Richard Wingfield, 1st Viscount Powerscourt (third creation)
Quick Facts
Biography
Richard Wingfield, 1st Viscount Powerscourt PC (I) (19 August 1697 – 21 October 1751) was an Anglo-Irish politician and peer.
Powerscourt was the son of the politician Edward Wingfield and his wife, Eleanor Gore, a daughter of Sir Arthur Gore, 1st Baronet. He was a descendant of the uncle of Folliott Wingfield, 1st Viscount Powerscourt.
He sat in the Irish House of Commons as the Member of Parliament for Boyle between 1727 and 1743. On 4 February 1743 he was elevated to the Peerage of Ireland as Viscount Powerscourt, of Powerscourt in County Wicklow, and Baron Wingfield, of Wingfield in County Wexford, and he assumed his seat in the Irish House of Lords. In 1746 he was made a member of the Privy Council of Ireland.
On 13 April 1727 he married Dorothy Beresford Rowley, and together they had four children. He was succeeded in his titles by his eldest son, Edward. Edward was in turn succeeded by the first Viscount's second son, Richard.
Powerscourt was responsible for commissioning the German architect, Richard Cassels, to carry out extensive remodelling work on Powerscourt House between 1731 and 1741.