Charles Augustus Murray

Sir Charles Augustus Murray (22 November 1806 – 3 June 1895) was a British author and diplomat.

Early life

Murray was the second of three sons born to George Murray, 5th Earl of Dunmore, and the former Lady Susan Hamilton. His elder brother was Alexander Murray, 6th Earl of Dunmore who married Lady Catherine Herbert (daughter of the 11th Earl of Pembroke). His younger brother was the Hon. Henry Anthony Murray, a Rear Admiral in the Royal Navy, who died unmarried.

His paternal grandparents were the former Lady Charlotte Stewart (a daughter of Alexander Stewart, 6th Earl of Galloway) and John Murray, 4th Earl of Dunmore, the former colonial governor of the Province of New York and Virginia. His aunt, Lady Augusta Murray, married Prince Augustus Frederick, a younger son of King George III. His maternal grandparents were Archibald Hamilton, 9th Duke of Hamilton and the former Lady Harriet Stewart (a daughter of Alexander Stewart, 6th Earl of Galloway). and Lady Charlotte Hamilton (wife of the 11th Duke of Somerset) and uncles, Alexander Hamilton, 10th Duke of Hamilton and Lord Archibald Hamilton.

He was educated at Eton College and Oriel College, Oxford, where he matriculated in 1824, and graduated B.A. in 1827.

Murray spent several years travelling across Europe and America from 1835 and 1838, including several months with a Pawnee tribe in 1835. He described his experiences in his popular book Travels in North America (1839). There he fell in love with Elizabeth "Elise" Wadsworth, a daughter of New York landowner James Wadsworth who disapproved of the match. He attempted to remain in the United States as Secretary of the British Legation, but failed to obtain the position. He returned to England, and wrote of his experiences in a novel, The Prairie-Bird (1844).

Career On three occasions Murray stood as a Member of Parliament, but was unsuccessful each time. He obtained a position, from 1838 to 1844, as Master of the Household and Extra Groom in Waiting in the Court of the young Queen Victoria. He was removed in the Household reforms initiated by Albert, Prince Consort. on good terms with the Ottoman Viceroy, Mehmet Ali Pasha. He was then appointed British ambassador to the Court of the Shah of Persia in 1854. The Shah, Nasser al-Din Shah, and Murray disliked each other immediately. Murray's heavy-handed attitude inflamed an existing dispute over Hashim Khan, one of the Shah's bodyguards and an officer in the Persian army, who took up a position as secretary in the British embassy against the wishes of the Shah and his prime minister. Hashim Khan's wife was the subject of widespread gossip relating to Murray and his predecessor as ambassador; she was also a sister of the Shah's principal wife, so the scandal was political dynamite. Hashim Khan's wife was taken into custody by her brother on 14 November 1855, to defend her honour. Murray took this as an insult to the British legation; after demanding her release, Murray broke off diplomatic relations on 20 November. Anglo-Persian relations were already strained as the young Shah sought to annex the city of Herat, a goal which had eluded the Qajar dynasty previously; and Britain for its part sought to deny such control, lest the city, considered the "Key to India," fall under the influence of Persia's patron, Russia. Murray's departure marked a break in Anglo-Persian relations and thus contributed to the outbreak of the Anglo-Persian War of 1856/7. After the war, Murray remained ambassador until 1859.