Thomas Pitt (5 July 1653 – 28 April 1726) of Blandford St Mary in Dorset, later of Stratford in Wiltshire and of Boconnoc in Cornwall, known during life commonly as Governor Pitt, as Captain Pitt, or posthumously, as "Diamond" Pitt was an English merchant involved in trade with India who served as President of Madras and six times as a Member of Parliament. He was the grandfather of William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham ("Pitt the Elder") and was great-grandfather of Pitt the Younger, both prime ministers of Great Britain.
Origins
Pitt was born at Blandford Forum, Dorset, the second son of Rev. John Pitt (1610–1672), Rector of Blandford St Mary (whose mural monument survives in that church), by his wife Sarah Jay. His second cousin was the poet Rev. Christopher Pitt (1699–1748) whose mural monument survives in the church of St Peter and St Paul, Blandford Forum, displaying the arms of Pitt: Sable, a fesse chequy argent and azure between three bezants. The earliest prominent ancestor of his family was John Pitt (died 1602) a mercer from Blandford Forum and Clerk of the Exchequer who received a grant of arms, from whose younger son, Thomas Pitt of Blandford (father of Rev. John Pitt), the Pitts of Boconnoc were descended. The eldest son of John Pitt (died 1602) was Sir William Pitt (1636), MP for Wareham, who founded the senior line of Pitt of Stratfield Saye in Hampshire, many of whose descendants served as an MP for Wareham and in 1776 acquired the title Baron Rivers.
In the Mughal Empire
In 1674, Pitt went to India with the East India Company, and soon began trading for himself as an "interloper" in defiance of the East India Company's legal monopoly on Indian trade. Upon his return to England, he was fined £400 for his actions, although by that time he was already very wealthy and could easily afford the fine. He then proceeded to buy the manor of Stratford, Wiltshire and its surrounding borough of Old Sarum. With that acquisition he gained a seat in the House of Commons, as it was a rotten borough, although his first seat was as the member for Salisbury in the Convention Parliament of 1689. The purchase of Old Sarum would have a significant effect on English history, as the seat would pass to Pitt's rather influential descendants. Pitt returned to India and eventually was hired by the East India Company.
In August 1698, Pitt arrived at Madras as the President of the East India Company and was entrusted to negotiate an end to the Child's War with the Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb. In August 1699, he had been appointed as the Governor of Fort St. George. In 1702, when the fort was besieged by Daud Khan of the Carnatic, the Mughal Empire's local subedar (lieutenant), Pitt was instructed to seek peace. He later bought out some of the Carnatic region. He began garrisoning East India Company forts by raising regiments of local sepoys by hiring from Hindu warrior castes, arming them with the latest weapons and deploying them under the command of English officers to save Madras, his base of operations, from further Mughal harassment.
President of Madras
Pitt became the President of Madras on 7 July 1698 and remained in his post till 1709.
In 1698, a new company called English Company Trading to the East Indies was floated by English merchants with Whiggish affiliations with a capital of £2 million. In August 1699, one John Pitt arrived at Madras and claimed that he had been appointed as the Governor of Fort St George by the new Company on behalf of the Stuarts. However, the Government in England passed an order that the authorities were to receive orders from no-one save those appointed by King William III.
On 4 December 1700, the Government of Fort St George banned cock-fighting and other traditional games, regarding it as the foremost reason for the poverty of the inhabitants of Madras.
Pitt's term of office is known as the 'Golden Age of Madras'. He fortified the walls of Black Town and organised an accurate survey of the city. Pitt is best known for the acquisition of the Five New Towns: Tiruvatiyoor, Kathiwakam, Nungambakkam, Vyasarpady and Sathangadu.
Later career
In need of money after making gifts to his family, he gave up his seat in parliament in 1716 in favour of the position of governor of Jamaica. However, his finances were restored by the sale of a large diamond (later known as the Regent Diamond) and he resigned the position the following year without ever going there. He was soon re-elected to parliament to represent Thirsk, and thereafter Old Sarum for the last time, finally quitting parliament in 1726.