Thomas Winnington (1696–1746)

Biography

Winnington was the son of Salwey Winnington of Stanford Court, Member of Parliament for Bewdley, and grandson of Sir Francis Winnington, who had been Solicitor General in the 1670s. He was educated at Westminster School and Christ Church, Oxford, and was admitted to Middle Temple in 1714.

He entered Parliament in 1726 as Whig member for Droitwich, and was re-elected there at every general election for the rest of his life; however in 1741 he was also elected for Worcester (a more prestigious constituency), and he chose to represent that city in what turned out to be his last Parliament.

A supporter of the Prime Minister Robert Walpole, Winnington was made a Lord of the Admiralty in 1730, and served as a Lord of the Treasury from 1736 to 1742; in 1741 he was made a Privy Counsellor and became Cofferer of the Household. When Henry Pelham became Prime Minister in 1743, he appointed Winnington Paymaster General of the Forces, the post he himself had held in the previous administration (although unlike Pelham, Winnington was not accorded a seat in the Cabinet); he held this post for the remaining two-and-a-half years of his life.

Winnington purchased the shares of the elder sisters in the family estate of Stanford (which his grandfather Sir Francis had acquired for the family through his second marriage), and in 1674 he bought the leasehold interest under the crown of the manor of Bewdley. The Elizabethan mansion of Stanford Court was burnt on 5 December 1882, and the valuable books and manuscripts in the old library were destroyed. Stanford Court was rebuilt and remained the family seat until sold by Sir Francis Winnington, 6th Baronet in 1949.

Family

In 1719, Winnington married Love Reade, daughter of Sir James Reade, Bt. of Brocket Hall, Hertfordshire. They had no children. The Stanford Court estate subsequently passed to his cousin who became Sir Edward Winnington, 1st Baronet.