Charles Talbot, 1st Baron Talbot

{{Short description|Lawyer, politician and Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain (1685–1737)}}

{{for|other people named Charles Talbot|Charles Talbot (disambiguation)}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=November 2016}}

{{Use British English|date=November 2016}}

{{Infobox officeholder

| honorific-prefix = The Right Honourable

| name = The Lord Talbot

| honorific-suffix = {{postnominals|country=GBR|size=100%|PC}}

| image = Charles Talbot, 1st Baron Talbot of Hensol by John Vanderbank.jpg

| caption = Portrait by John Vanderbank

| monarch1 = George II

| primeminister1 = Sir Robert Walpole

| office1 = Lord Chancellor

| term_start1 = 29 November 1733

| term_end1 = 14 February 1737

| predecessor1 = The Lord King

| successor1 = The Lord Hardwicke

| birth_date = 1685

| birth_place =

| death_date = {{death date|1737|2|14|df=y}}

| death_place = Lincoln's Inn Fields

| alma_mater = Oriel College, Oxford

| spouse =

| children =

| education = Eton College

}}

File:1stLordTalbot.jpg

Charles Talbot, 1st Baron Talbot, {{post-nominals|country=GBR|PC}} (1685{{snd}}14 February 1737) was a British lawyer and politician. He was Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain from 1733 to 1737.

Early life

Talbot was the eldest son of Rt. Rev. William Talbot, Bishop of Durham, a descendant of the 1st Earl of Shrewsbury, and Catherine King.

He was educated at Eton and Oriel College, Oxford, and became a fellow of All Souls College in 1704.

Career

He was called to the bar in 1711, and in 1717 was appointed solicitor general to the prince of Wales. Having been elected a member of the House of Commons in 1720, he became Solicitor General in 1726, and in 1733 he was made Lord Chancellor and raised to the peerage with the title of Lord Talbot, Baron of Hensol, in the County of Glamorgan.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

Talbot proved himself a capable equity judge during the three years of his occupancy of the Woolsack. Among his contemporaries he enjoyed the reputation of a wit; he was a patron of the poet James Thomson, who in The Seasons commemorated a son of his to whom he acted as tutor; Joseph Butler dedicated his famous Analogy to Talbot, as was Upton's edition of Epictetus. The title he assumed derived from the Hensol estate in Pendoylan, Glamorgan, which came to him through his wife.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

Talbot is remembered as one of the authors of the Yorke–Talbot slavery opinion, as a crown law officer in 1729. The opinion was sought to determinate the legality of slavery: Talbot and Philip Yorke opined that it was legal. The opinion was relied upon widely before the decision of Lord Mansfield in Somersett's Case.

Personal life

File:Tomb_of_Cecil_Talbot_in_the_churchyard_of_St_Nicholas.jpg

Talbot married, in the summer of 1708, Cecil Mathew (d. 1720), daughter of Charles Mathew of Castell y Mynach, Glamorganshire, and granddaughter and heiress of David Jenkins of Hensol. There he built a mansion in the Tudor style, known as the Castle. They had five sons, of whom three survived him:

After an illness during which the King and Queen enquired after his health every day, Talbot died on 14{{nbsp}}February 1737 at his home in Lincoln's Inn Fields.{{cite news |title=From Wye's Letter and the London Prints, Feb 15 |work=Newcastle Courant |date=19 February 1737 |access-date=26 January 2016 |url=http://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/viewer/bl/0000085/17370219/008/0002| via = British Newspaper Archive|url-access=subscription }} He was succeeded in the title by his second son, William (1710–1782).{{cite DNB|wstitle=Talbot, Charles (1685-1737)|volume=55}}

References

  • {{EB1911|wstitle=Talbot of Hensol, Charles Talbot, 1st Baron|volume=26|page=368}}
  • {{cite DNB|wstitle=Talbot, Charles (1685-1737)|volume=55}}
  • {{cite ODNB|first=M. |last=Macnair|title=Talbot, Charles, first Baron Talbot of Hensol (bap. 1685, d. 1737)|id=26923|ref=none}}
  • Lord Campbell, Lives of the Lord Chancellors and Keepers of the Great Seal (8 vols. London, 1845–69)
  • Edward Foss, The Judges of England (9 vols. London, 1848–64)
  • Lord Hervey, Memoirs of the Reign of George II ( 2 vols. London. 1848)
  • G. E. Cokayne, Complete Peerage, vol. vii. (London, 1896)

Notes

{{reflist}}

{{s-start}}

{{s-par|gb}}

{{succession box

| title = Member of Parliament for Tregony

| years = 1720–1722

| with = James Craggs to 1720

| with2 = Daniel Pulteney 1720{{snd}}March 1721

| with3 = John Merrill from March 1721

| before = Sir Edmund Prideaux
James Craggs

| after = James Cooke
John Merrill

}}

{{succession box

| title = Member of Parliament for City of Durham

| years = 1722–1734

| with = Thomas Conyers to 1727

| with2 = Robert Shafto 1727–1730

| with3 = John Shafto from 1730

| before = George Baker
Thomas Conyers

| after = Henry Lambton
John Shafto

}}

{{s-legal}}

{{s-bef|before= Clement Wearg}}

{{s-ttl|title= Solicitor General for England and Wales |years=1726–1733}}

{{s-aft|after= Dudley Ryder}}

{{s-off}}

{{succession box | title=Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain | before=The Lord King | after=The Lord Hardwicke | years=1733–1737}}

{{s-reg|gb}}

{{s-new | creation}}

{{s-ttl

| title = Baron Talbot

| years = 1733–1737

}}

{{s-aft | after=William Talbot }}

{{s-end}}

{{Lord chancellors}}

{{Walpole ministry}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Talbot, Charles Talbot, 1st Baron}}

Category:Lord chancellors of Great Britain

Category:Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for the City of Durham

Category:Members of the Privy Council of Great Britain

Category:Fellows of All Souls College, Oxford

Category:People educated at Eton College

Category:Alumni of Oriel College, Oxford

Category:Peers of Great Britain created by George II

Category:1685 births

Category:1737 deaths

Category:Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for Tregony

Category:British MPs 1715–1722

Category:British MPs 1722–1727

Category:British MPs 1727–1734

Charles

Category:Barons Talbot