Brummell was born on June 7, 1778 in London, the younger son of William Brummell, a politician, of Donnington Grove in Berkshire. The family was middle class, but the elder Brummell was ambitious for his son to become a gentleman, and young George was raised with that understanding.
He was educated at Eton and afterward at Oxford, where he marked himself as a paragon of social correctness and wit.
Not yet 17, he charmed the Prince of Wales (the future George IV), who gave him a commission in the crack regiment of the Tenth Hussars, the prince's own. The regiment was stationed at Brighton where the prince was building his famous Pavilion. Here young Brummell became the intimate of the most influential members of English society. At the end of 1798 he resigned his commission and set himself up in London. His style of dress, the invention of his famous cravat, his ready and often impudent wit, but more than anything else his exquisite manners, made him the idol of society. The Prince of Wales made him his constant companion and adviser in elegance. When, at the prince's suggestion, he founded Watier's Club, Brummell was ruling London's social life. But gambling caused his ruin, and to this was added a dispute with the prince, who was now regent. One night in May 1816, to escape his pressing creditors, Brummell took flight to Calais and never returned to England. He lived 14 years at Calais, supported and visited by his London friends. But things became difficult, and in 1830, to help him out, his influential friends obtained for him the post of British consul at Caen. Six months later the post was suppressed, and Brummell was left to face a penury that brought him to debtors' prison and later to an institution for the mentally ill. He died in this institution on May 30, 1840.
