PRATT, CHARLES, Earl of Camden, was the third son of Sir John Pratt, knight, chief-justice of the Court of King’s-Bench under George I. by his second wife Elizabeth, daughter of the Reverend Hugh Wilson, canon of Bangor, and was born in 1713, the year before his father was called to the honour of the bench. He received the first rudiments of his education at Eton, and afterwards removed to King’s College, Cambridge. Of his early life at both places little is known, other than that at college he was found to be remarkably diligent and studious, and particularly so in the history and constitution of this country. By some he was thought to be a little too tenacious of the rights and privileges of the college he belonged to; but perhaps it was to this early tendency that we are indebted for those noble struggles in defence of liberty, which, whether in or out of office, he displayed throughout the whole course of his political life. After remaining the usual time at college, and taking his master’s degree, in 1739 he entered himself a student of the Inner Temple, and was in due time admitted by the honourable society as a barrister-at-law. And here a circumstance developes itself in the history of this great man, which shows how much chance govérns in the affairs of this world, and that the most considerable talent and indisputable integrity will sometimes require the introduction of this mistress of the ceremonies, in order to obtain that which they ought to possess from their own intrinsic qualifications.

Mr. Pratt, after being called to the bar, notwithstanding his family introduction, and his own personal character, was very near nine years in the profession, without ever getting in any degree forward. Whether this arose from a natural timidity of* constitution, ill-luck, or perhaps a mixture of despondence growing out of the two circumstances, it is now difficult to tell. But the fact was so; and he was so dispirited by it, that he had some thoughts of relinquishing the profession of the law, and retiring to his college, where, in rotation, be might be sure of a church living, that would give him a small but honourable independence. With these melancholy ideas he went as usual the western circuit, to make one more experiment, and then to take his final determination. Mr. Henley, afterwards Lord Northington, and chancellor of England, was in the same circuit. He was Mr. Pratt’s most intimate friend; and he now availed himself of that friendship, and told him his situation, and his intentions of retiring to the university and going into the church. He opposed his intention with strong raillery, and got him engaged in a cause along with himself; and Mr. Henley being ill, Mr. Pratt took the lead, and displayed a professional knowledge and elocution that excited the admiration of his brother baιτisters as much as that of the whole court. He gained his cause; and besides, he acquired the reputation of an eloquent, profound, and constitutional lawyer. It was this circumstance, together with the continued good offices of his friend Henley, which led to his future greatness; for with all his abilities and all his knowledge, he might otherwise in all probability have passed his life in obscurity, and gone down to the grave unnoticed and unknown.

He now became one of the most successful pleaders at the bar, and honours and emoluments flowed thick upon him. He was chosen to represent the borough of Downton, Wiltshire, after the general election in 1759; recorder of Bath 1759; the same year he was appointed attorney-general; and in January 1762 he was called to the degree of serjeant at law, appointed chief-justice of the common pleas, and knighted. His lordship presided in that court with a dignity, weight, and impartiality, never exceeded by any of his predecessors; and when John Wilkes was seized and committed to the Tower on an illegal general warrant, his lordship, with the intrepidity of a British magistrate, and the becoming fortitude of an Englishman, granted him an habeas corpus, and on his being brought before the court of common pleas, discharged him from his confinement in the Tower, 6th May 1763, in a speech which did him honour. His wise and spirited behaviour on this remarkable occasion, was so acceptable to the nation, that the city of London presented him with the freedom of their corporation in a gold box.

On the 16th of July 1765 he was created a peer of Great [7:18:504]Britain, by the style and title of Lord Camden, Baron Camden, in the county of Kent; and, on the 30th July 1766, on the resignation of Robert Earl of Northington, he was appointed lord high chancellor of Great Britain. In this capacity he, in a speech of two hours, declared, upon the first decision of the suit against the messengers who arrested Mr. Wilkes, that it was the unanimous opinion of the whole court, that general warrants, except in cases of high treason, were illegal, oppressive, and unwarrantable. He conducted himself in this high office so as to obtain the love and esteem of all parties; but when the taxation of America was in agitation, having declared himself against it, and strongly opposed it, he was removed from his station in 1770.

Upon the fall of Lord North he was again taken into the administration, and on the 27th of March 1782, appointed president of the council; an office which he resigned in March 1783. On the 13th of May 1786, he was created Viscount Bayham of Bayham Abbey, Kent, and Earl Camden. He died on the 18th of April 1794 at his house in Hill Street, Berkeley Square, being at that time president of his Majesty’s most honourable privy council. He married Elizabeth, daughter and co-heir of Mr. Nicholas Jeffery, son and heir of Sir Jeffery Jcfferys of Brecknock Priory, knight, who died in December 1779, and by whom he had issue John Jcfferys Pratt, born 1759, and several daughters.