George Tierney

George Tierney PC (20 March 1761 – 25 January 1830) was an Anglo-Irish Whig politician.

Background and education
Born in Gibraltar, Tierney was the son of Thomas Tierney, a wealthy Irish merchant of London, who was living in Gibraltar as prize agent. He was sent to Eton and Peterhouse, Cambridge, where he took the degree of Law in 1784. He was called to the bar from Lincoln's Inn in the same year, but abandoned law and plunged into politics.  On 10 July 1789 he married Anna Maria Miller of Stapleton in Gloucestershire; she died in 1844.

Political career

Tierney contested Colchester in 1788, when both candidates received the same number of votes, but Tierney was declared elected. He was, however, defeated in 1790. He sat for Southwark from 1796 to 1806, and then represented in turn Athlone (1806–1807), Bandon (1807–1812), Appleby (1812–1818), and Knaresborough (1818–1830). 

When Charles James Fox seceded from the House of Commons, Tierney became a prominent opponent of William Pitt's policy. In May 1798, Pitt accused him of want of patriotism. A duel ensued at Putney Heath on Sunday, 27 May 1798; but neither combatant was injured. 

In 1803, Tierney, partly because peace had been ratified with France, and partly because Pitt was out of office, joined the ministry of Henry Addington as Treasurer of the Navy, and was created a Privy Councillor; but this alienated many of his supporters among the middle classes, and offended most of the influential Whigs. On the death of Fox, he joined (1806) the Grenville ministry as President of the Board of Control, with a seat in the cabinet, and thus brought himself once more into line with the Whigs. 

About a year after the death of George Ponsonby in 1817, Tierney reluctantly became the recognised leader of the opposition in the House of Commons. 
At first he was successful, with Whig gains being made at the 1818 general election. 
On 18 May 1819, Tierney moved a motion in the House of Commons for a committee on the state of the nation. This motion was defeated by 357 to 178, which was a division involving the largest number of MPs until the debates over the Reform bill in the early 1830s. 
Foord comments that "this defeat put an effective end to Tierney's leadership... Tierney did not disclaim the leadership till 23 Jan. 1821 ..., but he had ceased to exercise its functions since the great defeat".

In George Canning's ministry, he was Master of the Mint, and when Lord Goderich succeeded to the lead Tierney was admitted to the cabinet; but he was already suffering from ill-health and died suddenly at Savile Row, London.

References

Attribution

Sources
 Parliamentary Election Results in Ireland 1801–1922, edited by B.M. Walker (Royal Irish Academy 1978).
 His Majesty's Opposition 1714–1830, by Archibald S. Foord (Oxford University Press 1964)

External links 

 

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Category:1761 births
Category:1830 deaths
Category:Alumni of Peterhouse, Cambridge
Category:Duellists
Category:Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for English constituencies
Category:Members of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom
Category:Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for English constituencies
Category:Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for County Cork constituencies (1801–1922)
Category:Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for Athlone
Category:Masters of the Mint
Category:People educated at Eton College
Category:Whig (British political party) MPs
Category:Gibraltarian people
Category:UK MPs 1801–1802
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