The English statesman Charles Watson-Wentworth, 2nd Marquess of Rockingham (1730-1782), as prime minister and leader of the Whig opposition, advocated leniency toward the American colonies.

Charles Watson-Wentworth was born on May 13, 1730. He was educated at Westminster School and at Cambridge. In 1745, at the age of 15, he ran away without parental permission to join the Duke of Cumberland's army, which was fighting against Prince Charles Edward Stuart, who was known as Bonnie Prince Charlie or the Young Pretender. Between 1748 and 1750, Watson-Wentworth completed the grand tour of Europe.

On the death of his father in 1750, Rockingham succeeded to the family estates in Yorkshire, Northamptonshire, and Ireland, and in 1752 he augmented his inheritance by marrying Mary Bright, a Yorkshire heiress. In 1751 Rockingham also succeeded to his father's offices of lord lieutenant of the North and East Ridings of Yorkshire, was appointed a lord of the bedchamber, and took his seat in...