Grey, Charles Grey, 2d Earl, British And Irish History, Biographies

Related Category: British And Irish History, Biographies

Grey, Charles Grey, 2d Earl 1764–1845, British statesman. Elected to Parliament in 1786, he was one of those appointed to manage the impeachment of Warren Hastings. From 1792 he was a leader of the movement for parliamentary reform and opposed the repressive policies of Sir William Pitt. He succeeded (1806) Charles James Fox as foreign secretary in the "ministry of all talents" and Whig leader of the House of Commons, putting through the measure to abolish the African slave trade (1807). As prime minister (1830–34) he secured the passage of the Reform Bill of 1832 (see under Reform Acts) by threatening to force William IV to create enough Whig peers to carry it in the House of Lords.

See biography by G. M. Trevelyan (1929, repr. 1971).