Background
Temple was a son of Henry Temple (son of Henry Temple, 1st Viscount Palmerston) and Jane, daughter of Sir John Barnard, Lord Mayor of London. He was born into "the Ascendancy", the Anglo-Irish aristocracy.
Temple was a son of Henry Temple (son of Henry Temple, 1st Viscount Palmerston) and Jane, daughter of Sir John Barnard, Lord Mayor of London. He was born into "the Ascendancy", the Anglo-Irish aristocracy.
He succeeded to the peerage in 1757, and was educated at Clare College, Cambridge from 1757 to 1759.
His family owned a vast country estate in the north of County Sligo in the west of Ireland. He was appointed to the Board of Trade in 1765, was a Lord Commissioner of the Admiralty between 1766 and 1777, and was a Lord of the Treasury from 1777 to 1782. In 1763 Temple journeyed to Italy, staying with Voltaire at Ferney en route.
He reached Rome in 1764, and from there visited Paestum, south of Naples.
He bought antiquities and paintings from Gavin Hamilton, antiquities from Giovanni Battista Piranesi, paintings from Angelica Kauffman, cameos from Giovanni Pichler and sculpture from Joseph Nollekens. A portrait of Henry Temple by Angelica Kauffman is held at Broadlands, Hampshire.
Royal Society; 1st United Kingdom Parliament. 12th Parliament of Great Britain. 13th Parliament of Great Britain.
14th Parliament of Great Britain.
15th Parliament of Great Britain. 16th Parliament of Great Britain.
17th Parliament of Great Britain. 18th Parliament of Great Britain]
As a member of the British House of Commons, he represented the constituencies of East Looe between 1762 and 1768, Southampton between 1768 to 1774, Hastings between 1774 and 1784, Boroughbridge between 1784 and 1790, Newport, Isle of Wight between 1790 and 1796, and Winchester between 1796 and his death in 1802.