Background
Coote was the third son of the 3rd Earl of Mountrath (1655–1709).
Coote was the third son of the 3rd Earl of Mountrath (1655–1709).
He was educated at Street Paul"s School and Trinity College, Cambridge, where he matriculated in 1706.
Coote was elected to the Irish House of Commons for Jamestown in 1715. Coote succeeded in his turn on 27 March 1720 and ascended to the Irish House of Lords. Mountrath was appointed to the Privy Council of Ireland in 1723.
As his earldom was also Irish, it did not disqualify him from sitting in the British House of Commons, and he entered Parliament in the same year as member for Castle Rising in Norfolk, which he represented for ten years.
He also became Governor of Queen"s County. In 1741 he stood for Parliament again at Hedon in Yorkshire, and was initially declared defeated.
However, on petition to the House of Commons (in those days the normal procedure in a disputed election), the result was overturned and on 4 March 1742 Mountrath was declared elected after all. He sat as member for the borough for the remaining two years of his life.
Horace Walpole described her as being "as rich and as tipsy as Cacofogo in the comedy.
What a jumble of avarice, lewdness, dignity - and claret!". They had only one child, Charles (c 1725-1802), who succeeded to the earldom on Mountrath"s death in 1744, but who also died unmarried, the title thereby becoming extinct.
6th Parliament of Great Britain. 7th Parliament of Great Britain. 9th Parliament of Great Britain.