WILLIAM, Earl of Bath, an eminent politician, was descended from a good family, and was born in 1682. After spending his years of education at Westminster School, and at Christ Church, Oxford, he travelled for some time on the Continent, and on his return was sent to Parliament by Henry Guy, Esq., formerly secretary to the Treasury, as representative of the borough of Hedon in Yorkshire. Guy subsequently left him a legacy of L40,000, and landed property to the value of L500 a year. Pulteney had a good estate of his own, and this legacy, together with a large portion brought him by his wife, Anna Maria, daughter of John Gunley, Esq. of Isleworth, enabled him in after life to perform numerous acts of charity and benevolence. On his entry into the House of Commons, he attached himself to the Whig party, and continued to represent Hedon throughout the entire reign of Queen Anne. He made his maiden speech on the "Place Bill;" he distinguished himself on the prosecution of Dr Sacheverell; and, in a word, rendered himself so obnoxious to the Tories, that when they came into power in 1710, they are said to have been avenged on the youthful orator by removing his uncle, John Pulteney, Esq., from the Board of Trade. During the latter years of the Queen's reign he had a principal share in the debates, and in 1712, on the prosecution of Walpole, he defended him in an eloquent oration.

When George I. came to the throne, Pulteney was made secretary-at-war, an office which he held till 1717, when Walpole resigned. He was subsequently, in 1720, promoted to the valuable sinecure of cofferer of the household; but in 1725, after a disagreeable quarrel with his friend Sir Robert Walpole, he threw himself into the ranks of the opposition, was dismissed from his office of cofferer, and became so obnoxious to the King, that in 1731 his Majesty called for the council-book, and with his own hand struck out his name from the list of privy-councillors. This proceeding served to inflame his resentment and to increase his popularity; and he continued his attacks upon Walpole with a severity of eloquence and sarcasm which nothing could withstand. Nor did he confine his opposition to his speeches in Parliament; out of doors he assisted Bolingbroke in his paper called the Craftsman, and in numerous pamphlets he held up the minister and his friends to the scorn and reprobation of the nation. His shining qualities as a debater, the hot patriotism with which he spiced his harangues as leader of the opposition, lifted him to the height of public esteem, and rendered him the most popular man in the country. Meanwhile Walpole was at last overthrown, February 1742, and the entire authority seemed for a moment to lie at the feet of Pulteney. But Walpole secretly influenced his Majesty in his negotiations with his rival; the composition of the new cabinet disappointed the expectations both of his immediate partisans and of the public; suspicion and a sense of injury done to the cause burst into a perfect storm of popular indignation; when Pulteney, under cover of the smoke thus raised, walked into the House of Lords as Earl of Bath—shrunk, in short, as Chesterfield phrased it, “into insignificance and an earldom.” In February 1746, on the resignation of the Pelham ministry, he held the premiership for two days, but was constrained to retire, as no persons of weight would join him. In 1760 he published A Letter to Two Great Men (Pitt and the Duke of Newcastle), recommending proper articles to be insisted on in a treaty of peace. It was published anonymously, was greatly applauded, and went through several impressions. He died in 1764; and as his only son had died before him, the title became extinct.