Malmesbury, JAMES HARRIS, first EARL OF, diplomatist, was born at Salisbury, 21st April 1746, the only son of James 'Hermes' Harris (q.v.). Educated at Winchester, at Merton College, Oxford, and at Leyden, in 1768 he became secretary of legation at Madrid, and in 1772 minister at Berlin, in 1777 at St Petersburg, in 1784 at The Hague. In 1779 he received the Order of the Bath, and in 1788 was created Baron, in 1800 Earl of Malmesbury. Meanwhile, in 1793, with other Whigs he had seceded from Fox to Pitt, and in 1795 had married by proxy and conducted to England the Princess Caroline. 'I'm not well, Harris; get me a glass of brandy, Harris'—one remembers the Prince's reception of his bride. Very deaf during the last twenty years of his life, Lord Malmesbury died in London, 20th November 1820. See his Diaries and Correspondence (1844), and Lord Malmesbury and his Friends (1870), both edited by his grandson.
That grandson, JAMES HOWARD HARRIS, third EARL OF MALMESBURY, was born in London, 25th March 1807, and from Eton proceeded to Oriel College, Oxford. He took his B.A. in 1827, and then made a continental tour (1828–29), during which at Rome he formed a close friendship with Louis Napoleon. In 1837 he stood as a Tory for Portsmouth, and in 1841 had just been returned for Wilton, when his father's death called him to the House of Lords. In 1852 he was Foreign Secretary under Lord Derby, as again in 1858–59, when his policy prior to the outbreak of the Franco-Austrian war was directed wisely if unsuccessfully to the preservation of the peace of Europe. In 1866–68, and again in 1874–76, he was Lord Privy Seal; in 1884 appeared his valuable and entertaining Memoirs of an Ex-Minister. He died 17th May 1889.