Giles Earle (1678 – 20 August 1758), was a British Army officer and politician who sat in the House of Commons for 32 years from 1715 to 1747.
He resigned this position in 1720, when public differences broke out between the prince and his father, and took a post under the Duke of Argyll as Clerk of Board of Green Cloth.
[2] At the general election of 1722 Earle stood for Parliament at Malmesbury where he was defeated in the poll, but seated on petition on 13 December 1722.
[2] His readiness to do the minister's bidding ingratiated him with Walpole, to whom he was an acceptable companion although he was personally unpopular.
Lord Chesterfield, when Walpole's fall seemed probable, wrote, with allusion to Earle, that "the court generally proposes some servile and shameless tool of theirs to be chairman of the committee of privileges and elections.
Why should not we therefore pick out some whig of a fair character and with personal connections to oppose the ministerial nominee?".
[2] Earle's sordid nature and broad jokes were the subject of universal comment, and his jests are said to have been "set off by a whining tone, crabbed face, and very laughing eyes".
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu speaks of him as 'a facetious gentleman, vulgarly called Tom Earle.
The latter, who was also a member of parliament and a placeman, died in 1774, aged 72, and was buried near his sister in the vault of his grandfather at Hendon, Middlesex.