The Tory Administrations, 1809–30

The election of Robert Peel to the House of Commons, as member for the tiny Irish borough of Cashel, at the age of only twenty-one in April 1809, marked an important stage in the social and political ascent of one of the most spectacularly successful families of the early Industrial Revolution. Although Peel was educated at Harrow and Christ Church, Oxford, and embarked immediately upon a parliamentary career, he had been born in Bury, Lancashire, in February 1788, the son of a wealthy cotton textile manufacturer. Like many business families of the late eighteenth century, the Peels were staunchly Tory in their politics, and the fact that they were able to rise so rapidly to a position of great prominence, supplying the country with a future Prime Minister, testifies to the relative openness of the British political elite. Indeed, the achievements of the Peel family exemplify the cultural resilience and adaptability which helped Britain to come to terms with the pressures of industrial transformation without experiencing a complete collapse of the social order.