Apps

Lewis Harcourt, 1st Viscount Harcourt — news, coverage & facts — IJR

Death

Harcourt died in his sleep at his London townhouse at 69 Brook Street (now the Savile Club) in the early hours of 24 February 1922, aged 59. He had taken an overdose of a sleeping draught, and there were rumours of suicide following accusations of sexual impropriety by Edward James, a young Etonian who later became an important collector of surrealist and other contemporary art. James's mother spread the story in society, although the accusations remained unknown by the wider public for fifty years. An inquest was held as to the cause of death, which returned a verdict of death by misadventure; the underlying cause being given as heart failure and sudden oedema of the lungs brought on by a dose of Bromidia, which he had been prescribed as a sleep aid. According to the coroner, who found extensive heart disease, the amount of Bromidia he had taken would not have caused death in a healthy person. According to his valet, there was only a very small amount of Bromidia left in the bottle the prior evening, which Harcourt did not take regularly.

His physician, Dr Lindsay Scott, had last seen him on 30 January and testified that Harcourt was not in very good health, being weak and with an irregular heartbeat. He said that he did not expect him to die suddenly, but admitted, "I did not think he would live many years." The coroner dismissed the notion of suicide as "grotesque" given the evidence. Patrick Jackson, Harcourt's biographer in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, also noted that suicide seemed unlikely given that Harcourt was in the midst of finishing a biography on his father, Sir William, which he had commissioned from Alfred George Gardiner. Harcourt had spent the evening prior to his death editing a recent draft and had an appointment with Gardiner the following day to discuss the project. Jackson writes, "It seems hard to believe that Harcourt would not have wished to see through to completion an enterprise over which he had exercised tight control, and which recalled for him the glorious days of political partnership with his father."

A memorial service for Lord Harcourt was held on 1 March at St Margaret's, Westminster, with Prebendary of Westminster William Carnegie officiating with the Very Rev. Albert Baillie, Dean of Windsor. Lord Harcourt was buried after a large, well-attended funeral service the same day at the parish church at Nuneham Courtney, conducted by Bishop of Oxford Hubert Burge, Bishop of Birmingham Henry Wakefield, and the rector Rev. Hildebrand Thomas Giles Alington. He was buried in the family vault in the churchyard.

Lewis Harcourt, 1st Viscount Harcourt

Comments

Lewis Harcourt, 1st Viscount Harcourt

Comments

Lewis Harcourt, 1st Viscount Harcourt across IJR

Article

Early life and education

Article

Early life and education

Political career

Public appointments and other interests

Port Harcourt

Queen Victoria

Marriage and children

Sexual misconduct

Death

Lewis Harcourt, 1st Viscount Harcourt across IJR