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Portrait of Earl of Wilmington

Prime Ministers · 18th century

Earl of Wilmington

c. 1673–1743 · English

Whig

In office: 1742–1743

Spencer Compton, 1st Earl of Wilmington, was a long-serving Speaker of the House of Commons who succeeded Sir Robert Walpole as First Lord of the Treasury in 1742. A stopgap figure overshadowed by Lord Carteret during the War of the Austrian Succession, he died in office after little more than a year.

How to spot them

  • ▸Speaker of the House of Commons, 1715–1727
  • ▸Succeeded Walpole in 1742; died in office in 1743
  • ▸Wilmington, Delaware and Wilmington, North Carolina are named after him

In office

Speaker of the House of Commons, 1715–1727 (1715–1727)

Presided over the Commons under George I before becoming a peer

George II's first choice to lead the government in 1727, before deferring to Walpole (1727)

He famously had to ask Walpole to help draft the new king's speech

Stopgap successor after Walpole's fall (1742)

Nominal head of a ministry dominated by Lord Carteret and Henry Pelham

First Prime Minister to die in office (1743)

Died on 2 July 1743 during the War of the Austrian Succession

Quick-fire facts

  • •Created Baron Wilmington in 1728 and Earl of Wilmington in 1730
  • •Wilmington, Delaware was named in his honour in 1739
  • •He never married
  • •Born at Compton Wynyates, Warwickshire, a younger son of the Earl of Northampton

Drill it — 5 cards

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Sources