LIVERPOOL, CHARLES JENKINSON, first Earl of, was the eldest son of Col. Jenkinson, the representative of a family which had been settled at Walcot, near Charlbury, Oxfordshire, for above a century. Mr Jenkinson received his education at the Charter-House School and at the University of Oxford. In early life he published Verses on the Death of Frederick Prince of Wales; a Dissertation on the Establishment of a National and Constitutional Force in England, independently of a Standing Army; and a Discourse on the Conduct of Government respecting Neutral Nations. In 1761, having obtained an introduction to the Earl of Bute, he became one of the under-secretaries of state, and in the same year was returned to parliament for Cockermouth. In 1763 he was appointed joint-secretary to the Treasury; and having shared the marked favour of his majesty George III. with Lord Bute, he, on that nobleman's sudden retirement from office, became a conspicuous member of the party then commonly called the King's Friends. On the accession to power of the Rockingham administration, in
Liverpool. 1765, he resigned his public appointments; but about the same period he was nominated auditor of accounts to the Princess-Dowager of Wales. In 1766 he was appointed a lord of the Admiralty by the Grafton administration; and the following year he became a lord of the Treasury. Under Lord North's government new honours awaited this steady aspirant for promotion. In 1772 he was appointed one of the vice-treasurers of Ireland; and in 1775 he was allowed to purchase the patent office of clerkship of the pells in that country. He afterwards succeeded Lord Cadogan as master of the mint; and in 1778 he became secretary-at-war. In 1783 he became a member of the Board of Trade; and in 1785 he published his Collection of all the Treaties of Peace, Alliance, and Commerce, between Great Britain and other Powers, from the Treaty of Munster in 1648 to the Treaties signed at Paris in 1783. In 1786 he was made chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster; called up to the House of Lords by the style and title of Baron Hawkesbury of Hawkesbury, in the county of Gloucester; and appointed president of the Board of Trade. In 1796 he was advanced to the dignity of Earl of Liverpool. His lordship was twice married, and had two sons and a daughter. After obtaining his earldom, he rarely quitted his retirement; but whenever he spoke in the House of Peers, the extent and accuracy of his information, particularly on commercial subjects, procured him marked attention. In 1805 he addressed a letter to the king on the coins of the realm, containing a concise and distinct statement of most of the facts deserving of notice in the history of British coinage. He died 17th December 1808.