Richard Pakenham

Richard Pakenham was born in County Westmeath in 1797 and attended Trinity College Dublin. He began diplomatic work in The Hague in 1817, later served in Switzerland, and spent much of his early career in Mexico. As minister there from 1835, he helped arrange peace between France and Mexico in 1839 and negotiated an agreement against the slave trade in 1841. He received the American appointment in December 1843, as disputes over Texas and Oregon threatened relations with the United States. ¹

In March 1846 Pakenham reported to Foreign Secretary Aberdeen that most American senators favored a compromise Oregon boundary at the forty-ninth parallel. He distinguished that majority from the expansionists demanding the whole territory and considered whether President James K. Polk's public language had restricted his room for negotiation. ²

On 15 June 1846 Pakenham and Secretary of State James Buchanan signed the Oregon Treaty. It continued the boundary westward along the forty-ninth parallel, then turned south through the channel separating Vancouver Island from the mainland. The agreement protected existing British property interests south of the new boundary and secured navigation rights on the Columbia for the Hudson's Bay Company and British traders connected with it. ³

Pakenham returned to Britain in 1847, leaving John Crampton in charge of the legation. He later represented Britain in Portugal from 1851 to 1855 and returned on a special mission for Pedro V's accession. He retired to Coolure in County Westmeath and died on 28 October 1868. ^{1, 4}