William Legge, 2nd Earl of Dartmouth


William Legge, 2nd Earl of Dartmouth, PC, FRS, styled as Viscount Lewisham from 1732 to 1750, was a British statesman who is most remembered for his part in the government before and during the American Revolution, and as the namesake of Dartmouth College.

Background

Dartmouth was the son of William Legge, 1st Earl of Dartmouth. His mother was Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Arthur Kaye, 3rd Baronet. Having entered Trinity College, Oxford, in 1748, he succeeded his grandfather in the earldom in 1750.
, 1752–56, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire

Political career

Lord Dartmouth was Secretary of State for the Colonies from 1772 to 1775. Lord Dartmouth's arrival in the Colonies was celebrated by Phillis Wheatley's famous poem, "To the Right Honourable William, Earl of Dartmouth."
It was Lord Dartmouth who, in 1764, at the suggestion of Thomas Haweis, recommended John Newton, the former slave trader and author of "Amazing Grace", to Edmund Keene, the Bishop of Chester. He was instrumental in Newton's acceptance for the Anglican ministry.
In 1772, in correspondence with Sir William Johnson, the Superintendent of Northern Indian Affairs in America, he suggested that there was no reasonable way the British Government could support new trade regulations with the Indians. He sympathised with Johnson's arguments but stated the Colonies did not seem inclined to concur with any new regulations.

Philanthropy

Lord Dartmouth was a large donor to and the leading trustee for the English trust that would finance the establishment of the Moor's Charity School, in Lebanon, Connecticut by Eleazar Wheelock to educate and convert the Indians. Wheelock subsequently founded Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, naming the school in Lord Dartmouth's honour, in hopes of getting his financial support. Lord Dartmouth refused. In London, Lord Dartmouth supported the new Foundling Hospital, a charitable institution for the care and maintenance of London's abandoned children. He served as a vice-president of the organisation from 1755 until his death. The famous painter Sir Joshua Reynolds painted the Earl's portrait and donated it to the hospital. The portrait is still in the Foundling Hospital Collection and can be seen at the Foundling Museum in London. He was admitted a Fellow of the Royal Society on 7 November 1754.

Marriage and children

Lord Dartmouth married Frances Catherine Nicholl, daughter of Sir Charles Gounter Nicoll, on 11 January 1755. They had six children together:
Dartmouth died at Blackheath, Kent, on 15 July 1801, in the seventy-first year of his age, and was buried in Trinity Church in the Minories on 3 August 1801.
He was succeeded by his eldest son, George. Lady Dartmouth died in July 1805. The family lived at Sandwell Hall in Sandwell Valley.