On 9 April 1827 the Tory Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Lord Liverpool, suffered a cerebral haemorrhage. He had been Prime Minister nearly fifteen years, ever since the assassination of his predecessor Spencer Perceval in May 1812. The man chosen to succeed him was the Foreign Secretary and Leader of the House of Commons, George Canning. Canning was very much on the moderate wing of the Tory Party, and many of the more hard-line members of Liverpool's government, including the Home Secretary, Sir Robert Peel, and national hero the Duke of Wellington (Master-General of the Ordnance), refused to serve under him. Canning's government was therefore recruited from the moderate wing of the Tory Party, known as the Canningites, with the support of several members of the Whig Party.