of the heroes of her reign...He was a statesman, an orator, a mathematician, a scholar, and the most fascinating talker of his day...A noble gentleman in the highest sense of the word, full of light, intellect, and dignity, loved and lamented. His best qualities, no doubt, as is often the case, he carried almost to excess; for his cherished independence he led to a morbid craving for isolation. But to the charge of vacillation in public affairs he was not obnoxious; he was always true to his faith. But he chose his masters well, Johnson and Burke; the one gave him his religious, the other his political creed. In life he was brilliant and successful. In oratory, in parliament, in society, he was almost supreme. But he can scarcely be said to survive. He left no stamp, no school, no work. To those, however, who care to disinter his memory he displays character and qualities of excellence, rare at all times, rarest in these. F. P. Lock has described Windham as "a Norfolk squire of uncommon intellectual gifts and great personal charm. His great failing was chronic indecision". Boyd Hilton said Windham "was the first in a line of brilliant but maverick right-wing politicians—Lyndhurst, Randolph Churchill, F. E. Smith—who operated too far outside the consensus to be effective. He had a scintillating personality, and political convictions so strong that they belied his otherwise scholarly and discriminating characteristics, but he lacked judgement and had a streak of melancholic instability". Windham, a lost early hamlet in Richmond Hill, Ontario, Canada was named for Windham. Notes References External links 1750 births 1810 deaths People from Felbrigg People educated at Eton College Alumni of the University of Glasgow Alumni of University College, Oxford Members of Parliament for Norfolk British MPs 1784–1790 British MPs 1790–1796 British MPs 1796–1800 Members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for English constituencies UK MPs 1801–1802 UK MPs 1802–1806 UK MPs 1806–1807 UK MPs 1807–1812 William Secretaries of State for War and the Colonies Chief Secretaries for Ireland Members of the Privy Council of Great Britain Members of the Privy Council of Ireland