Mervyn Herbert | |
Country: | England |
Fullname: | Mervyn Robert Howard Molyneux Herbert |
Birth Date: | 27 December 1882 |
Birth Place: | Highclere Castle, Hampshire, England |
Death Place: | Rome, Italy |
Batting: | Right-handed |
Role: | Batsman |
Family: | Henry Howard (grandfather) |
Club1: | Nottinghamshire |
Club2: | Oxford University |
Club3: | Somerset |
Type1: | First-class |
Debutdate1: | 1 May |
Debutyear1: | 1901 |
Debutfor1: | Nottinghamshire |
Debutagainst1: | Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) |
Lastdate1: | 30 May |
Lastyear1: | 1924 |
Lastfor1: | Somerset |
Lastagainst1: | Cambridge University |
Columns: | 1 |
Column1: | First-class |
Matches1: | 42 |
Runs1: | 854 |
Bat Avg1: | 12.02 |
100S/50S1: | –/3 |
Top Score1: | 78 |
Deliveries1: | 18 |
Wickets1: | – |
Bowl Avg1: | – |
Fivefor1: | – |
Tenfor1: | – |
Best Bowling1: | 0/28 |
Catches/Stumpings1: | 18/– |
Date: | 19 June |
Year: | 2010 |
Source: | https://cricketarchive.com/Archive/Players/3/3613/3613.html CricketArchive |
The Honourable Mervyn Robert Howard Molyneux Herbert (27 December 1882 – 26 May 1929) of Tetton, Kingston St Mary[1] in Somerset, was a career diplomat and a first-class cricket player.
Herbert was born at Highclere Castle in Hampshire, the third son of Henry Herbert, 4th Earl of Carnarvon, a wealthy landowner, British cabinet minister, and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. His mother (his father's second wife and cousin) was Elizabeth Catherine Howard (1856-1929[2]) ("Elsie"), a daughter of Henry Howard of Greystoke Castle, near Penrith, Cumberland, a son of Lord Henry Howard-Molyneux-Howard, younger brother of Bernard Howard, 12th Duke of Norfolk. Elizabeth Howard's brother was Esmé Howard, 1st Baron Howard of Penrith.
Herbert was a younger full brother of the writer and politician Aubrey Herbert and was a younger half-brother of George Herbert, 5th Earl of Carnarvon, the noted Egyptologist who, together with Howard Carter, discovered Tutankhamen's tomb.[3] Mervyn travelled to Egypt for the official opening of Tutankhamen's tomb in November 1922.[4]
He was educated at Eton College and at Balliol College, Oxford.[3]
In 1921 he married Mary Elizabeth Willard, a daughter of Joseph E. Willard, the US ambassador to Spain, and younger sister of Belle Willard, the wife of Kermit Roosevelt, son of the former US president Theodore.[5] [6] He had three children.
Herbert was a right-handed middle-order batsman. He played for Eton in the 1901 Eton v Harrow cricket match at Lord's, and in a house match at Eton that season he and George Lyttelton put on 476 for the second wicket, both scoring double centuries.[7] In the same year, he made the first of six appearances in first-class cricket for Nottinghamshire, starting off with an innings of 65 in a match against the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) at Lord's.[8]
Though Herbert played occasional matches for Oxford University he was not selected as a blue, and from 1903 most of his first-class cricket was for Somerset. Only in 1909 was he able to play at all regularly and in that season he made his highest first-class score, 78, in the match against Middlesex at Lord's.[9] He also played an innings of 55 in 1909, batting at No 9 and sharing an eighth wicket partnership of 125 with Talbot Lewis that enabled Somerset to save the match against Kent, the 1909 County Champions, after following on.[10] He did not play at all after 1912 until he reappeared in one match in each of the 1922, 1923 and 1924 seasons.[11]
Herbert was appointed as an attache in the Foreign Office in 1907. He became a third secretary in the Diplomatic Service in 1910. In 1916 he was further promoted to become a second secretary. And then in 1919 he became a first secretary. He served in embassies and delegations in Rome, Lisbon, Madrid and Cairo, and was first secretary in Madrid up to 1922, returning to a Whitehall job in the Foreign Office between 1924 and 1926.[12]
He was reported in the New York Times as having died at the British Embassy in Rome of "malarial pneumonia".[13] The Times of London reported that he was passing through Rome on his way home from Albania, where his family had extensive interests, and caught malaria that turned to pneumonia.[14]