Harold Caccia, Baron Caccia

Harold Anthony Caccia, Baron Caccia, (21 December 1905 – 31 October 1990) was a British diplomat who rose to become Permanent Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs from 1962 to 1965.

Biography

Born in Pachmarhi, British India, Caccia was educated at Summer Fields School, Eton College and Trinity College, Oxford and won a Blue at rugby union, playing at centre for Oxford in the Varsity Match in 1926. He played cricket for Oxfordshire in the Minor Counties Championship between 1928 and 1938. In 1932 he married Anne Catherine Barstow, daughter of Sir George Barstow and Enid Lillian Lawrence.

Caccia entered the diplomatic service in 1929 and was posted to Peking and then to Athens and London where, in 1936, he became assistant private secretary to Anthony Eden. He was back in Athens early in World War II, but was then attached to the staff of Harold Macmillan, Britain's representative at Allied headquarters in North Africa. The Greek Civil War once again saw him in that country, and by 1945 his services earned him recognition as a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George (CMG).

His daughter Clarissa married David Pryce-Jones, son of Alan Pryce-Jones and Thérèse Fould-Springer ("Poppy").

In 1961, he became Permanent Under-Secretary of State, an office he held until 1965. He was Provost of Eton 1965-78 and President of the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) in 1973–74.

He was knighted in 1950, and was created a life peer with the title Baron Caccia, of Abernant in the County of Brecknock, on 11 May 1965. Caccia was appointed a Bailiff Grand Cross and Lord Prior of the Order of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem, a Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order and a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George. Lord Caccia was a Knight of the International Order of St. Hubertus.

Caccia died in Builth Wells, Wales.

Arms