sat at the board of admiralty he ranked as a prime favourite of Lord Sandwich, but on becoming Lord Bristol he grew dissatisfied with his friend and became his personal enemy. Some difference existed between him and Keppel in 1765, but it was gradually effaced, and in 1778 Keppel received from him among the peers the highest praise. He was the first to rouse the navy over the attack on Keppel, and he signed a memorial to the king in condemnation of the court-martial on that admiral, and on the acquittal his house in St. James's Square was brilliantly illuminated. His speech on 23 April 1779 over the condition of the navy, which ended with a motion for the removal of Sandwich from his office, was printed in that year. His constitution, naturally strong, was weakened by the changes of climate necessary in his profession. He died at St. James's Square, London, on 23 Dec. 1779, and on 28 Dec. was buried at Ickworth, Suffolk, where in the previous year he had restored the church and built the brick tower. As he left no legitimate issue, the title and entailed estates passed to his brother Frederick Augustus [q. v.], bishop of Derry, but he alienated all that he could. He bequeathed all his personalty and an estate of 1,200l. a year in Yorkshire to Mrs. Nesbit, and she was to allow Augustus Henry, his natural son by Mrs. Clarke (‘Kitty Hunter’), 300l. a year during a minority and 400l. afterwards. To this son he left his father's manuscripts, but these and the ‘Memoirs’ were not to be published during the reign of George III, and neither he nor Colonel the Hon. William Hervey, their next possessor, was to ‘give, lend, or leave them to his brother Frederic.’
Hervey lost reputation through his relations with his wife. Their union was dissolved by the ecclesiastical court on 11 Feb. 1769 through collusion, and Walpole adds that Hervey's consent was obtained through a bribe of 14,000l. When she was presented at court as Duchess of Kingston in March 1769, ‘Augustus Hervey chose to be there, and said aloud that he came to take one look at his widow.’ He afterwards denied the rumour that he was about to marry Miss Moysey, the daughter of a physician at Bath. His original correspondence with Lord Hawke is in the Record Office (Admirals' Despatches, Channel, vol. vi.), and his journals ‘kept on board the Greyhound, John Ambrose, commander; Pembroke, the Hon. Will. Hervey, commander; and Gloucester, the Hon. George Clinton, commander, from 5 June 1736 to 15 Feb. 1739–40,’ are at the British Museum (Addit. MS. 12129). Many letters by him are in Keppel's ‘Life of Lord Keppel’ and the ‘Grenville Papers,’ vols. iii. and iv. On account of the similarity of handwriting, Dr. O'Conor suggested him as a possible author of the letters of ‘Junius.’ His portrait by Reynolds was engraved by Edward Fisher in 1763, and is now, as the property of the corporation of Bury St. Edmunds, in its public library. The background represents the attack on Moro Castle. A portrait of him by Gainsborough was engraved by James Watson in 1773. A character of Lord Bristol by Lord Mulgrave was circulated in 1780, and is reprinted in Nichols's ‘Literary Anecdotes,’ viii. 11–12. He was active and brave, but reckless and over-confident.
[Charnock's Biog. Nav. vi. 27–34; Gent. Mag. January 1780, pp. 10–14, 125; Walpole's George III, ii. 173, 330, 336; Walpole's Journals, 1771–83, i. 258, 477, 490, ii. 212, 215, 324–9; Walpole's Letters, passim; Jesse's Selwyn, iv. 88–93; Mundy's Life of Rodney, i. 81; Keppel's Lord Keppel, i. 279, 344, 352–67, 378–9, ii. 34–5, 97, 239; Burrows's Lord Hawke, pp. 365, &c.; J. C. Smith's Portraits, ii. 495, iv. 1514; Leslie and Taylor's Reynolds, i. 208–9, 219; Grenville Papers, i. 350–1, iii. xiv; Albemarle's Rockingham, i. 122; Faulkner's Chelsea, p. 119; Hervey's Suffolk Visitation, ed. Howard, ii. 200; Bury and West Suffolk Archæol. Instit. ii. 428–9.]
HERVEY, FREDERICK AUGUSTUS, D.D., fourth Earl of Bristol (1730–1803), bishop of Derry, third son of John Hervey, baron Hervey of Ickworth [q. v.], and grandson of John Hervey, first earl of Bristol [q. v.], was born on 1 Aug. 1730. He was educated at Westminster School and Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, where he graduated M.A. as a nobleman in 1754, and was created D.D. in 1770. Originally intended for the bar, he entered one of the inns of court, but finally took holy orders. He became a clerk of the privy seal in 1756, principal clerk in 1761, and a royal chaplain in 1763. But substantial preferment, though eagerly solicited by him, came slowly, and in the meantime Hervey visited the chief cities and places of interest on the continent. He was passionately fond of art, and Italy naturally possessed great attractions for him. Being at Naples in 1766, at a time when Vesuvius was in a state of agitation previous to its eruption, he visited the crater; was severely wounded in the arm by a falling stone, and thenceforth closely studied volcanic phenomena. His interest in this field of science brought him into contact with Sir John Strange, at that time British resident at Venice, with whom he formed a lifelong friendship, and with the Italian naturalist, Fortis, with whom he made a journey through
