ORFORD, ROBERT WALPOLE, IST EARL OF (1676 generally known as SIR ROBERT WALPOLE, prime minister of England from 1721 to 1742, third son of Robert Walpole, M.P., of Houghton in Norfolk, was born at Houghton on Aug. 26, 1676. He was an Eton colleger from 1690 to 1695 and was admitted at King's College, Cambridge, as scholar on April 22, 1696. At this time he was destined, as a younger son, for the church, but the death of two elder brothers made him heir to an estate producing about L2,000 a year, whereupon he resigned his scholarship and was withdrawn from the university.
Walpole sat in parliament at first for the family borough of Castle Rising (I 70!) and then for King's Lynn, which he rep resented until he was raised to the peerage. In June 1705 he was appointed one of the council to Prince George of Denmark, the inactive husband of Queen Anne, and then lord high admiral of England. On Feb. 25, 1708, he succeeded Henry St. John as secretary at war, and was thus brought into immediate contact with the duke of Marlborough and the queen. With this post he held for a short time (1710) the treasurership of the navy, and was admitted to the inmost councils of the ministry. He could not dissuade Godolphin from the impeachment of Sacheverell, and when the committee was appointed in Dec. 1709 to draw up the impeachment Walpole was nominated one of the man agers for the House of Commons. Walpole shared in the general wreck of the Whig party, and in spite of the flattery, followed by the threats, of Harley he took his place with his friends in opposition. Both in debate and in the pamphlet press he vindi cated Godolphin from the charge of peculation, and in revenge for his zeal his political opponents brought against him an accusa tion of personal corruption. On these charges he was in 1712 expelled from the House and spent a short time in the Tower. His prison cell became the rendezvous of the Whigs, while his praises were sung in popular ballads. In the last parliament of Queen Anne he defended Sir Richard Steele against the attacks of the Tories.
After the accession of George, the Whigs for nearly half a century retained the control of English politics. Walpole, who had supported the Hanoverian succession, obtained the lucrative post of paymaster-general of the forces in the administration which was formed under the nominal rule of Lord Halifax, but of which Stanhope and Townshend were the guiding spirits.
Walpole was chairman of the committee appointed to inquire into the acts of the late ministry, and especially into the Peace of Utrecht, with a view to the impeachment of Harley and St. John. Halifax died on May 19, 1715, and after a short interval Walpole became first lord of the treasury and chancellor of the exchequer (Oct. II, 1715). Jealousies, however, prevailed among the Whigs, and the German favourites of the new monarch quickly showed their discontent with the heads of the ministry. Towns hend was forced to resign his secretaryship of state for the vice royalty of Ireland, hut he never crossed the sea to Dublin, and the support which Sunderland and Stanhope, the new advisers of the king, received from him and from Walpole was so grudging that Townshend was dismissed from the lord-lieutenancy (April 9, 1717), and Walpole on the next morning withdrew from the ministry. They plunged into opposition with unflagging energy, and in resisting the measure by which it was proposed to limit the royal prerogative in the creation of peerages (March—Dec. 1718) Walpole exerted all his powers. This display of ability brought about a partial reconciliation of the two sections of the Whigs. To Townshend was given the presidency of the council, and Walpole re-assumed the paymastership of the forces (1720).
On the financial crash which followed the failure of the South Sea scheme, Walpole was regarded by the general public as the indispensable man. Stanhope and James Craggs, the two secre taries of state, died, John Aislabie, the chancellor of the exchequer, was committed to the Tower, and Sunderland, though acquitted of corruption, was compelled to resign. Walpole, at first lord of the treasury and chancellor of the exchequer (April 1721), be came with Townshend responsible for the government (though for some years they had to contend with the influence of Car teret), the danger arising from the panic in South Sea stock was averted by its amalgamation with Bank and East India stock, and during the rest of the reign of George I. they remained at the head of the ministry. The hopes of the Jacobites, which revived with these financial troubles, were disappointed. Atterbury, their bold est leader, was exiled in 1723 ; Bolingbroke sued for pardon, and was permitted to return to his own country. Peace was assured by a treaty between England, Prussia and France concluded at Hanover in 1725.