Constituency : Aylesbury 1852-7, Southwark 1860-70
Austen came in at Southwark after the death of Sir Charles Napier.
Austen was born in Paris of Huguenot descent. His father was in the Ceylon Civil Service. He was educated in various countries and started work in his solicitor uncle's office. During this period he befriended Disraeli. In 1839 he set off overland for Ceylon. He was diverted at Constantinople by the ambassador Stratford Canning into unofficial ( Aberdeen refused to make him a paid attaché ; he eventually secured this from Palmerston ) diplomatic missions and archaeological excavations. He made his name with books on his excavations at Nimrud, Nineveh and Babylon and was responsible for acquiring many of the Assyrian antiquities in the British Museum.
Austen was first elected in 1852 as a Radical though he was assisted by Lord Carington. He was immediately appointed Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs but resigned a few weeks later on the fall of Russell's government despite tempting offers from the Conservatives to continue. Russell secured for him an offer of the consul-generalship of Egypt in 1853 but he declined.He was an ardent Turcophile who agitated against Russia and eventually called for Aberdeen's overthrow telling his colleagues "throw your Jonah overboard; if you do not your vessel will be wrecked". He was present during the Crimean War but not in a fighting capacity. He also founded the Ottoman Bank with Stratford de Radcliffe. When Palmerston came to power in 1855 he wanted to place him at the War Office but the queen refused to countenance it after his outspoken criticims of the army commanders . Instead he offered him the post of under-secretary for the Colonies but he declined and was jeered at for injudicious remarks about Whig scum coming to the top. Instead he founded the Administrative Reform Association calling for a meritocracy in public appointments especially in the army. Palmerston responded with a sarcastic reference to Austen's own career and his motion in the Commons was heavily defeated. After opposing Palmerston over China he went down to defeat at Aylesbury in 1857. He went off to India to investigate the causes of the Mutiny. He unsuccessfully contested York in 1859.
Back in Parliament Austen settled his differences with Palmerston whose Italian policy he supported and in 1861 was appointed Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs ( against Victoria's opposition ) to help Palmerston in the Commons when Russell went to the Lords. Cobden described him as Palmerston's "partial imitator". He held the post until the fall of Russell's government.
Austen was an ardent supporter of parliamentary reform and raised hackles again by describing wavering Liberals as "traitors". However he later blamed the 1867 Act for lessening MPs' independence.
When Gladstone came to power in 1868 he appointed Austen First Commissioner of Works but their relations were not good and Gladstone vetoed his grandiose schemes for redeveloping the British Museum. He resigned after less than a year to become ambassador to Madrid. He resigned his seat shortly afterwards ( which went to the Tories ).
In 1877 Disraeli appointed Austen Ambassador to Constantinople and he was involved in the Congress of Berlin and the concession of Cyprus to Britain. He had heavily criticised Gladstone's campaign on the Bulgarian atrocities so his days were numbered when Gladstone returned to power in 1880. Gladstone got rid of him by publishing a rash despatch in which he described the Sultan as a hypocrite. Gladstone kept him dangling until 1883 before telling him he would not get another posting. He settled in Venice and spent his last years as a writer on art and travel.
He died in 1894 aged 77.
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