Memoirs of Celebrated Etonians (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1902. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER XIV. WILLIAM PITT, EARL OF CHATHAM. During the more than four centuries that Eton has been the prolific mother of the gifted and the illustrious, she has given birth to no nobler son than the elder William Pitt, "the Great Commoner," as he was affectionately styled by his contemporaries, "the great Earl of Chatham" of our own time. William Pitt was born on the 15th of November, 1708. According to his biographer, the Rev. F. Thackeray, he first saw the light in the parish of St. James, Westminster; while Seward, in his "Anecdotes of Distinguished Persons," no less confidently states that he was bor n at Stratford House, at the foot of the fortress of Old Sarum, in Wiltshire.1 The former statement we believe to comprise the truth. His father was Robert Pitt, Esq., of Boconnoc, in Cornwall, one of the clerks of the green cloth to George II. when Prince of Wales, and member of Parliament successively for Old Sarum and Okehampton. He died in 1727, apparently about two years after his son must have left Eton. Mr. Pitt's mother, who survived her husband nine years, was Harriet Villiers, sister of John, Lord Grandison. Through her he was lineally descended from Sir George Villiers, father of the powerful favourite, George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham; as likewise was his schoolfellow, Henry Fielding, through his ancestress, Susan, Countess of Denbigh, sister of the great duke. Mr. Pitt's paternal grandfather, it should be mentioned, was the well-known Governor Pitt, who purchased in the East Indies, for. 20,400, the famous Pitt diamond, weighing 127 carats, which he afterward sold for. 135,000 to the King of France. 1 An engraved view of Stratford House forms the frontispiece to Seward's second volume. Of William Pitt's Eton days we have little ...