Sir Esmé Howard

Esmé William Howard (1863–1939), later Baron Howard of Penrith, entered diplomacy in the 1880s and served in Rome and Berlin. His career also included service as a trooper in the Boer War and a consulship in Crete. In October 1906 Foreign Secretary Edward Grey and Charles Hardinge asked him to become counselor at Washington and take charge of the embassy during the replacement of Ambassador Mortimer Durand. ^{1, 2}

As chargé in June 1907 Howard conveyed Jamaica’s thanks for assistance provided by the United States Atlantic Fleet after the Kingston earthquake. Britain had learned that Washington did not intend to seek repayment for relief supplies. Howard transmitted the colonial government’s appreciation to the State Department. ³

Later posts included Switzerland, Sweden during the First World War, and Spain. In Stockholm he dealt with the effects of Britain’s blockade on a neutral country. He participated in the Paris peace settlement and returned to Washington as ambassador in 1924. The naval treaty obligations and trade questions of the postwar period formed part of his embassy’s work; in 1925 his counselor Henry Getty Chilton formally reported, on his behalf, Britain’s completion of the required scrapping of capital ships. ^{4, 1, 5, 6}

In May 1928 Howard conveyed Austen Chamberlain’s instructions on the proposed treaty renouncing war, which became the Kellogg–Briand Pact. Britain sought the simultaneous participation of the Dominions and India as original signatories. Howard explained the preferred procedure for separate American invitations, including direct approaches through the United States legations in Ottawa and Dublin. Secretary of State Frank Kellogg then instructed American missions to issue those invitations. ⁷

Howard left Washington in 1930 and was created Baron Howard of Penrith that July. His surviving diplomatic papers and diaries include material on the Versailles negotiations. ^{1, 4}