Living Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom

Updated on Sep 27, 2024

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This is a list of all of the living people who have served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom at each moment in British history.

There have been four time periods when there was only one living Prime Minister, first with the appointment of Sir Robert Walpole in 1721, and most recently during the second term of William Ewart Gladstone following the 1881 death of Benjamin Disraeli. There have been ten time periods when six living current or former Prime Ministers co-existed, with the longest being a nine-year period beginning with the first appointment of Sir Robert Peel in 1834. The most recent period was between 1990 and 1995 beginning with the 1990 appointment of John Major, and ending with the 1995 death of Harold Wilson. If one includes future Prime Ministers, there has been only one time period when nineteen (see § Statistics) different Prime Ministers co-existed.

There are presently five living Prime Ministers. From oldest to youngest: Sir John Major, Gordon Brown, Tony Blair, Theresa May and David Cameron.

Statistics

There have been four men who have been the only living British prime minister (no former Prime Minister being alive): Sir Robert Walpole (as the first Prime Minister from April 1721 to February 1742), Henry Pelham (from Walpole's death in March 1745 to March 1754), 1st Duke of Newcastle (from Pelham's death in March 1754 to November 1756) and William Ewart Gladstone (from Benjamin Disraeli's death in April 1881 to June 1885).

During ten periods in the history of Great Britain and the United Kingdom from 1801 to the present, there have been six persons alive to have been Prime Minister. Such periods include: from October to November 1768 (when Newcastle, 3rd Earl of Bute, George Grenville, 2nd Marquess of Rockingham, William Pitt the Elder and 3rd Duke of Grafton were alive); from January to November 1770 (when Bute, G. Grenville, Rockingham, Pitt the Elder, Grafton and Lord North were alive); from December 1783 to March 1792 (when Bute, Grafton, North, 2nd Earl of Shelburne, 3rd Duke of Portland and William Pitt the Younger were alive); from December 1834 to February 1844 (when Henry Addington, 1st Viscount Goderich, 1st Duke of Wellington, 2nd Earl Grey, 2nd Viscount Melbourne and Sir Robert Peel were alive); from May to October 1923 (when 5th Earl of Rosebery, Arthur Balfour, H. H. Asquith, David Lloyd George, Bonar Law and Stanley Baldwin were alive); from January 1924 to February 1928 (when Rosebery, Balfour, Asquith, Lloyd George, Baldwin and Ramsay MacDonald were alive); from October 1964 to January 1965 (when Sir Winston Churchill, Clement Attlee, Sir Anthony Eden, Harold Macmillan, Sir Alec Douglas-Home and Harold Wilson were alive); from April 1976 to January 1977 (when Eden, Macmillan, Douglas-Home, Wilson, Edward Heath and James Callaghan were alive); from May 1979 to December 1986 (when Macmillan, Douglas-Home, Wilson, Heath, Callaghan and Margaret Thatcher were alive). The tenth and most recent period was from November 1990 to May 1995 (when Douglas-Home, Wilson, Heath, Callaghan, Thatcher and John Major were alive). Of these periods, the earliest two and the most recent three consisted of each Prime Minister appointed consecutively. The longest period where there have been six living Prime Ministers was 9 years and 67 days, ending with the death of Addington in February 1844.

Newcastle was the only person to be both the only living Prime Minister (from March 1754 to November 1756) and one of the six living Prime Ministers (from October to November 1768).

There have been 21 premierships during which a Prime Minister has not died, the most recent being Gordon Brown's premiership. This does not include the premierships of 1st Earl of Wilmington, Rockingham and George Canning (who were themselves the only Prime Ministers to die during their premierships), nor the premiership of incumbent Theresa May (no Prime Minister has died since Thatcher, who died during David Cameron's premiership). Conversely, only twice (during the premierships of Pitt the Younger and Baldwin) has there been as many as three deaths during a premiership. (This does not count the Spencer Perceval's premiership, whose own death was the third during his ministry). The longest streak of premierships without a prime ministerial death is three, which has happened twice: no Prime Minister died during the premierships of Newcastle, 4th Duke of Devonshire or Bute; nor would a Prime Minister die during the premierships of Eden, Macmillan or Douglas-Home. If one were to include the multiple terms served by each Prime Minister that had been in office more than once, the record is five: no Prime Minister died during Salisbury's first ministry, Gladstone's third ministry, Salisbury's second ministry, Gladstone's fourth ministry or during the premiership of Rosebery.

Because he was the first Prime Minister, and the fact that he served for more than twenty years, Walpole holds the distinction of serving over the longest period during which no Prime Ministers died. The second longest term without a death of a Prime Minister would be that of 2nd Earl of Liverpool who served almost fifteen years in office. In recent years, the Prime Minister who served the longest without a death in his term was Macmillan, who served for almost seven years in office.

The longest period between deaths of Prime Ministers was the 17 years and 41 days between the deaths of Baldwin on 14 December 1947 and Churchill on 24 January 1965. The shortest was the 113 days between the deaths of Callaghan on 26 March 2005 and Heath on 17 July 2005.

If the longest period between deaths is to be exceeded, no Prime Minister must die before 19 May 2030 (both the current oldest and the second oldest surviving Prime Ministers, Major and Brown, would then be 87 years old and 79 years old respectively).

The second longest was the 17 years and 30 days between the deaths of Disraeli on 19 April 1881 and Gladstone on 19 May 1898.

Only three times (in 1792, 1995 and 2005) have there been two Prime Ministers dying in the same year.

Following his premiership's end in 1804, Addington lived to see a record 14 premierships prior to his death in February 1844. Goderich follows with 12 premierships after his own premiership ended in 1828, prior to his death in January 1859. In modern times, the Prime Minister to have lived to see the most premierships following their own was Lloyd George, with eight following the end of his premiership in 1922.

If one includes future as well as past and current Prime Ministers, the record sits at nineteen:

Between Disraeli's birth on 21 December 1804 and Shelburne's death on 7 May 1805, the following Prime Ministers were alive: Grafton, Shelburne, Portland, Pitt the Younger, Addington, 1st Baron Grenville, Perceval, Liverpool, Canning, Goderich, Wellington, Grey, Melbourne, Peel, Lord John Russell, 14th Earl of Derby, 4th Earl of Aberdeen, 3rd Viscount Palmerston and Disraeli.

Since 6 April 1955 (a period of 7009195525360000000♠61 years, 350 days), there have been at least three Prime Ministers living.

References

Living Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom Wikipedia

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