Henry Labouchere was born on 15 August 1798 at Over Stowey, into a Huguenot merchant family. He graduated B.A. (1821) and M.A. (1828) at Oxford. In 1826 he became M.P. for Michael Borough on the Whig ticket. In 1830, he moved to the seat for Taunton, which he held until 1859. (In 1835, he held it against Disraeli, defeating him 452 votes to 282).

Labouchere was first named to office by Early Grey in 1832, serving as Lord of the Admiralty. After beginning the second Melbourne ministry as Master of the Mint, Privy Counsellor, and vice-president of the Board of Trade (and later Under-Secretary of War and the Colonies), Labouchere was raised to a cabinet post, President of the Board of Trade, which he held from 1839 until the Melbourne government fell in 1841.

When the Whigs, now led by Lord John Russell, returned to office in 1846, Labouchere returned to the cabinet, this time as Chief Secretary for Ireland. The following year, he once again became President of the Board of Trade, and stayed in that post until Russell’s government fell in 1852.

Labouchere’s final cabinet posting came during the first Palmerston ministry, for which he served as Secretary of State for the Colonies from 1855 to 1858. In 1859 Henry Labouchere was raised to the House of Lords as Baron Taunton.

Lord Taunton died on 13 July 1869 at his home in Over Stowey. He had married Frances Baring in 1840, and after her death, Lady Mary Howard in 1852. He had three daughters but no son, as so his barony became extinct at his death. His nephew, also Henry Labouchere, inherited part of his fortune, and was later to become a well-known newspaper editor and politician.