Sir Edward Littleton, 4th Baronet
[2] His mother, Frances, was the daughter and coheir of James Whitehall of Pipe Ridware, a village close to Rugeley, Staffordshire.
Edward's cousin, the 3rd Baronet, sent him to nearby Brewood School, a clear sign that he regarded him as a likely heir.
The school was at that time under the headship of the celebrated William Budworth, who benefited considerably from the Baronet's generosity.
The smaller part, conferred on the Collegiate Church of St. Michael, Penkridge, and known as the deanery manor, had been leased to the Littletons even before the Reformation.
The larger part of the manor, conferred on lay landowners, had belonged to heads of the Greville family, later Barons Brooke, since the early 16th century.
The Hortons had just had their medieval manor house demolished to make way for a large baroque building more in keeping with the times.
The main building was linked by curved screen walls to flanking ranges, one housing stables, the other kitchens, stores and servants' rooms.
He actively improved Teddesley Park, the area around his new home, creating gardens and hundreds of acres of grazing land beyond them.
In 1762-3 he was High Sheriff of Staffordshire, an onerous and expensive post that was not universally welcomed but reflected his standing.
Littleton was returned unopposed, along with Sir John Wrottesley, 8th Baronet, as MP for Staffordshire on 8 April 1784.
The second seat was for a country member: a gentleman acceptable to the local landowning interest but essentially uncommitted to the party.
Gower was to remain an MP for Staffordshire until 1799, when his half-brother Lord Granville Leveson-Gower took over, holding the seat until 1815.
In 1791 he opposed the repeal of the Test Act in Scotland, an early move towards civil rights for Roman Catholics, a cause that was to become an identifying mark of liberals in both Whig and Tory parties.
This was probably because the Leveson Gowers were increasingly opposed to Pitt, while his colleague from 1799, Lord Granville Leveson-Gower was personally sympathetic to the Whigs.
The Leveson Gowers induced Littleton to join the opposition to Pitt's Additional Forces Bill of 1803.
He was a very different MP from the 4th Baronet: urbane, studious, a master of political detail and a determined debater, he first joined the Canningite Tories, but later became a Whig.
Littleton's sister, also called Frances, had married Moreton Walhouse, a member of a business dynasty with valuable investments in the Walsall area.
Heir to two fortunes, and thus a very rich man, he also became by far the most illustrious of the Littleton family politically, an important reformer and an active parliamentarian in both Houses for over fifty years, he served as Chief Secretary for Ireland in the 1830s.
