Yes, Prime Minister

Sir Robert Walpole remains Britain’s longest-serving Prime Minister; in the modern era, Margaret Thatcher’s 11 years was the longest continuous run. Worldwide, the longestserving PM is Cambodia’s Hun Sen, who took office in 1985 George Canning is the shortest-serving British PM; he died from pneumonia a mere 119 days after taking office in April 1827 Spencer Perceval (1809–12) was shot dead in the lobby of the House of Commons by an aggrieved Liverpool merchant, John Bellingham, who was later hanged for his pains

The Duke of Wellington described his first cabinet meeting as PM, in 1834, as: ‘An extraordinary affair. I gave them their orders and they wanted to stay and discuss them’ It’s claimed that

Sir Robert Peel’s ambitious father said: ‘Bob, you dog, if you do not become Prime Minister someday I’ll disinherit you.’ Peel, who was MP for Cashel, Co Tipperary, was Home Secretary twice, famously starting the Metropolitan Police, hence ‘bobby’ and ‘peeler’. His career as PM, however, was defined by the repeal of the

Corn Laws in 1846 after a fivemonth row in the Commons William Pitt the Elder, who suffered badly from gout, was a renowned and fearless orator; his maiden speech was so critical of the establishment that Walpole removed his military commission ‘to muzzle this terrible young cornet of horse’ Benjamin Disraeli’s maiden speech was also a disaster, but he concluded: ‘I will sit down now, but the time will come when you will hear me.’ Outside politics, he wrote 14 novels, some of which were heartily criticised; his last, unfinished, was seen as an

unflattering caricature of his bitter rival, William Gladstone Known for the eponymous bag, Gladstone’s political life began with the Tories, but he was a Liberal by the time the first of his record four premierships started, in 1868. The working classes labelled him ‘Grand Old Man [GOM]’— until the death of Gen Gordon in Khartoum, when he became ‘Murderer of Gordon [MOG]’ Gladstone was 82 when he last became PM, after a political career that spanned more

than 60 years; Viscount Palmerston, who implemented the Divorce Court, was the oldest to take office for the first time, aged 70 in 1855; William Pitt the Younger (above, 1783–1801 and 1804–06); was the youngest, aged only 24, but he suffered terrible health and died at 46 David Lloyd George (1916–22) was Britain’s last Liberal to hold office and the only Welshman (his first language was Welsh). Just before he died, he was created an earl, despite having described the House of Lords as ‘a body of 500 men chosen at random from amongst the unemployed’ Stanley Baldwin, who was PM three times, was a nephew of artists Edward Burne-jones and Sir Edward Poynter and a cousin of Rudyard Kipling. He was at the helm during the 1926 General Strike and the Abdication crisis of 1936 Among many other accolades, Sir Winston Churchill, who also crossed the floor (from the Conservatives to the Liberals and back), is the only PM to have won the Nobel Prize in Literature, in 1953, ‘for his mastery of historical and biographical description as well as for brilliant oratory in defending exalted human values’

Labour Prime Minister Clement Attlee (1945–51) created the NHS and National Insurance; planning permission started during his tenure, as did the creation of National Parks and AONBS Harold Macmillan (1957–63) was known as ‘Supermac’ and famously said that Britons ‘had never had it so good’. The year 1963 saw not only the great achievement of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, but the end of his premiership, brought down by cabinet upheavals Only four Prime Ministers— Palmerston, Wellington, Gladstone and Churchill— have been awarded a state funeral. Disraeli refused one in his will and Baroness Thatcher also declined one, but was given a ceremonial funeral The Queen has been served by 14 UK Prime Ministers, from Churchill to Boris Johnson; Queen Victoria was served by 10, starting with Viscount Melbourne and ending with The Earl of Rosebery Twenty of Britain’s 77 Prime Ministers were educated at Eton College, including Walpole and the present incumbent; seven at Harrow, such as Peel and Churchill, and six at Westminster, including Henry Pelham (1743–54) and the Duke of Devonshire (1756–57) Kate Green