[1] The son of a baker, Whitehead was born in Cambridge and through the patronage of Henry Bromley, afterwards Baron Montfort, was admitted to Winchester College aged fourteen.

He entered Clare College, Cambridge on a Pyke scholarship in 1735, and became a fellow in 1742 (resigning this in 1746), and admitted Master of Arts in 1743.

The plots of these tragedies are based the Horace (1640) of Pierre Corneille, and the Ion (c. 414–412 BC) of Euripides.

Astonishingly for a political appointee, he appeared to see no requirement "to defend the King or support the government".

[6] For some 28 years in this post, he contented himself in writing the obligatory verse, avoiding flattery and domestic politics, and bolstering Britain’s place in world affairs.

3, 7, 20) and other collections, and his poems appear in Alexander Chalmers's Works of the English Poets (vol.