Richard Pennant, 1st Baron Penrhyn (1737 – 21 January 1808), was a Welsh politician and nobleman who served as an MP in the

British Parliament The Parliament of the United Kingdom is the supreme legislative body of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories. It meets at the Palace of Westminster, London. It alone possesses legislative suprem ...

, representing

Petersfield Petersfield is a market town and civil parish in the East Hampshire district of Hampshire, England. It is north of Portsmouth. The town has its own railway station on the Portsmouth Direct line, the mainline rail link connecting Portsmouth a ...

and

Liverpool Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a populat ...

for 29 years between 1761 and 1790. He was the owner of

Penrhyn Castle Penrhyn Castle ( cy, Castell Penrhyn) is a country house in Llandygai, Bangor, Gwynedd, North Wales, constructed in the style of a Norman castle. The Penrhyn estate was founded by Ednyfed Fychan. In the 15th century his descendent Gwilym a ...

, an estate on the outskirts on Bangor,

North Wales North Wales ( cy, Gogledd Cymru) is a region of Wales, encompassing its northernmost areas. It borders Mid Wales to the south, England to the east, and the Irish Sea to the north and west. The area is highly mountainous and rural, with Snowdonia N ...

. Pennant was also an absentee owner of six sugar plantations and slaves in

Jamaica Jamaica (; ) is an island country situated in the Caribbean Sea. Spanning in area, it is the third-largest island of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean (after Cuba and Hispaniola). Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, and west of His ...

. In Parliament, Pennant was a staunch

proslavery Proslavery is a support for slavery. It is found in the Bible, in the thought of ancient philosophers, in British writings and in American writings especially before the American Civil War but also later through 20th century. Arguments in favor o ...

advocate who opposed the abolitionist movement. In

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the Bristol Channel to the south. It had a population in ...

, Pennant was a major figure in the development of the Welsh slate industry. He received an

Irish peerage The Peerage of Ireland consists of those titles of nobility created by the English monarchs in their capacity as Lord or King of Ireland, or later by monarchs of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. It is one of the five divis ...

from

King George III George III (George William Frederick; 4 June 173829 January 1820) was King of Great Britain and of Ireland from 25 October 1760 until the union of the two kingdoms on 1 January 1801, after which he was King of the United Kingdom of Great Br ...

in 1783, and died in 1808, leaving his estates to George Hay Dawkins.

Early life

Pennant was the second son of John Pennant, a

-based merchant, and his wife Bonella Hodges, a wealthy heiress from the British

colony of Jamaica The Crown Colony of Jamaica and Dependencies was a British colony from 1655, when it was captured by the English Protectorate from the Spanish Empire. Jamaica became a British colony from 1707 and a Crown colony in 1866. The Colony was prima ...

. He was educated at

Newcome's School Newcome's School was a fashionable boys' school in Hackney, then to the east of London, founded in the early 18th century. A number of prominent Whig families sent their sons there. The school closed in 1815, and the buildings were gutted in 182 ...

in Hackney, and was admitted to

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge or Oxford. ...

on 18 January 1754.

Political career

Pennant entered the

House of Commons The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. T ...

as an MP representing

at the 1761 general election alongside William Jolliffe under an arrangement with William Beckford. He intended to represent

in the House of Commons at the next election, but when a vacancy arose in 1767, he was returned unopposed at a

by-election A by-election, also known as a special election in the United States and the Philippines, a bye-election in Ireland, a bypoll in India, or a Zimni election (Urdu: ضمنی انتخاب, supplementary election) in Pakistan, is an election used to f ...

on 4 December 1767. He successfully contested Liverpool in 1768, and again in 1774. In the 1780 general election, he was defeated at Liverpool. On the recommendation of

Charles James Fox Charles James Fox (24 January 1749 – 13 September 1806), styled ''The Honourable'' from 1762, was a prominent British Whig statesman whose parliamentary career spanned 38 years of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. He was the arch-riv ...

, he was granted an

from

and created 1st Baron Penrhyn of Penrhyn in the county of Lough,

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

in 1783. Holding an Irish peerage did not disqualify him from standing for elections to the House of Commons as, both before and after the Acts of Union, Irish peerages were used to create peers who could not sit in the

House of Lords The House of Lords, also known as the House of Peers, is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Membership is by appointment, heredity or official function. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminste ...

but who could do so in the House of Commons. In the 1784 general election, Penrhyn again contested Liverpool and was returned as MP to Parliament. In the ensuing parliament he is said to have made over thirty speeches relating to the

West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greate ...

and trade in Liverpool. There was a debate on the

slave trade Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...

in May 1788, and it was reported that the only two MP's who spoke in favor of the trade were Penrhyn and Bamber Gascoyne. He stood again for Liverpool at the 1790 general election and was ahead in the poll, but withdrew in favour of Sir Banastre Tarleton, who was also a staunch proslavery advocate.

Estates and involvement in slate industry

Pennant owned numerous properties in

Caernarfonshire , HQ= County Hall, Caernarfon , Map= , Image= Flag , Motto= Cadernid Gwynedd (The strength of Gwynedd) , year_start= , Arms= ''Coat of arms of Caerna ...

, half of which he inherited from his wife, Ann Susannah Pennant ''née'' Warburton, the daughter of

British Army The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...

officer Hugh Warburton; the other half he inherited from his father, who was Warburton's business partner. As the owner of

Penrhyn quarry The Penrhyn quarry is a slate quarry located near Bethesda, North Wales. At the end of the nineteenth century it was the world's largest slate quarry; the main pit is nearly long and deep, and it was worked by nearly 3,000 quarrymen. It has ...

, he was prominent in the development of the Welsh slate industry. Pennant was also the absentee owner of six sugar plantations in Jamaica, which were operated with the forced labour of over six hundred

enslaved Africans The Atlantic slave trade, transatlantic slave trade, or Euro-American slave trade involved the transportation by slave traders of enslaved African people, mainly to the Americas. The slave trade regularly used the triangular trade route and i ...

. Despite this, Pennant never visited the island, managing them from his estates in Britain. The wealth Pennant generated from his sugar plantations were invested by him into road and dock construction, alongside the Welsh slate industry- most prominently the Penrhyn quarry.

Death and legacy

On his death on 21 January 1808, Penrhyn's entire estate went to his second cousin, politician George Hay Dawkins, who subsequently adopted the surname of Dawkins-Pennant. Dawkins' daughter Juliana and her husband were named as co-heirs of the estate on the condition that they also took the surname Pennant, which they duly accepted. Dawkins' son-in-law, Edward Gordon Douglas, was later created 1st Baron Penrhyn of Llandygai. The widowed Lady Penrhyn moved to a home in Grosvenor Square.

Early life

Political career

Estates and involvement in slate industry

Death and legacy

References

Citations

Books

Websites

Further reading