Colonial Despatches

As British ambassador, he negotiated the Webster-Ashburton treaty of 1842, which resolved disputes concerning the boundary between the British North American colonies and the United States from the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes.1

Alexander Baring was born in London in 1773 and travelled to the United States at 22 as the representative of his father's merchant house.2 He played a key role as financier in the American Louisiana Purchase of 1803.3

In the decade that followed, he became the dominant senior partner in the Baring Brothers firm.4 After being elected to the House of Commons in 1806, he moved from the Whigs to the Tories.5

For his service as an officer in Peel's ministry from 1834-35, he was elevated to the House of Lords as Baron Ashburton.6

• 1. John Orbell, Baring, Alexander, first Baron Ashburton (1773–1848), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.
• 2. Ibid.
• 3. Ibid.
• 4. Ibid.
• 5. Ibid.
• 6. Ibid.