Robert Walpole, 2nd Earl of Orford

British peer and politician

The Right HonourableThe Earl of OrfordKB
Portrait by John Theodore Heins
Born	1701
Died	31 March 1751 (age 49–50)
Spouse	Margaret Rolle (m. 1727; div. 1730)
Partner	Hannah Norsa (1736–1751)
Children	George Walpole
Parents	Sir Robert Walpole (father) Catherine Shorter (mother)
Relatives	Walpole family George Townshend

Heanton Satchville depicted in 1739, the inheritance of Margaret Rolle who had by then been estranged for three years from Walpole; detail from engraving in Vitruvius Britannicus with caption:"Heanton Hall and Park in Devonshire, the Seat of the Right Hon.ble Robert Lord Walpole Ld. Lieutenant of the County of Devon and Knight of the Most Hon.ble Order of the Bath"

Robert Walpole, 2nd Earl of Orford, KB (1701 – 31 March 1751), was a British peer and politician, styled Lord Walpole from 1723 to 1745.

Origins

Houghton Hall, Norfolk

He was the eldest son of Sir Robert Walpole (1676–1745), the King's First Minister, now regarded as the first British Prime Minister, by his first wife Catherine Shorter. In 1723 his father declined a peerage for himself but did accept the offer on behalf of his 22-year-old son Robert who was thus raised to the peerage as Baron Walpole, of Walpole in the County of Norfolk.

Marriage

Circa 26 March 1724 Lord Walpole married the 15-year-old heiress Margaret Rolle (1709–1781), the only surviving daughter of Colonel Samuel Rolle (1646–1719), of Heanton Satchville, Petrockstowe. Margaret was the heiress to a junior branch of the great Rolle family of Stevenstone in Devon and to her paternal grandmother, born Lady Arabella Clinton, an aunt and co-heiress of her nephew Edward Clinton, 5th Earl of Lincoln and 13th Baron Clinton (d. 1692).

The marriage was not a success and Lady Walpole quarrelled violently with his whole family. After one son was born they lived apart and later obtained a legal separation.

In 1736 Hannah Norsa, a leading singer and actress at Covent Garden, moved to Houghton Hall in Norfolk and remained there as Walpole's mistress until his death in March 1751. Her financial support may have saved him from dying bankrupt. In Walpole's many absences Hannah Norsa was escorted in her landau and six horses by his chaplain, Rev William Paxton, who received the position as a small part of the Walpole family compensation for his father's defence of Walpole's father, the Prime Minister.

His estranged widow became the 15th Baroness Clinton succeeding in her own right after the death of her cousin Hugh Fortescue, 1st Earl Clinton. She had remarried on Walpole's death but soon separated from her second husband, Hon Sewallis Shirley, a son of the 1st Earl Ferrers and Comptroller of Queen Charlotte's Household. Lady Clinton died at Pisa, in Tuscany, in 1781, and was buried at Leghorn, "a woman of very singular character and considered half mad" (according to her friend, Selina, Countess of Huntingdon). Walpole himself is buried in the Church of St Martin at Tours on the Houghton Hall estate.

Progeny

Both the Earl of Orford and his wife Baroness Clinton were succeeded in all their titles by their son George Walpole, 3rd Earl of Orford and 16th Baron Clinton (1730–1791), a celebrated falconer, who left no legitimate children and died insane.

Career

Robert Walpole held the following posts at some time between 1701 and 1751:

Clerk of the Pells (1721–1739)
Auditor of the Receipt of the Exchequer (1739–1751)
Ranger of Richmond Park
High Steward of Yarmouth
Lord Lieutenant of Devon (1733–1751)

References

"Baron Walpole". Debrett's Peerage. 1968. p. 1128.
Baldwin, Olive; Wilson, Thelma (2004). "Norsa, Hannah (d. 1784)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press.
Historic England. "St Martin's Church (Grade I) (1077787)". National Heritage List for England. Retrieved 31 July 2022.

Notes

Kidd, Charles; Williamson, David, eds. (1990). Debrett's Peerage and Baronetage. New York: St Martin's Press.
Leigh Rayment's Peerage Pages
thepeerage.com

Honorary titles
Preceded byHenry Pelham	Clerk of the Pells 1721–1739	Succeeded bySir Edward Walpole
Preceded byThe Lord Clinton	Lord Lieutenant of Devon 1733–1751	Succeeded byThe Duke of Bedford
Preceded byThe Earl of Halifax	Auditor of the Exchequer 1739–1751	Succeeded byThe Earl of Lincoln
Peerage of Great Britain
Preceded byRobert Walpole	Earl of Orford 2nd creation 1745–1751	Succeeded byGeorge Walpole
	Viscount Walpole 1745–1751
	Baron Walpole of Houghton 1745–1751
New creation	Baron Walpole of Walpole 1723–1751

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