Records of Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom of . From oldest to youngest: The most recent death of a former Prime Minister was that of Baroness Thatcher (served 1979–90) on 8 April 2013 (aged 87 years, 177 days). Seven Prime Ministers have died in office: Spencer Perceval is the only British Prime Minister to have been assassinated. Sir Robert Peel, Margaret Thatcher and John Major survived assassination attempts in 1843, 1984 and 1991 respectively. Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman and Bonar Law each resigned during their respective final illnesses. Law died five months after his resignation, but Campbell-Bannerman lived only another 19 days, dying at 10 Downing Street, the
Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Lord and not the Prime Minister. Despite the reluctance to legally recognise the Premiership, ambivalence toward it waned in the 1780s. During the first 20 years of his reign, George III (1760–1820) tried to be his own "prime minister" by controlling policy from outside the Cabinet, appointing and dismissing ministers, meeting privately with individual ministers, and giving them instructions. These practices caused confusion and dissension in Cabinet meetings; King George's experiment in personal rule was generally a failure. After the failure of Lord North's ministry (1770–1782) in March 1782 due to Britain's defeat in the American Revolutionary War and the