Biography of James Harris 1st Earl Malmesbury 1746-1820
Paternal Family Tree: Harris
The Early Diaries of Frances Burney May 1775. 20 Jan 1741. The party consisted of the Baron Deiden, the Danish Ambassador and the Baronness his lady, who is a sweet woman, young, pretty, accomplished, and graceful. She is reckoned one of the best lady harpsichord players in Europe. Miss Phipps, whom I have mentioned before. Sir James Lake,56.1 who, as heretofore, was sensible, cold, and reserved. Lady Lake,56.2 who as heretofore was all politeness and sweetness. Miss Lake, sister of Sir James, who is a very obliging and sweet-tempered, oldish maid;56.3 and Sir Thomas Clarges, a young baronet, who was formerly so desperately enamoured of Miss Linley, now Mrs. Sheridan, that his friends made a point of his going abroad to recover himself: he is now just returned from Italy, and I hope cured. He still retains all the school-boy English mauvaise honte [bashfulness]; scarce speaks but to make an answer, and is as shy as if his last residence had been at Eaton instead of Paris.57.1 [his father] Mr. Harris (age 31), author of the three Treatises on Music, Poetry, and Happiness, of Philosophical Arrangements, Hermes, and several other tracts. He is at the same time learned and polite, intelligent and humble.57.2 Mrs. Harris, his wife, is in nothing extraordinary57.3. Miss Louisa Harris, his second daughter, is a modest, reserved, and sensible girl. She is a singing-scholar of Sacchini's, and has obtained some fame as a lady-singer58.1. Mrs. Ord58.2, a very musical lady and agreeable woman. Miss Ord, a fine girl, but very insipid. Mr. Earl, a very musical gentleman. Mrs. Anguish, a keen, sharp, clever woman. Miss Harrison, daughter of the unfortunate Commodore58.3, a haughty and uninteresting sort of girl. Mr. Merlin, the very ingenious mechanic. He is very diverting also in conversation. There is a singular simplicity in his manners. He speaks his opinion upon all subjects and abcat all persons with the most undisguised freedom. He does not, though a foreigner, want words; but he arranges and pronounces them very comically. He is humbly grateful for all civilities that are shown him; but is warmly and honestly resentful for the least slight58.4.
Note 56.1. Sir James Winter Lake (son of Sir Sitwell Lake, Governor of the Hudson's Bay Company), and himself a director of "The Million Bank," had "one of the most extensive and choice collections of English portraits in the kingdom."
Note 56.2. Henrietta Maria, daughter of the first Baron Mulgrave (age 18), afterwards married to Charles, eleventh Viscount Dillon [Note. TT. Mistake for 12th Viscount Dillon], was the "amiable and zealous" friend who, gathering from her brother, Captain Phipps, that Dr. Burney had been elected a fellow of the Royal Society without a single black-ball, made it known to him by directing a letter to "Dr. Burney, F.R.S., Queen's Square," before the President, or the friend who had nominated him, had time to forward the news.
Note 56.3. In her letter to Mr. Crisp upon this concert, Fanny says playfully of Miss Lake, that she is a "very agreeable old maid, I respect and admire,-and wish to imitate her."
Note 57.1. Sir Thomas Clarges afterwards married a lady who was beloved by Dr. Burney as resembling his Susan (who was her dear friend) in person, voice, and musical taste and skill; Lady Clarges afterwards, unfortunately, resembled Susan in her delicacy of health and premature death.
Note 57.2. In the letter Mr. Harris is said to be "a charming old man,-well. bred even to humility, gentle in his manners, communicative and agreeable in his conversation.
Note 57.3. Here we raise the pen of protest. This was indeed a hasty judgement, made from the surface. It is heightened in the letter to Mr. Crisp, describing this same evening "Mrs. Harris - a so, so, sort of woman" What! was our witty Mrs. Harris to be made out to be like that gown in which she went to the birthday in 1774-"& decent, plain silk,-no colour-"? Read her, reader. Mortimer Collins made us read her. We quote from his article on "Mrs. Harris": "Mrs. Harris was a person who made her mark in the world .... She was a constant correspondent of her son," (the first Lord Malmesbury) "whether he was studying at Oxford or the Hague, or doing diplomacy at Madrid, or Berlin, or St. Petersburg; and her letters are charming for their vivacity, and for the graphic style in which they narrate the events of the day.... I wonder if any rising politician of the present day has a mother who can send him such delightful epistles-I greatly doubt it." Mortimer ends by saying that now "nobody can chronicle the gossip of the day with so playful a pen as Mrs. Harris." She was Elizabeth, daughter, and in the end heiress, of John Clarke, M.P., of SANFORD, in Somersetshire, a woman of fashion and esprit, but not wholly like the family whom she thus wittily describes: "They have a good house in Park Place, and are people of this world." Her letters to her son begin on his going to Oxford in June, 1763, and end in October, 1780, when he represented Great Britain at St. Petersburg. They are not to be found in the Diplomatic Correspondence of the first Lord Malmesbury, but in another collection, that of the Letters of his Family and Friends.
Note 58.1. Fanny says in the letter, "Miss Louisa Harris has a bad figure, and is not handsome.
Note 58.2. Mrs. Ord, Fanny's firm friend in after years, was daughter of an eminent surgeon surnamed Dillingham, or Dellingham; and was, then, a wealthy widow.
Note 58.3. Called "the unfortunate" because, after distinguished service in the East and West Indies, he was stricken with palsy from over-work of mind and body, and lived in a helpless state for twenty years.
Note 58.4. Merlin was a clever but absurd man, a mechanician, always trying new inventions. In her letter Fanny says, "he pronounces English very comically, for though he is never at a loss for a word, he almost always puts the emphasis on the wrong syllable."
In 1745 [his father] James Harris (age 35) and [his mother] Elizabeth Clarke were married.
On 21 Apr 1746 James Harris 1st Earl Malmesbury was born to James Harris (age 36) and Elizabeth Clarke and Elizabeth Clarke at Salisbury.
Around 1758 James Harris 1st Earl Malmesbury (age 11) was educated at Winchester College , Winchester.
In 1777 James Harris 1st Earl Malmesbury (age 30) and Harriet Maria Amyand Countess Malmesbury (age 16) were married.
In 1777 Gilbert Elliot 1st Earl Minto (age 25) and [his sister-in-law] Anna-Maria Amyand Countess Minto (age 24) were married.
On 19 Aug 1778 [his son] James Edward Harris 2nd Earl Malmesbury was born to James Harris 1st Earl Malmesbury (age 32) and [his wife] Harriet Maria Amyand Countess Malmesbury (age 17).
On 22 Dec 1780 [his father] James Harris (age 71) died at Malmesbury House, Salisbury Cathedral Close [Map]. On 28 Dec 1780 he was buried at Salisbury Cathedral [Map]. There is a memorial in the South Transept.
In 1784 [his daughter] Frances Harris was born to James Harris 1st Earl Malmesbury (age 37) and [his wife] Harriet Maria Amyand Countess Malmesbury (age 23).
The London Gazette 13204. 13 Sep 1788.
The King has been pleased to grant the Dignity of a Baron of the Kingdom of Great Britain to the Right Honourable Sir Joseph Yorke (age 64), Knight of the Bath, and General of His Majesty's Forces, and the Heirs Male of his Body lawfully begotten, by the Name, Stile and Title of Lord Dover, Baron of the Town and Port of Dover, in the County of Kent.
The King has also been pleased to grant the Dignity of a Baron of the Kingdom of Great Britain to the Right Honourable Sir James Harris (age 42), Knight of the Bath, His Majesty's Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to the States General of the United Provinces, and the Heirs Male of his Body lawfully begotten, by the Name, Stile and Title of Lord Malmesbury, Baron of Malmesbury, in the County of Wilts.
The King has been pleased to appoint Charles Whitworth (age 36), Esq; to be His Majesty's Envoy Extradinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to the Court of Petersburgh.
The King has also been pleased to appoint Robert Liston, Esq; to be His Majesty's Envoy Extraordinary to the Court of Stockholm.
The King has also been pleased to appoint Daniel Hailes, Esq; to be His Majesty's Envoy Extraordinary to the Court of Warsaw.
The King has been pleased to approve of Thomas Gavino, Esq; to be Consul for the States General of the United Provinces at Gibraltar.
The London Gazette 15317. Whitehall, December 9, 1800.
The King has been pleased to grant the Dignities of Viscount and Earl of the Kingdom of Great Britain to the Right Honorable Charles Sloane Lord Cadogan (age 72), and the Heirs Male of his Body lawfully begotten, by the Name, Style, and Title of Viscount Chelsea, in the County of Middlesex, and Earl Cadogan. [Mary Churchill Countess Cadogan (age 42) by marriage Countess Cadogan.]
The King has also been pleased to grant the Dignities of Viscount and Earl of the Kingdom of Great Britain to the Right Honorable James Lord Malmesbury (age 54), Baron of Malmesbury, in the County of Wilts, Knight of the Most Honorable Order of the Bath, and the Heirs Male of his Body lawfully begotten, by the Name, Style, and Title of Viscount Fitz-Harris, of Hurn Court, in the County of Southampton, and Earl of Malmesbury. [[his wife] Harriet Maria Amyand Countess Malmesbury (age 39) by marriage Countess Malmesbury.]
On 17 Jun 1806 [his son] James Edward Harris 2nd Earl Malmesbury (age 27) and [his daughter-in-law] Harriet Susan Dashwood (age 23) were married. He the son of James Harris 1st Earl Malmesbury (age 60) and [his wife] Harriet Maria Amyand Countess Malmesbury (age 45).
In 1813 Gilbert Elliot 1st Earl Minto (age 61) was created 1st Earl Minto of Minto in Roxburghshire. [his sister-in-law] Anna-Maria Amyand Countess Minto (age 60) by marriage Countess Minto of Minto in Roxburghshire.
On 15 Jun 1815 [his son-in-law] Galbraith Lowry-Cole (age 43) and [his daughter] Frances Harris (age 31) were married. She the daughter of James Harris 1st Earl Malmesbury (age 69) and [his wife] Harriet Maria Amyand Countess Malmesbury (age 54). He the son of William Willoughby Cole 1st Earl Enniskillen and Anne Lowry-Corry Countess Enniskillen.
On 21 Nov 1820 James Harris 1st Earl Malmesbury (age 74) died. His son [his son] James Edward Harris 2nd Earl Malmesbury (age 42) succeeded 2nd Earl Malmesbury, 2nd Viscount Fitz-Harris of Hurn Court in Hampshire, 2nd Baron Malmesbury.
Memorials of Francis Chantrey RA in Hallamshire and Elsewhere Part V London Life and Works. In 1822, Chantrey (age 40) exhibited his admirable bust of George IV., now in the Royal College of Physicians; and in the following year - 1823 - the impressive cumbent figure of John, the first Earl of Malmsbury, deeply thoughtful, with a book in his hand, now in Salisbury Cathedral [Map]. Dr. Carus, who accompanied the King of Saxony on his visit to this country, in 1844, says- "The image of a noble, intelligent man, who, in the midst of bodily sufferings, still continues to apply himself to the higher objects of mental development, is here so admirably delineated, that I must pronounce this work, which is also beautifully treated in marble, in a statuary point of view, one of the most peculiar and remarkable of modern times. "1
Note 1. King of Saxony's Journey, p. 193.
On 20 Aug 1830 [his former wife] Harriet Maria Amyand Countess Malmesbury (age 69) died.
[his son] Thomas Alfred Harris was born to James Harris 1st Earl Malmesbury.
Kings Wessex: Great x 21 Grand Son of King Edmund "Ironside" I of England
Kings Gwynedd: Great x 17 Grand Son of Owain "Great" King Gwynedd
Kings Seisyllwg: Great x 23 Grand Son of Hywel "Dda aka Good" King Seisyllwg King Deheubarth
Kings Powys: Great x 18 Grand Son of Maredudd ap Bleddyn King Powys
Kings England: Great x 9 Grand Son of King Henry VII of England and Ireland
Kings Scotland: Great x 20 Grand Son of King Duncan I of Scotland
Kings Franks: Great x 17 Grand Son of Louis VII King Franks
Kings France: Great x 12 Grand Son of Charles "Beloved Mad" VI King France
GrandFather: James Harris
Father: James Harris 8 x Great Grand Son of King Henry VII of England and Ireland
Great x 4 Grandfather: John Cooper
Great x 3 Grandfather: John Cooper 1st Baronet
Great x 4 Grandmother: Margaret Skutt
Great x 2 Grandfather: Anthony Ashley-Cooper 1st Earl Shaftesbury
Great x 4 Grandfather: Anthony Ashley 1st Baronet
Great x 3 Grandmother: Anne Ashley Lady Cooper
Great x 4 Grandmother: Jane Okeover
Great x 1 Grandfather: Anthony Ashley-Cooper 2nd Earl Shaftesbury 6 x Great Grand Son of King Henry VII of England and Ireland
Great x 4 Grandfather: Richard Cecil 7 x Great Grand Son of King Edward III of England
Great x 3 Grandfather: David Cecil 3rd Earl Exeter 8 x Great Grand Son of King Edward III of England
Great x 4 Grandmother: Elizabeth Cope 13 x Great Grand Daughter of King Edward I of England
Great x 2 Grandmother: Frances Cecil 5 x Great Grand Daughter of King Henry VII of England and Ireland
Great x 4 Grandfather: John Egerton 1st Earl Bridgewater
Great x 3 Grandmother: Elizabeth Egerton Countess Exeter 4 x Great Grand Daughter of King Henry VII of England and Ireland
Great x 4 Grandmother: Frances Stanley Countess Bridgewater 3 x Great Grand Daughter of King Henry VII of England and Ireland
GrandMother: Elizabeth Ashley-Cooper 7 x Great Grand Daughter of King Henry VII of England and Ireland
Great x 4 Grandfather: John Manners 5 x Great Grand Son of King Edward III of England
Great x 3 Grandfather: George Manners 6 x Great Grand Son of King Edward III of England
Great x 4 Grandmother: Dorothy Vernon 6 x Great Grand Daughter of King Edward III of England
Great x 2 Grandfather: John Manners 8th Earl of Rutland 7 x Great Grand Son of King Edward III of England
Great x 4 Grandfather: Henry Pierrepont 10 x Great Grand Son of King John "Lackland" of England
Great x 3 Grandmother: Grace Pierrepont 9 x Great Grand Daughter of King Edward I of England
Great x 4 Grandmother: Frances Cavendish 8 x Great Grand Daughter of King Edward I of England
Great x 1 Grandmother: Dorothy Manners Countess Shaftesbury 8 x Great Grand Daughter of King Edward III of England
Great x 4 Grandfather: Edward Montagu 8 x Great Grand Son of King Edward I of England
Great x 3 Grandfather: Edward Montagu 1st Baron Montagu 9 x Great Grand Son of King Edward I of England
Great x 4 Grandmother: Elizabeth Harrington
Great x 2 Grandmother: Frances Montagu Countess Rutland 10 x Great Grand Daughter of King Edward I of England
Great x 4 Grandfather: Thomas Cotton
Great x 3 Grandmother: Frances Cotton 12 x Great Grand Daughter of King Henry "Curtmantle" II of England
Great x 4 Grandmother: Elizabeth Shirley 11 x Great Grand Daughter of King Henry "Curtmantle" II of England
James Harris 1st Earl Malmesbury 9 x Great Grand Son of King Henry VII of England and Ireland
GrandFather: John Clarke of Sanford in Somerset
Mother: Elizabeth Clarke