Constituency Dates
Bury St Edmunds 1713 – 1722
Family and Education
b. 17 Sept. 1691, o.s. of John Hervey, M.P., 1st Earl of Bristol, by his 1st w. Isabella, da. of Sir Robert Carr, 3rd Bt., M.P., of Sleaford, Lincs., sis. and h. to Sir Edward Carr, 4th Bt., half-bro. of John, Lord Hervey, and Hon. Felton and Thomas Hervey. educ. Clare, Camb. 1708, Grand Tour (France, Flanders, Holland, Germany, Italy) 1711-13. unm.
Offices Held

Gentleman of the bedchamber to the Prince of Wales 1714 – d.

Address
Main residence: Ickworth, Suff.
biography text

Carr, Lord Hervey, was the son and heir of a wealthy Suffolk country gentleman who, having served for nine years as a Whig Member of Parliament, was raised to the peerage in 1703 and created Earl of Bristol at the coronation of George I. During his grand tour he visited Hanover to pay his court to the future George I and George II. Returned on his family’s interest for Bury St. Edmunds in 1713, he entered the service of the Prince of Wales in 1714, following him into opposition from 1717 to 1720. He lost his seat by neglect in 1722, when his stepmother describes him as ‘utterly ruined both in reputation and fortune’, adding: ‘the life he leads must soon put an end to his trouble’. He died, ‘drowned in drink’,1Letter Bks. of John Hervey, 1st Earl of Bristol, ii. 171, 249. 14 Nov. 1723. The apocryphal story that he was the father of Horace Walpole is probably a garbled version of contemporary gossip about the paternity of the 3rd Earl of Orford.2Hervey, Mems. 741-2.

Author
R.R.S.
Volume
Commons 1715-1754
Notes
  • 1. Letter Bks. of John Hervey, 1st Earl of Bristol, ii. 171, 249.
  • 2. Hervey, Mems. 741-2.