Henry Dundas
Advocate and politician
Died when: 69 years 30 days (829 months)Star Sign: Taurus
Henry Dundas, 1st Viscount Melville, PC, FRSE (28 April 1742 – 28 May 1811), styled as Lord Melville from 1802, was the trusted lieutenant of British Prime Minister William Pitt and the most powerful politician in Scotland in the late 18th century.
Dundas was instrumental in the encouragement of the Scottish Enlightenment, in the prosecution of the war against France, and in the expansion of British influence in India.
Prime Minister Pitt appointed him Lord of Trade (1784–1786), Home Secretary (1791–1794), President of the Board of Control for Indian Affairs (1793–1801), Secretary at War (1794–1801) and First Lord of the Admiralty (1804–1805).
His deft and almost total control of Scottish politics during a long period in which no monarch visited the country led to him being nicknamed "King Harry the Ninth", the "Grand Manager of Scotland" (a play on the masonic office of Grand Master of Scotland), the "Great Tyrant" and "The Uncrowned King of Scotland".
He was, however, a controversial figure, as he proposed a gradual abolition of the British transatlantic slave trade over eight years at a time when the leaders of the abolitionist movement sought an immediate end to the slave trade and the West Indian interests opposed any abolition at all.