GEORGE (WILLLIAM FREDERICK) IIL, the eldest son of Frederick Lewis, prince of Wales, was born on the 4th of June 1738. Ilia mother was Augusta, daughter of Frederick IL, duke of Saxe Gotha, born in 1719, married to the Prince of Wales on the 25th of April 1736. Their other children were-1, Augusta, born 1737, married in 1761 to Charles William Ferdinand, duke of Brnnswick Wolfenbiittel, died 1818; 3, Edward Augustus, born 1739, created Duke of York 1760, died 1767 ; 4, Elizabeth Caroline, born 1741, died 1759; 5, William Henry, born 1743, created Duke of Glouceater 1764, died 1805; 6, Henry Frederick, born 1745, created Duke of Cumber land 1766, died 1790 ; 7, Lonisa Anne, born 1749, died 1768 ; 8, Frede rick William, born 1750, died 1765 ; 9, Caroline Matilda, born 1751 (four months after her father's death), married to Christian VIL, king of Del:mark, 1766, died 1774.
On the death of his father on the 20th of March 1751, Prince George succeeded to the title of the Duke of Gloucester, but he was created Print,. of Wales on the 20th of ApriL His mother, under whose care he then remained, soon disengaged herself from, or was deserted by, 1,,r1 111/17 OP, Mr the leaders of the parliamentary opposition which had gathered around and made a tool of her husband ; but the king's habitual dislike to her appears never to have been overcome. It has been asserted that, encouraged by the manner in which the princess was treated by the rest of the royal family, the prince'a governor, Lord Harcourt, and his preceptor, Dr. Hayter, bishop of Norwich, exerted their influence to prejudice him both against the old friends of his father and against his mother herself. Another account is that the princess was prejudiced against the governor and the preceptor by Lord Bute, who now became her confidential adviser. [Brie; EARL or.] From whatever cause, Lord Harcourt and the bishop resigned their places in December 1752 ; the ground which they assigned was that Mr. Stone, the prince's sub governor (placed in that situation by the ministry), Mr. Scott, another tutor (who had been recommended to the late prince by Lord Bpling broke), and Mr. Creaset (who had been appointed treasurer of the prince'a household on the recommendation of his mother), were all concealed Jacobites. Stone, it was affirmed, had about twenty years before actually drunk the Pretender'a health in public. This charge, in which Dr. Johnson, bishop of Gloucester, and Mr. Murray, after
wards the celebrated Lord Mansfield, were also involved, was made the subject not only of an inquisition by the cabinet, but afterwards of a debate in the House of Lords. It appears to have rested on little or no evidence, and the charge, in itself an abundantly ridiculous one, wholly broke down under judicial investigation. Lord Waldegrave was soon after appointed the prince's governor, and Dr. John Thomas, bishop of Peterborough (afterwards of Salisbury, finally of Winchester), his preceptor ; and under their management and the more influential superintendence of Lord Bute, matters proceeded without further dissension. The prince was kept by his mother in great privacy, and permitted to associate only with a very small and select circle. Her royal highness seems to havo been actuated by good intentions ; she was anxious to preserve her son from the contamination of the fashion able profligacy of the day; and in this respect her method may be allowed to have been aucceasfuL But in regard to anything beyond this, both her own notions and those of the persona in whose hands she placed herself were narrow in the extreme. One of her complaints to Dodington against the Bishop of Norwich was that he insisted upon teaching the prince and his brothers logic, " which, as she was told, was a very odd study for children of their age, not to say of their condition." Bute iudeed appears to have felt the propriety of some political instruction being given to the heir-apparent; but his lordship, although he soon after adventured upon the office of prime minister, had himself scarcely any practical acquaintance with political matters, and had never made that department of knowledge his study. Iudependently therefore of hia party prejudices, which gave him a general bias towards what would now be called by most people anti quated and illiberal opinions, he was from mere ignorance of the subject a very unfit director of the political studies of the prince; nor were any of his coadjutors or subordinates much more competent. Their pupil accordingly can scarcely be said to the end of his life to have mastered even the details and conventional forma of political science. In 1759, when he had attained his majority, the prince took his seat in the House of Peers; but there is no record of his having taken any part in the business of the House..