Charles Stanhope, 3rd Earl Stanhope
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The Right Honourable The Earl Stanhope FRS |
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Portrait of Earl Stanhope by John Opie
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Member of Parliament for Wycombe with Robert Waller |
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In office 18 October 1780 – 1786 |
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| Preceded by | Thomas FitzMaurice |
| Succeeded by | Earl Wycombe |
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| Born | 3 August 1753 |
| Died | 15 December 1816 (aged 63) |
| Spouse(s) | Lady Hester Pitt Louisa Grenville |
Charles Stanhope, 3rd Earl Stanhope aka Charles Mahon, 3rd Earl Stanhope FRS (3 August 1753 – 15 December 1816) was a British and scientist. He was the father of the great traveller and Arabist Lady Hester Stanhope and brother-in-law of William Pitt the Younger. He is sometimes confused with an exact contemporary of his, Charles Stanhope, 3rd Earl of Harrington. His lean and awkward figure was extensively caricatured by James Sayers and James Gillray, reflecting his political opinions and his relationship with his children.
The son of Philip Stanhope, 2nd Earl Stanhope, he was educated at Eton and the University of Geneva. While in Geneva, he devoted himself to the study of mathematics under Georges-Louis Le Sage, and acquired from Switzerland an intense love of liberty.
In politics he was a democrat. As Lord Mahon he contested the Westminster without success in 1774, when only just of age; but from the general election of 1780 until his accession to the peerage on 7 March 1786 he represented through the influence of Lord Shelburne the Buckinghamshire borough of High Wycombe. During the sessions of 1783 and 1784 he supported William Pitt the Younger, whose sister, Lady Hester Pitt, he married on 19 December 1774. He was close enough to be singled out for ridicule in the Rolliad:
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