Joseph Hume Burnley

Joseph Hume Burnley (1821–1904) was born in Trinidad to plantation owner William Hardin Burnley and Charlotte Brown. He was named for the politician Joseph Hume, his uncle by marriage. His mother moved to Europe while he was young, and he grew up with her in Paris. In 1836 his father selected Karl Ferdinand Becker’s school at Offenbach with a diplomatic career in mind. Burnley married Emily Adelaide Heath in London in 1850. ¹

He was already serving in Madrid in 1851. Later appointments included the legation secretaryships at Berne, Copenhagen, and Washington. On 5 December 1864, as Lord Lyons prepared to leave Washington because of ill health, he recommended Burnley to Secretary William Seward as the chargé d’affaires already presented to the American government. ^{1, 2, 3}

On 25 February 1865 he forwarded New Brunswick’s response to an American request for extradition of the St. Albans raiders. Lieutenant Governor Arthur Gordon had issued an arrest warrant, but the colony’s solicitor general warned that the American requisition omitted the victims’ identities and dates of the alleged crimes. Burnley specifically asked Seward to consider that opinion. ⁴

After a posting at The Hague, Burnley became chargé at Dresden in 1867 and remained until 1873. The mission had recently reopened at reduced rank. His reports followed the new German Empire’s domestic politics as well as court affairs. During the Chemnitz strike in November 1871 he described workers returning to the factories, endorsed the employers’ position, and criticized Social Democratic newspapers. He retired from the Dresden post and died in 1904. ^{2, 5, 6}