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- 1770-1827. British Tory politician, foreign
- secretary 1807-10 and 1822-27, and prime
- minister 1827 in coalition with the Whigs. He
- was largely responsible, during the
- Napoleonic Wars, for the seizure of the
- Danish fleet and British intervention in the
- Spanish peninsula. Canning entered Parliament
- 1793. His verse, satires, and parodies for
- the Anti-Jacobin 1797-98 led to his
- advancement by Pitt the Younger. His
- disapproval of the Walcheren expedition 1809
- involved him in a duel with the war minister,
- Castlereagh, and led to Canning's resignation
- as foreign secretary. He was president of the
- Board of Control 1816-20. On Castlereagh's
- death 1822, he again became foreign
- secretary, supported the national movements
- in Greece and South America, and was made
- prime minister 1827. When Wellington, Peel,
- and other Tories refused to serve under him,
- he formed a coalition with the Whigs. He died
- in office.
-