Addington

Addington, Henry, Viscount Sidmouth, son of Lord Chatham's medical adviser, born at Reading 1757. After being educated at Winchester and Oxford, he was called to the bar, but immediately entered Parliament (1784) as M.P. for Devizes. "The Doctor" was one of Pitt's intimates, and in 1789 was elected Speaker, in which capacity for twelve years he displayed tact and dignity. In 1801, when Pitt went out of office owing to the king's obduracy as to Catholic Emancipation, Addington came in at the head of "the King's Friends," and concluded the short-lived Peace of Amiens. The combination of Pitt and Fox, to urge on Parliament more adequate plans for national defence, ousted the Cabinet of Courtiers in 1804, but Addington returned next year as President of the Council, with a peerage. In 1805 his attitude towards Lord Melville compelled him once more to resign, but on Pitt's death he came back for a year as Privy Seal and Lord President. In 1812 he resumed the latter post under Perceval, but soon exchanged it for the Home Office, which he held for ten years in Lord Liverpool's ministry. He displayed his courage, consistency, and ill-judged loyalty in one continuous effort to suppress the liberties of the people, and to him the "Manchester or Peterloo Massacre" of 1819 was largely due. From 1822 to 1824 he sat in the Cabinet without a portfolio, and then retiring into private life he attained the venerable age of 87, dying Feb. 15, 1844.