HERBERT, Edward (?1700-70), of Muckross, co. Kerry.

The Herberts of Muckross, who had settled in Ireland in the seventeenth century, were descended from the Herberts of Powis. They do not seem to have been of high standing in Ireland, and the marriage with Edward Herbert was vigorously opposed, on social as well as religious grounds, by Frances Browne’s Catholic family, who considered the Herberts ‘a poor sort of people’.Irish HMC Kenmare, 124. Also by the English Herberts, with whom Edward Herbert kept up a connexion, he seems to have been regarded as a poor relation. In 1736 he was appointed agent to the Kenmare estate by Henry Arthur Herbert (created Earl of Powis 1748), then guardian of the 4th Viscount Kenmare, but in 1747, when Kenmare came of age, was dismissed with ‘a present of £4000, balance of money due from him to me as my agent’. Kenmare later wrote of the Herberts: ‘[I] recommend it to such as succeed me upon no account to ... have any dependence on the honesty or professions of their family.’ He subsequently seems to have modified his opinion about the Herbert family, adding in October 1767: ‘I have since that time been under some obligations to the old gentleman and his son Tom for services rendered me in providing for a youth in the East Indies’ and for ‘their zeal in an appeal’ he had in court.Notebook of Thos. 4th Visct. Kenmare, ibid. 189-90.

In 1754 Herbert settled in England as agent to Lord Powis, and in September, after the death of Powis’s brother, Richard Herbert, was returned in his place for Ludlow. In Parliament Herbert supported Administration, and in July 1761 was unsuccessfully recommended by Powis to Newcastle for the post of auditor general to the Queen. Like Powis, he supported Bute and Grenville, and opposed Rockingham, voting against the repeal of the Stamp Act, 22 Feb. 1766. He voted against the higher land tax, 27 Feb. 1767, but supported Administration on nullum tempus, 17 Feb. 1768. In the new Parliament he voted with Opposition in three divisions on Wilkes and the Middlesex election, 27 Jan., 2 and 3 Feb. 1769. There is no record of his having spoken in the House. He died 26 Sept. 1770.