Lord John Townshend

Lord John Townshend PC (19 January 1757 – 23 February 1833), styled The Honourable John Townshend until 1787, was a British Whig politician.

Background Townshend was the second son of Field Marshal George Townshend, 1st Marquess Townshend, by his first wife Charlotte Compton, 16th Baroness Ferrers of Chartley. George Townshend, 2nd Marquess Townshend, was his elder brother and Charles Townshend his uncle. He was educated at Eton and St John's College, Cambridge.

Political career Townshend was elected to the House of Commons for Cambridge University in 1780, a seat he held until 1784, and later represented Westminster from 1788 to 1790 and Knaresborough from 1793 to 1818. He was admitted to the Privy Council in 1806 and served under Lord Grenville as Paymaster of the Forces (alongside Lord Temple) between 1806 and 1807.

Family Georgiana Anne, Lady Townsend, painting by George Romney, 1792–1794. Townshend married in 1787 Georgiana Anne Fawkener, daughter of William Poyntz, and the divorced wife of William Fawkener. When his grandmother Etheldreda Townshend died in 1788, she left him much of her fortune, including Balls Park. Their elder son Charles Fox Townshend was the founder of the Eton Society but died young. Their younger son John became an admiral in the Royal Navy and succeeded his first cousin as 4th Marquess Townshend in 1855. Their daughter Elizabeth Frances Townshend (2 August 1789 –10 April 1862 Nice) married 20 October 1813 Captain Augustus Clifford R.N., later Sir Augustus Clifford, 1st Bt (1788–1877), illegitimate son of the 5th Duke of Devonshire and his mistress, Lady Elizabeth Foster, née Hervey, later the Duke's second wife (1811). Mrs Clifford became Lady Clifford in 1838 when her husband was raised to a baronetcy. Townshend died in February 1833, aged 76. Lady Georgiana Anne died in 1851.