Eldest son of the prime minister Robert Peel, he was educated at Harrow and Christ Church, Oxford, and entered the Diplomatic Service in 1844.

[1] Entering the House of Commons as the 'Liberal-Conservative' (i.e. as one of the Peelites) member for his father's former constituency, Tamworth, on 19 July 1850,[1] he had every opportunity open to him of taking a distinguished place in public life.

[1] He had a fine presence and gaiety of manner,[1] and was popular in social life; while his oratorical gifts – a rich ringing voice, a perfect command of language, rare powers of irony, a capacity for producing unexpected rhetorical effects – ought to have rendered his success in parliament a certainty.

[1] The want of moral fibre in his volatile character,[1] an absence of dignity,[1] and an inability to accept a fixed political creed,[1] prevented him from acquiring the confidence of his associates or of the public.

The lecture, severely commented on by the Russian and French press, was the subject of a parliamentary debate, and caused great annoyance to the English court.

Although he took a warm interest in some Irish questions, especially higher education, which he had aided by a handsome contribution to the Queen's Colleges founded by his father, his career in Ireland was a failure.

In 1871 he gave a remarkable proof of his eloquence by describing to the House the rout, which he had himself witnessed, of the French army of General Bourbaki, and its flight over the Swiss frontier in the depth of winter during the Franco-Prussian War.

[1] Neither of the incumbents returned had been Liberals since the election of 1880 but the by-election was expected to be a closer affair, and polling 39.3% of the vote, he decided not to stand again to be an MP.

[1] His father's fine collection of 77 pictures and 18 drawings, including Chapeau de Poil by Rubens, he sold to the National Gallery in March 1871 for £75,000 (equivalent to about £8,800,000 in 2023).

However, in later life his private circumstances, a reckless extravagance and rift from his wife, meant he ceased to live at Drayton Manor, Staffordshire.

[4] The Times wrote his obituary to include a statement that his death "left no gap in English public life...his career has closed in disappointment and futility."