horse races forced Leveson-Gower to refrain from leaving his house for a time. Despite mounting levels of public and private criticism, he refused to resign from his position as Lord Privy Seal, an action which led English lexicographer and prominent Tory Dr. Samuel Johnson to include Leveson-Gower in his seminal 1755 work A Dictionary of the English Language under the definition of renegado, though this was later removed by Johnson's printer. By the early 1750's, Leveson-Gower had solidified his political loyalty to the Pelham brothers, joining a group of British politicians (dominated by members of the Whig party) known as the "Pelhamites". Later life and death During the 1747 British general election, Leveson-Gower's parliamentary support base, which included seven constituencies in Staffordshire and Westminster, came under heavy threat by rival political candidates. Though he had succeeded to the position of Lord Lieutenant of Staffordshire in 1742, which gave him a large advantage in determining the outcome of parliamentary elections, all seven constituencies were contested by Tory politicians with extensive backing. Despite suffering from gout, Leveson-Gower chose to defend his support base, focusing on the constituencies of Stafford and Lichfield; this was despite the fact that, as George Anson noted in a letter to the 4th Duke of Bedford, "everything has been done that could be thought of against Lord Gower's interest". Leveson-Gower complained that he was being opposed in the elections "by... men that I have lived in the strictest friendship with the best part of my life". When the results of the elections were announced, Leveson-Gower discovered that, despite his extensive campaigning efforts, he had lost five out of the seven constituencies of his support base; the two he had retained, Stafford and Lichfield, were due in Henry Pelham's opinion "almost entirely to the Whigs". According to Wisker, the "considerable" cost of campaigning during the general election sapped a significant portion of Leveson-Gower's financial estate. In June 1751, Leveson-Gower refused to join his third son Granville (by now a member of parliament) and the 4th Duke of Bedford in resigning from their positions as a show of support to John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich, who had been dismissed from his position as First Lord of the Admiralty by the 1st Duke of Newcastle. When Henry Pelham died in March 1754, leading to the Broad Bottom ministry's collapse, he again refused to resign from his position. On 25 December