1756 - 1761

William Pitt 'the Elder' (1708-1778) made a name for himself as one of the young Turks who launched an effective opposition to Walpole in the late 1730s. His vaunted patriotism suffered a blow when he took office in 1746 under Henry Pelham, but after Pelham's death he returned to opposition and popularity with telling criticisms of the adequacy of the Newcastle government's preparations for war with France. After the military disasters of the beginning of the Seven Years' War and the government's resignation in 1756, Pitt seemed to be the only person who could attract the confidence of the House of Commons; the King, though, found him unbearable, and dismissed him at the first possible opportunity; Pitt organised a country-wide popular campaign demanded his reinStatement. George II had to accept, and a compromise was arranged in which Newcastle became formal Leader of a ministry whose effective Leader in the Commons was Pitt. Pitt's Leadership of the Commons and the country during the war was highly effective, but the spell was broken by the accession of George III in 1760, who was determined to bring an end to the war, as well as by a mysteriously debilitating illness which was to affect Pitt for the rest of his life. Pitt resigned in 1761, and spent the next years in semi-retirement. He emerged from it in 1766-68 to lead a government from the Lords as Earl of Chatham, but never repeated the successes of his war ministry.