Henry Fox, Lord Holland

Joseph Haynes after William Hogarth
The Right Hon. Henry Fox, Lord Holland
London, May 19th. 1782
Etching
240 x 180 mm
Trimmed to platemark.
£100
Henry Fox, 1st Baron Holland, (1705-1774), devoted supporter of Sir Robert Walpole and together his most docile pupil in the arts of high politics, was a member of the cabinets of the Duke of Newcastle and the Earl of Bute. As speaker he could take on Pitt. For putting through in parliament in 1763 the Treaty of Paris, which together with the Treaty of Hubertusburg ended the Seven Years’ War, he was raised Baron Holland of Foxley, Wiltshire. Two years later, however, Fox was forced out of the office of the Paymaster of the Forces he had held since 1757 and which had earned him a fortune. Though he could clean himself from the accusation of fraud in the years following, the further promotion to earldom was denied to him and he died sorely disappointed in Holland House as “the most thoroughly hated statesman of his day”.