertook the nationalisation of public utilities and major industries, and implemented wide-ranging social reforms, including the passing of the National Insurance Act 1946, the formation of the National Health Service (NHS), and the enlargement of public subsidies for council house building.

Sir Winston Churchill (second term)

[start]

Conservative

Sir Anthony Eden

[start]

Conservative. He became foreign secretary aged 38, before resigning in protest at Neville Chamberlain's appeasement policy towards Mussolini's Fascist regime in Italy. Eden's reputation as a skilled diplomat was overshadowed in 1956 when the United States refused to support the Anglo-French military response to the Suez Crisis, which critics across party lines regarded as a historic setback for British foreign policy, signalling the end of British influence in the Middle East.

Harold Macmillan

[start]

Conservative

Sir Alec Douglas-Home

[start]

Conservative

Harold Wilson (first term)

[start]

Labour. Served 2 terms.

Sir Edward Heath

[start]

Conservative

Harold Wilson (second term)

[start]

Labour. Served 2 terms.

James Callaghan

[start]

Labour

Baroness Margaret Thatcher

[start]

Conservative

The Rt Hon Sir John Major KG CH

[start]

Conservative

The Rt Hon Tony Blair

[start]

Labour

The Rt Hon Gordon Brown

[start]

Labour

The Rt Hon David Cameron

[start]

Conservative

The Rt Hon Theresa May MP

[start]

Conservative

The Rt Hon Boris Johnson MP

[start]

The Rt Hon Elizabeth Truss MP

[start]

Conservative