[Knox], The Claim of the Colonies

William Knox was born in Monaghan, Ireland, educated in Church of Ireland schools and Trinity College, Dublin, and first experienced politics during the Anglo-Irish political crisis of 1753–6 under the patronage of the Irish House of Commons opposition leader, Sir Richard Cox. Arriving in London in 1762, in the closing stages of the Seven Years War, he found his experience of colonial administration much sought after. Knox was probably the author of the anonymous ‘Hints Respecting the Settlement of our American Provinces’ (1763), found among material relating to the Stamp Act in the papers of Charles Jenkinson and seen by lords Grosvenor and Bute. According to Knox, common law, Magna Carta, and the Bill of Rights ‘with one voice declare the subject shall not be taxed by any other authority than that of parliament’.