Charles Montagu, 1st Earl of Halifax, was an English statesman and poet. He was the grandson of the 1st Earl of Manchester and was eventually ennobled himself, first as Baron Halifax in 1700 and later as Earl of Halifax in 1714. As one of the three members of the so-called Whig Junto, Montagu played a major role in English politics under the reigns of King William III and Queen Anne. He served as Chancellor of the Exchequer from 1694 to 1699 and as First Lord of the Treasury from 1714 until his death the following year. He was also president of the Royal Society and a patron of the scientist Isaac Newton.
Thomas Osborne, 1st Duke of Leeds, was an English Tory politician and peer. During the reign of Charles II of England, he was the leading figure in the English government for roughly five years in the mid-1670s. Osborne fell out of favour due to corruption and other scandals. He was impeached and eventually imprisoned in the Tower of London for five years until James II of England acceded in 1685. In 1688, he was one of the Immortal Seven who invited William of Orange to depose James II during the Glorious Revolution. Osborne was again the leading figure in England's government for a few years in the early 1690s before dying in 1712.
Robert Harley, 1st Earl of Oxford and Earl Mortimer, KG PC FRS was an English statesman and peer of the late Stuart and early Georgian periods. He began his career as a Whig, before defecting to a new Tory ministry. He was raised to the peerage of Great Britain as an earl in 1711. Between 1711 and 1714 he served as Lord High Treasurer, effectively Queen Anne's chief minister. He has been called a prime minister, although it is generally accepted that the de facto first minister to be a prime minister was Robert Walpole in 1721.
Admiral of the Fleet Edward Russell, 1st Earl of Orford, PC was a Royal Navy officer and politician. After serving as a junior officer at the Battle of Solebay during the Third Anglo-Dutch War, he served as a captain in the Mediterranean Sea in operations against the Barbary pirates.
The first Parliament of the Kingdom of Great Britain was established in 1707 after the merger of the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland. It was in fact the 4th and last session of the 2nd Parliament of Queen Anne suitably renamed: no fresh elections were held in England or in Wales, and the existing members of the House of Commons of England sat as members of the new House of Commons of Great Britain. In Scotland, prior to the union coming into effect, the Scottish Parliament appointed sixteen peers and 45 Members of Parliaments to join their English counterparts at Westminster.
John Smith (1656–1723) of Tedworth House, Hampshire, was an English politician who sat in the English and British House of Commons between 1678 and 1723. He served as Speaker and twice as Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Admiral Peregrine Osborne, 2nd Duke of Leeds, styled Viscount Osborne between 1673 and 1689, Earl of Danby between 1689 and 1694 and Marquess of Carmarthen between 1694 and 1712, was an English Tory politician.
Major General Charles Trelawny, also spelt 'Trelawney', was an English soldier from Cornwall who played a prominent part in the 1688 Glorious Revolution, and was a Member of Parliament for various seats between 1685 and 1713.
Peregrine Bertie was an English politician, the second son of Montagu Bertie, 2nd Earl of Lindsey. A member of the court party, later the Tories, he sat for Stamford from 1665 to 1679, and from 1685 to 1687. Most active in Parliament during the 1670s, he and other members of his family were consistent political supporters of Bertie's brother-in-law, the Duke of Leeds throughout several reigns. While he never achieved significant political stature, he did hold several minor government offices: he was a captain in the Royal Regiment of Horse Guards until 1679, and a commissioner of the Alienation Office and a customs officer. The death of his wife's brother brought the couple an estate in Waldershare, Kent, where Bertie ultimately settled. He sat for Westbury after the Glorious Revolution, but showed little political activity compared to others of his family. Bertie stood down from Parliament in 1695 and died in 1701, leaving two daughters.
Sir William Ashhurst was an English banker, merchant and Whig politician who sat in the English and British House of Commons from 1689 to 1710. He also served as the Lord Mayor of London in 1693.
Peregrine Bertie DL was a British politician, the second son of Robert Bertie, 3rd Earl of Lindsey.
John Pulteney, of St James's, Westminster and Harefield, Middlesex, was an English lawyer and Whig politician who sat in the English and British House of Commons from 1695 to 1710.
The 1695 English general election was the first to be held under the terms of the Triennial Act 1694, which required parliament to be dissolved and fresh elections called at least every three years. This measure helped to fuel partisan rivalry over the coming decades, with the electorate in a constant state of excitement and the Whigs and Tories continually trying to gain the upper hand. Despite the potential for manipulation of the electorate, as was seen under Robert Walpole and his successors, with general elections held an average of every other year, and local and central government positions frequently changing hands between parties, it was impossible for any party or government to be certain of electoral success in the period after 1694, and election results were consequently genuinely representative of the views of at least the section of the population able to vote.
Sir Henry Belasyse, also spelt Bellasis, was an English military officer from County Durham, who also sat as MP for a number of constituencies between 1695 and 1715.
Sir Rushout Cullen, 3rd Baronet (1661–1730), of Upton, Ratley, Warwickshire and Isleham, Cambridgeshire, was an English landowner and Whig politician who sat in the English and British House of Commons between 1697 and 1710.
John Berkeley, 4th Viscount Fitzhardinge of Bruton, Somerset was an English courtier, treasury official, army officer and politician who sat in the English and British House of Commons from 1690 to 1710.
The 3rd Parliament of William III was summoned by William III of England on 12 October 1695 and assembled on 22 November 1695. It was the first election to be contested under the terms of the new Triennial Act passed in the previous Parliament which, amongst other things, limited the duration of the Parliament to 3 years. Its composition was 257 Whigs, 203 Tories and 53 others; Paul Foley, a Country Whig and member for Hereford, was installed as Speaker of the House of Commons.
The 4th Parliament of William III was summoned by William III of England on 13 July 1698 and assembled on 24 August 1698. The party political constitution of the new House of Commons was 246 Whigs, 208 Tories and 59 others. Sir Thomas Littleton, the Whig member for Woodstock, was elected Speaker of the House. The house was divided between the pro-government faction led by the Whig Junto and a Country Whig-Tory alliance, the New Country party, led by Robert Harley.
Bartholomew Van Homrigh, also Vanhomrigh was a Polish-born Irish merchant, estate agent and politician who served as the 33rd Lord Mayor of Dublin and twice MP for Londonderry City in William III's Irish Parliaments. Surviving correspondence between 1691-1700 with Godert de Ginkel, the 1st Earl of Athlone, for whom Van Homrigh served as estate agent after the Williamite War in Ireland, detail later troop movements, and various legal and financial updates.
Richard Bellew, 3rd Baron Bellew of Duleek was an Irish soldier, peer and politician.
