William Legge, 2nd Earl of Dartmouth, PC, FRS (20 June 1731 – 15 July 1801), styled as Viscount Lewisham from 1732 to 1750, was a British statesman who served as Secretary of State for the Colonies from 1772 to 1775, during the initial stages of the American Revolution. He is also the namesake of Dartmouth College.
Early Years
Dartmouth was the son of George Legge, Viscount Lewisham, who died when Dartmouth was one year old. His mother was Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Arthur Kaye, 3rd Baronet.[1] He entered Trinity College, Oxford, in 1748,[2] and succeeded his grandfather in the earldom in 1750.
In 1772, in correspondence with Sir William Johnson, the Superintendent of Northern Indian Affairs in America, he suggested that there was no reasonable way the British Government could support new trade regulations with the Indians. He sympathised with Johnson's arguments but stated the Colonies did not seem inclined to concur with any new regulations.
He received many letters from North Carolina royal governor Josiah Martin in the summer of 1775 communicating preparations the Loyalist government was making against Patriot militia units and events of the revolution.[5]
Wheelock subsequently founded Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, naming the school in Lord Dartmouth's honour, in hopes of getting his financial support. Lord Dartmouth refused. In London, Lord Dartmouth supported the new Foundling Hospital, a charitable institution for the care and maintenance of London's abandoned children. He served as a vice-president of the organisation from 1755 until his death. The famous painter Sir Joshua Reynolds painted the Earl's portrait and donated it to the hospital.
^Hopkins, Clare (2005), Trinity: 450 years of an Oxford college community (2007 reprint ed.), Oxford, ISBN978-0-19-951896-8{{citation}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
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