George Cornewall Lewis (1806-1863) was a British statesman and intellectual. Lewis was educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford, where he briefly practised law, but gave up due to poor health. In 1836 he published On Local Disturbances in Ireland, and the Irish Church Question, an overview of organised rural violence. In 1845, he was blamed for abuses of the Poor Law system in an inquiry on the Andover Workhouse Scandal. Lord Palmerston made him Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1855, where he was responsible for the financing of the Crimean War, and in 1859, he was made the Home Secretary. In 1861 he headed the War Office, where he successfully argued against British intervention in the American Civil War. In 1863, he fell ill and died on 13 April 1863.
Writings
On Local Disturbances in Ireland: and on the Irish Church Question