George Savile, 1st Marquess of Halifax, (11 November 1633 – 5 April 1695), was an English statesman, writer, and politician who sat in the House of Commons in 1660, and in the House of Lords after he was raised to the peerage in 1668. Background and early life, 1633–1667 Savile was born in Thornhill, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, the eldest son of Sir William Savile, 3rd Baronet, and his wife Anne Coventry, eldest daughter of Lord Keeper Thomas Coventry, 1st Baron Coventry. His father distinguished himself in the civil war in the royalist cause and died in 1644. Savile was also the nephew of Sir William Coventry, who is said to have influenced his political opinions, and of Lord Shaftesbury, afterwards his most bitter opponent, and great-nephew of the Earl of Strafford. He was the great-grandson of Sir George Savile of Lupset and Thornhill (created baronet in 1611). He was educated at Shrewsbury School in 1643 while his mother was staying with a sister in Shropshire. He later travelled in France, where he attended a Huguenot academy in Paris, stayed in Angers and Orléans, in Italy and in the Netherlands, and was also believed to have been educated in Geneva. He returned to England by 1652. In 1660, Savile was elected Member of Parliament for Pontefract in the Convention Parliament, and this was his only appearance in the Lower House. In the same year he was made Deputy Lieutenant for the county of Yorkshire and Colonel of a foot regiment in the Yorkshire Militia. The Duke of York sought a peerage for him in 1665, but was successfully opposed by Clarendon, on the ground of his "ill-reputation amongst men of piety and religion." The chancellor's real motives may have been Savile's connection with Buckingham and Coventry. The honours were, however, only deferred for a short time and were obtained after the fall of Clarendon on 31 December 1667, when Savile was created Baron Savile of Elland and Viscount Halifax. In 1667 he was commissioned Captain to raise a troop in Yorkshire for Prince Rupert's Regiment of Horse. Political career, 1668–1680 Halifax supported zealously the anti-French policy formulated in the Triple Alliance of January 1668. He was created a privy councillor in 1672, and, while it is believed that he was ignorant of the secret clauses in the Treaty of Dover, was chosen envoy to negotiate terms of peace