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Portrait of Henry Addington

Prime Ministers · 19th century

Henry Addington

1757–1844 · English

Tory

In office: 1801–1804

Henry Addington, later 1st Viscount Sidmouth, was Speaker of the House of Commons before succeeding Pitt the Younger as Prime Minister in 1801. He made the short-lived Peace of Amiens with Napoleonic France and restructured income tax, but was mocked as a mediocrity and replaced by Pitt in 1804. As Home Secretary from 1812 to 1822 he became notorious for repression, including the Six Acts after Peterloo.

How to spot them

  • ▸Treaty of Amiens (1802)
  • ▸Speaker of the Commons 1789–1801; son of Chatham's physician, nicknamed 'the Doctor'
  • ▸'Pitt is to Addington as London is to Paddington'
  • ▸As Viscount Sidmouth, Home Secretary at the time of Peterloo, the Six Acts and the Cato Street Conspiracy

In office

The Treaty of Amiens (1802)

Brief peace with Napoleonic France; war resumed in May 1803

Speaker of the House of Commons, 1789–1801 (1789–1801)

Left the Speaker's chair to become Prime Minister after Pitt resigned

'Pitt is to Addington as London is to Paddington' (c. 1802)

George Canning's jibe at his mediocrity

Income tax reintroduced with deduction at source (1803)

Abolished after the peace in 1802, it returned in a more efficient form when war resumed

Home Secretary at the time of Peterloo and the Six Acts (1819)

As Lord Sidmouth he backed tough measures against radical meetings and publications

Quick-fire facts

  • •His father, Dr Anthony Addington, was physician to Pitt the Elder, hence the nickname 'the Doctor'
  • •Created Viscount Sidmouth in 1805
  • •Home Secretary from 1812 to 1822
  • •The Cato Street Conspiracy of 1820 plotted to murder the whole cabinet while he was Home Secretary
  • •A boyhood friend of Pitt the Younger
  • •Lived to 86, dying in 1844

Drill it — 6 cards

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Sources