(1757 - 1829), 2nd s. of John Abbot of Colchester, Essex, and Sarah, later Mrs Bentham; educ. Westminster and Ch.Ch. Oxf. 1775; M.Temple, called 1783; L.Inn 1785; MP 1795 - 1817; m. 1796 Elizabeth Gibbes; cr. B. Colchester 1817.
1788 [dep. Dover 26 Aug.] Turin (10 Sep.), Genoa (13 Sep.), Leghorn, Pisa, Florence (15 - 18 Sep.), Perugia (20 Sep.), Narni, Rome (21 - 28 Sep.), Naples (30 Sep. - 6 Oct.), Rome (7 - 10 Oct.), Siena (11 Oct.), Florence (12 Oct.), Bologna (15 Oct.), Venice (16 - 20 Oct.), Vicenza, Verona (22 Oct.) [London, 4 Nov.]
When their duties on the Oxford circuit were over in 1788, Abbot and his friend Hugh Leycester made a rapid tour of Italy, which Abbot succinctly recorded in a travel journal (Abbot jnl.MSS). They had prepared a notebook of personal observations on the route (drawn from accounts by Oswald Leycester, Henry Bankes, John Mitford, and [the Rev. George?] Chamberlayne), and took Louis Dutens's Itinéraire of 1786. In Florence they stayed at Megit's hotel, and Abbot disarmingly observed at Lord Cowper's that 'The Pictures seemed to be good but they were not our object'. Abbot was dismayed by the Campagna ('the total Reverse of Milton's Description'). At Rome, where they stayed at Margherita's hotel, they were guided by the antiquarian Angelo Dalmazzoni; Abbot noted that Piranesi's prints were 'the Best for the Antiquities and almost for Every thing, but they are too Black and unfinished'. He commissioned work from the seal engraver Alessandro Cades and the draughtsman 'Miri' [Ludovico Mirri] (coloured drawings, copies of ancient and modern masters, but dear). In Naples James Clark acted as their cicerone, and they dined at Sir William Hamilton's with Emma Hart and her mother. On their return journey, Abbot met Charles Fox and Mrs Armitstead in Venice. The tour, which took ten weeks and one day and covered 2,906 miles, cost £;690.7s.6d.
As Baron Colchester, Abbot made a second, more leisurely Continental tour of France, Switzerland and Italy, from July 1819 to May 1822.