Lord William Hamilton (c. 1706 – 11 July 1734) was a member of Parliament for

Lanarkshire Lanarkshire, also called the County of Lanark (; ), is a Counties of Scotland, historic county, Lieutenancy areas of Scotland, lieutenancy area and registration county in the Central Lowlands and Southern Uplands of Scotland. The county is no l ...

Early life

Lord William was the second oldest child of

James Hamilton, 4th Duke of Hamilton Lieutenant-General James Hamilton, 4th Duke of Hamilton and 1st Duke of Brandon (11 April 1658 – 15 November 1712), was a Scottish nobleman, soldier and politician. Hamilton was a major investor in the failed Darien scheme, which cost many of ...

, and his second wife Elizabeth (née Gerard). When the 4th Duke died in a duel, Lord William's eldest brother

James James may refer to: People * James (given name) * James (surname) * James (musician), aka Faruq Mahfuz Anam James, (born 1964), Bollywood musician * James, brother of Jesus * King James (disambiguation), various kings named James * Prince Ja ...

succeeded to the dukedom and became the head of the Jacobite interest in Scotland. In 1726, it was rumoured that Lord William would be given a troop of horse, when King George I recalled the Duke of Hamilton from Rome, where he had been seeing the

Old Pretender James Francis Edward Stuart (10 June 16881 January 1766), nicknamed the Old Pretender by Whigs or the King over the Water by Jacobites, was the House of Stuart claimant to the thrones of England, Ireland and Scotland from 1701 until ...

Marriage

Early in 1733, the already married Countess of Hertford became infatuated with Lord William and addressed a love poem to him, but he never responded; instead,

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (née Pierrepont; 15 May 168921 August 1762) was an English aristocrat, medical pioneer, writer, and poet. Born in 1689, Lady Mary spent her early life in England. In 1712, Lady Mary married Edward Wortley Montagu, ...

and the Baroness De La Warr conspired to write a poem on his behalf to reject Lady Hertford. In May that year, he

eloped Elopement is a marriage which is conducted in a sudden and secretive fashion, sometimes involving a hurried flight away from one's place of residence together with one's beloved with the intention of getting married without parental approval. A ...

with the beautiful but impoverished Frances Hawes, daughter of a stockbroker who lost all his fortune due to the South Sea Sufferer's Act 1721, without the duke's knowledge, having been led to believe he was marrying an heiress. The couple hurried to consummate the marriage to make it legally binding, fearing that her father might try to have it annulled, and it turned out to be a love match. Lord William was appointed Vice-Chamberlain to the queen,

Caroline of Ansbach Caroline of Brandenburg-Ansbach (Wilhelmina Charlotte Caroline; 1 March 1683 – 20 November 1737) was List of British royal consorts, Queen of Great Britain and Ireland and List of Hanoverian royal consorts, Electress of Hanover from 11 J ...

, the same year. As the second son, he was himself poor enough for Queen Caroline to refer to him and his wife as "handsome beggars". The couple had a stillborn child. Lord William returned to

to represent his eldest brother's interests and became member of Parliament on 16 May 1734, succeeding his uncle Archibald, but fell ill in June and died at his house in

Pall Mall, London Pall Mall is a street in the St James's area of the City of Westminster, Central London. It connects St James's Street to Trafalgar Square and is a section of the regional A4 road (England), A4 road. The street's name is derived f ...

, on 11 July. His widow was soon pressured to remarry, becoming Viscountess Vane. In her scandalous memoirs, she describes her grief over the loss of her first husband, which was ridiculed by

Horace Walpole Horatio Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford (; 24 September 1717 – 2 March 1797), better known as Horace Walpole, was an English Whig politician, writer, historian and antiquarian. He had Strawberry Hill House built in Twickenham, southwest London ...

References

External links

Lord William Hamilton
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hamilton, Lord William 1700s births 1734 deaths British MPs 1734–1741

William William is a masculine given name of Germanic languages, Germanic origin. It became popular in England after the Norman Conquest, Norman conquest in 1066,All Things William"Meaning & Origin of the Name"/ref> and remained so throughout the Middle ...

Younger sons of dukes Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for Scottish constituencies