Robert Pitt

Robert Pitt (1680 – 21 May 1727) was a British politician who sat as Member of Parliament for Old Sarum from 1705, a pocket borough controlled by his family. He was the eldest son of Governor Thomas 'Diamond' Pitt, a businessman who had made a fortune while in India.^[1] Governor Pitt built the family's wealth on his acquisition of the Pitt Diamond which he then sold on for a large profit. The diamond was brought into Britain in the heel of Robert Pitt's boot.^[2] Unlike the rest of his family, who were Whigs, Robert Pitt became a Tory possibly partly in resistance to his domineering Whig father.^[3]

Pitt married Harriet Villiers,^[4] the daughter of Edward Villiers-FitzGerald and the Irish heiress Katherine FitzGerald.

Robert Pitt is best known for being the father of William Pitt the Elder, a British statesmen who led the country three times between 1756–57, 1757–62 and 1766–68. Another son Thomas Pitt was also an MP who sat for Okehampton. He was also brother-in-law to General James Stanhope, through his sister Lucy Pitt. His grandson William Pitt the Younger became Prime Minister in 1783.

Pitt inherited the family estate of Boconnoc following his father's death in 1726. However, he died the next year and the estate passed entirely to his son Thomas Pitt.

References

1. Black p.1-5
2. Brown p.15-16
3. Brown p.17
4. "Lady Harriet Villiers (I3347)". University of Stanford.

Bibliography

• Black, Jeremy. Pitt the Elder. Cambridge University Press, 1992.
• Brown, Peter Douglas. William Pitt, Earl of Chatham: The Great Commoner. Allen & Unwin, 1978.