John Waldegrave, 3rd Earl Waldegrave
British politician

General John Waldegrave, 3rd Earl Waldegrave (28 April 1718 – 22 October 1784) was a British Army officer and politician.
Career
Waldegrave was the youngest son of the 1st Earl Waldegrave. He joined the 1st Regiment of Foot in 1735, rising to the rank of captain in 1739. He became a lieutenant-colonel in the 3rd Regiment of Foot in 1743 and fought in 1745 at the Battle of Fontenoy, where he was wounded, during the War of the Austrian Succession.
He became a member of parliament (MP) for Orford in 1747 and for Newcastle-under-Lyme in 1754. Promoted to major-general in 1757, he took part in the raid on St Malo in June 1758 and the Battle of Minden in August 1759 during the Seven Years' War. He was promoted to lieutenant-general in 1759 and became a Groom of the Bedchamber in 1760. On the death of his elder brother James Waldegrave, 2nd Earl Waldegrave without male heirs in 1763, Waldegrave inherited his titles and estates, including the family seat at Chewton Mendip. He was promoted to full general in 1772 and died in 1784.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “John Waldegrave, 3rd Earl Waldegrave” as british politician. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as british politician. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 14, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q6262675. VIAF identifies the subject as 56439312. The Library of Congress control number is no2008169113. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1718, 1784, 1735 and 1739.
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This entry incorporates text from “John Waldegrave, 3rd Earl Waldegrave” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.