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MONTAGU, George John, Visct. Hinchingbrooke (1773-1818).
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Biography Detail
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Constituency
Dates
Family and Education
b. 4 Feb. 1773, 2nd s. and event. h. of John Montagu*, 5th Earl of Sandwich, by 2nd w.; half-bro. of Hon. John George Montagu*. educ. Eton 1780-90; Trinity Coll. Camb. 1790-2. m. 9 July 1804, Lady Mary Anne Julia Louisa Harriet Lowry Corry, da. of Armar, 1st Earl of Belmore [I], 1s. 2da. suc. fa. as 6th Earl of Sandwich 6 June 1814.
Offices Held
Lt.-col. Hunts. militia 1794; lt. Mdx. yeomanry 1803; col. commdt. Hunts. vols. 1803, lt.-col. commdt. Hunts. militia 1808.
Biography
Hinchingbrooke’s elder half-brother had died in 1790 and he was not of age to succeed his father to the county seat in 1792, but it was kept warm for him by Lancelot Brown. In Parliament, where he apparently never spoke and was not a steady attender, he supported successive administrations until 1806. He voted for Pitt’s assessed taxes, 4 Jan. 1798. Lady Bessborough wrote of him later that year: ‘He is what is generally reckoned remarkably clever—very reserved, and seldom speaking but en epigramme, and then sparing neither friend nor foe in the severe but certainly clever sarcasms he deals about him’. In 1802 he visited France.
The Grenville ministry deprived his father of his place in February 1806 and Hinchingbrooke voted against them in the divisions of 3 Mar. and 30 Apr. They believed him hostile to the abolition of the slave trade. His father being restored to office in 1807, he again supported government. The Whigs noted him as ‘against the Opposition’ in 1810, when he voted with ministers throughout on the Scheldt inquiry, 23 Jan.-30 Mar., and against the release of the radical Gale Jones, 16 Apr. He was in the government minority on the Regency, 1 Jan. 1811. He voted against Catholic relief, 22 June 1812, and in the ensuing Parliament, listed a Treasury supporter, he materialized on 24 May 1813 to help defeat the Catholic bill by his vote. When he succeeded to the title in 1814, his heir was a child and there was no member of the family available to hold the county seat. He died in Italy, 21 May 1818.
J. Wilson, Biog. Index (1808), 295; Leveson Gower, ii. 222.
