Canning, GEORGE, a distinguished British statesman and orator, was born in London, April 11, 1770. His father, who claimed descent from William Canynge of Bristol, incurred the displeasure of his family for marrying beneath his station, and died in poverty when his son was only a year old. His mother tried the stage with but little success, married an actor, and subsequently a linen-drawer; but lived to rejoice in the success and participate in the good-fortune of her boy, whose education was liberally provided by his uncle, Stratford Canning, a banker. Canning was sent to Eton, from which he passed at the age of eighteen to Christ Church College, Oxford, where he greatly distinguished himself, especially in classics. While here, he cherished the friendship of the Hon. Charles Jenkinson (afterwards Lord Liverpool), who was of considerable service to him in after-life. From Oxford he went in 1790 to Lincoln's Inn, but on the suggestion of Burke, as it is said, he soon relinquished the bar for a parliamentary career. He entered the House for Newport, Isle of Wight, in 1794, as the protégé and supporter of the minister, Pitt. In 1796 he was appointed an under-secretary of state. It was not, however, until 1798 that Canning made a reputation as an orator and a statesman, by his speeches in favour of the abolition of the slave-trade and against Tierney's motion regarding peace with the French Directory, the latter of which, especially, was regarded as a masterpiece of eloquence, alike by the House and the country. In many important questions Canning gave valuable assistance to the ministry, not only by his voice in parliament, but by his pen in a satirical paper called the Anti-Jacobin (1797-98), in which he especially lashed the 'New Philosophy,' as it was called, promulgated by the French republicans. The 'Needy Knife-grinder' is one of the best known and happiest of his efforts in this line. In 1800 he made a happy marriage with Joan Scott, a lady of fortune, and sister to the Duchess of Portland. In 1801 Pitt resigned office, and Canning joined the opposition from the ministerial side of the House against the Addington ministry.
When Pitt again became premier in 1804, Canning was made treasurer of the navy, an office which he held until Pitt's death in 1806. His opposition to the short-lived Grenville ministry which succeeded savoured of the bitterness of party feeling, and his treatment of Fox in his last days, and of his memory after his death, was far from generous. When the Portland ministry was formed in 1807, Canning was appointed Minister for Foreign Affairs, a position for which he was specially qualified, and his despatches, written at this time, are models of manliness and lucidity. During his tenure of office Canning planned the expedition for the seizure of the Danish fleet, which did so much to upset the schemes of Napoleon; and he recommended the energetic prosecution of hostilities in Spain both under Moore and Wellesley. His disapproval of the Walcheren expedition led to a misunderstanding with Castlereagh (q.v.), secretary-at-war, which resulted in a duel with that statesman. Soon afterwards the Portland ministry came to a close, and Canning did not hold high office again for many years. His absence from the Foreign Office during the critical period at the close of the Napoleonic wars was to Canning a subject of lasting regret. In 1812 all his eloquence was enlisted in favour of Catholic emancipation. During the same year he was elected for Liverpool, which seat he exchanged for Harwich in 1822. In 1814 he went as ambassador to Lisbon, returned in 1816, and was made President of the Board of Control, and supported the Liverpool ministry in all their arbitrary and repressive measures until 1820, when he resigned, in consequence of the action of the government against Queen Caroline.
Nominated Governor-general of India in 1822, he was on the eve of departure when the suicide of Castlereagh, now Marquis of Londonderry, called Canning to the head of Foreign Affairs. In this capacity he conferred lasting benefits on his country. He infused a more liberal spirit into the cabinet, he asserted the independence of British politics against the diplomacy that would have entangled the nation with the Holy Alliance, and gave a new direction and impetus to commercial affairs by a gradual laying aside of the prohibitive system. He arranged the relations of Brazil and Portugal; drew the French cabinet into agreement with the British respecting Spanish-American affairs; was the first to recognise the free states of Spanish America; promoted the treaty combining England, France, and Russia, for the settlement of the affairs of Greece, which was signed July 6, 1827; protected Portugal from Spanish invasion; contended earnestly for Catholic emancipation; and prepared the way for a repeal of the corn laws. In February 1827 a stroke of paralysis forced the Earl of Liverpool to resign, and Canning was called upon to form a new administration, which he did with the aid of the Whigs. His health, however, gave way under the cares of office, and he died 8th August of the same year at the Duke of Devonshire's Chiswick villa, in the room where Fox had died twenty-one years earlier. He was buried, near Pitt, in Westminster Abbey. As a parliamentary orator Canning holds a prominent place in British annals. His acuteness, power of expression, and well-pointed wit were remarkable; but, on the whole, he was inferior to Pitt, Burke, and Fox. He lacked the imposing characteristics of the first, the overpowering enthusiasm of the second, and the winning address of the last. He was intensely British, and his foreign policy was of the character best calculated to promote British interests.
See his Speeches edited by Therry (6 vols. 1828); Stapleton's Political Life of Canning (1831), and George Canning and his Times (1859); and the masterly sketch in Lord Dalling's Historical Characters (1867).