ASHBURTON, Lord ALEXANDER Riunca, b. in 1774, a younger son of Sir Francis Baring, bart., was, in early life, for many years commercially engaged in the United States and the Canadas, in the service of the great London mercantile house founded by his father. On the death of the latter, in 1810, be became the head of the firm of Baring Brothers & Co., and in 1812 was elected M.P. for Taunton. He represented that place, Callington, and Thetford, on the liberal interest, till 1831, and in 1832 was returned for North Essex as a moderate conservative. In the short administration of Sir Hobert Peel (1834-35), he was president of the board of trade, and master of the mint, and was created baron A. by patent in April, 1835. This title had been conferred in April, 1782, on the celebrated lawyer, John Dunning, who had married Alexander Baring's aunt, and it became extinct on the death of his cousin, the second lord A., in 1823. In 1S42, lord A.'s knowledge of business, and thorough acquaintance with American institutions, customs, and modes of thotight, caused him to be appointed special ambassador to the United States, to settle the north-west boundary question, and other disputes, that then threatened to involve the two countries in war. In August of the same year, he con cluded the fatnous treaty of Washington, commonly called the A. treaty, by which the frontier line between the state of Maine and Canada was definitively agreed to. By this
treaty, seven twelfths of the disputed ground, and the British settlement of Madawaska, were given to the United States, and only five twelfths of the ground to Britain; but it secured a better military frontier to England, and included heights commanding the St. Lawrence, which the award of the king of Holland, who had been chosen arbiter, had assigned to the Americans. By the and 9th articles, provisions are made for putting an end to the African slave-trade; and the 10th article provides for the mutual extradi tion of suspected criminals. 'Lord A. opposed free-trade, but strongly supported the penny-postage system when first proposed by Lowland llill in 1837. Ile formed n valuable collection of old paintings. His death took place May 18, 1848.—His eldest son, William Bingham Baring, second lord A. of this creation, b. in 1799, and educated at Oriel College, Oxford, entered parliament in 1836. as member for Taunton, and in Sept., 1841, was appointed secretary to the board of control. 1845, he became paymaster-general of the forces, and treasurer of the navy. In 1855 he was made commander of the legion of honor, and in 1860 he was president of the geographical society. He d. in 1864.