Pitt Street, George Town have lived here for centuries. Pitt Street was named after William Pitt the Younger, who was the Prime Minister of Great Britain between 1783 and 1801. When Captain Francis Light founded Penang Island in 1786, he renamed the island the "Prince of Wales Island" in honour of the Prince of Wales, the new settlement of George Town after King George III and the first street within the settlement after himself. Worried that Prime Minister William Pitt may have felt offended as nothing was named after him, Light felt compelled to name Pitt Street after him. Pitt Street, created soon after
Robert Pitt sat for Okehampton and the Pitt estate passed entirely to him. His second son was William Pitt the Elder, a British statesmen who led the country three times in 1756–57, 1757–1762 and 1766–1768. His daughter Harriott married William Corbet. His grandson William Pitt the Younger became Prime Minister in 1783. Pitt was also brother-in-law to General James Stanhope, through his sister Lucy Pitt. Robert Pitt Sir Robert Pitt (1680 – 21 May 1727) was a British politician who sat in the House of Commons from 1705 to 1727. He was the father and grandfather of two prime ministers, William Pitt