Robert Hampden-Trevor, 1st Viscount Hampden (17 February 1706 – 22 August 1783) was a British diplomat at

The Hague The Hague ( ; nl, Den Haag or ) is a city and municipality of the Netherlands, situated on the west coast facing the North Sea. The Hague is the country's administrative centre and its seat of government, and while the official capital of ...

and then joint

Postmaster General A Postmaster General, in Anglosphere countries, is the chief executive officer of the postal service of that country, a ministerial office responsible for overseeing all other postmasters. The practice of having a government official respons ...

Origins

He was the eldest son of the second marriage of his father

Thomas Trevor, 1st Baron Trevor Thomas Trevor, 1st Baron Trevor, (8 March 165819 June 1730) was a British judge and politician who was Attorney-General and later Lord Privy Seal. Biography Trevor was the second son of John Trevor (1626–1672). and was educated privately bef ...

to Anne Bernard, née Weldon.

Career

He studied at

The Queen's College, Oxford The Queen's College is a Colleges of the University of Oxford, constituent college of the University of Oxford, England. The college was founded in 1341 by Robert de Eglesfield in honour of Philippa of Hainault. It is distinguished by its pred ...

, graduated in 1725 and then became a fellow of

All Souls College, Oxford All Souls College (official name: College of the Souls of All the Faithful Departed) is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in England. Unique to All Souls, all of its members automatically become fellows (i.e., full members of t ...

. In 1729 he was appointed as a clerk in the Secretary of State's office. In 1734 he went to the United Provinces as secretary to the embassy under Horatio Walpole. He succeeded as head of the embassy in 1739, initially as Envoy-Extraordinary, and from 1741 as Minister-Plenipotentiary. During this time he maintained a regular correspondence with

Horace Walpole Horatio Walpole (), 4th Earl of Orford (24 September 1717 – 2 March 1797), better known as Horace Walpole, was an English writer, art historian, man of letters, antiquarian, and Whigs (British political party), Whig politician. He had Strawb ...

. IN 1750 he was appointed a Commissioner of the Revenue in Ireland. He took the additional surname of Hampden in 1754, on succeeding to the estates of his relative

John Hampden John Hampden (24 June 1643) was an English landowner and politician whose opposition to arbitrary taxes imposed by Charles I made him a national figure. An ally of Parliamentarian leader John Pym, and cousin to Oliver Cromwell, he was one of th ...

. Twelve years after he had succeeded his brother as

Baron Trevor Baron Trevor is a title that has been created three times. It was created first in 1662 in the Peerage of Ireland along with the viscountcy of Dungannon. For information on this creation, which became extinct in 1706, see Viscount Dungannon. T ...

, he was created, on 14 June 1776,

Viscount Hampden Viscount Hampden is a title that has been created twice, once in the Peerage of Great Britain and once in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. The first creation came in the Peerage of Great Britain when the diplomat and politician Robert Hampde ...

, of

Great and Little Hampden Great and Little Hampden is a civil parish in Buckinghamshire, England, about three miles south-east of Princes Risborough. It incorporates the villages of Great Hampden and Little Hampden, and the hamlets of Green Hailey and Hampden Row. Grea ...

in the County of Buckingham. From 1759 to 1765 he was joint

. He wrote some

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

poems Poetry (derived from the Greek ''poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings in a ...

which were published at

Parma Parma (; egl, Pärma, ) is a city in the northern Italian region of Emilia-Romagna known for its architecture, Giuseppe Verdi, music, art, prosciutto (ham), Parmigiano-Reggiano, cheese and surrounding countryside. With a population of 198,292 ...

in 1792 as ''Poemata Hampdeniana''. His second son,

John Hampden-Trevor, 3rd Viscount Hampden John Hampden-Trevor, 3rd Viscount Hampden PC (24 February 1748 – 9 September 1824), was a British diplomat. He was the younger son of Robert Hampden, 1st Viscount Hampden and was educated at Westminster School and Christ Church, Oxford. H ...

(1749–1824), died only three weeks after he had succeeded his elder brother

Thomas Hampden-Trevor, 2nd Viscount Hampden Thomas may refer to: People * List of people with given name Thomas * Thomas (name) * Thomas (surname) * Saint Thomas (disambiguation) * Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) Italian Dominican friar, philosopher, and Doctor of the Church * Thomas the A ...

, when the titles became extinct.

References

*William Carr, "Trevor, Robert Hampden-, first Viscount Hampden (1706–1783)", rev. Martyn J. Powell, ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', (Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Jan 2008

accessed 10 Aug 2008. {{DEFAULTSORT:Hampden, Robert Hampden-Trevor, 1st Viscount 1706 births 1783 deaths 1 Alumni of The Queen's College, Oxford Diplomatic peers Fellows of All Souls College, Oxford United Kingdom Postmasters General Ambassadors of Great Britain to the Netherlands