George IV of the United Kingdom

George Augustus Frederick was born 12 August 1762, eldest son of George III and Queen Charlotte. He became Prince Regent on 5 February 1811 when his father's mental illness made him unfit to rule, and inherited the throne outright on 29 January 1820. His reign was defined less by policy - Lord Liverpool ran the government through Napoleon's defeat and the peace that followed - than by personal excess. He poured money into John Nash's Royal Pavilion in Brighton, the remodeling of Buckingham Palace, and Jeffry Wyatville's rebuilding of Windsor Castle, earning the nickname "the first gentleman of England" for his taste and charm. But his marriage to Caroline of Brunswick was a disaster, and when he barred her from his 1821 coronation and pushed the Pains and Penalties Bill to divorce her, public contempt hardened. His only legitimate child, Princess Charlotte, died in 1817; his brother Frederick followed in 1827. When George died on 26 June 1830, another brother, William IV, took the throne he left diminished.