[1st Baron]. British diplomatist, born in London on the 19th of September 1849, the son of Admiral Sir Frederick William Erskine Hamilton Nicolson, 10th Bart. (1815–1899). He was educated at Rugby and Brasenose College, Oxford, and in 1870 entered the Foreign Office, where he was for some time assistant private secretary to Lord Granville. In 1874 he was attached to the British Embassy in Berlin, and after occupying a succession of minor diplomatic posts became in 1885 chargé d’affaires at Teheran. From 1888 to 1893 he was consul-general at Budapest, in 1894 secretary of embassy at Constantinople, from 1894 to 1895 agent in Bulgaria, and from 1895 to 1904 minister in Morocco. In 1899 he succeeded his father as 11th baronet. In 1905 Sir Arthur Nicolson was sent as ambassador to Russia, where he remained until 1910, and in the latter year returned to the Foreign Office, being until 1916, when he retired, permanent Under-secretary for Foreign Affairs. He received the K.C.I.E. in 1888, the K.C.B. in 1901, the G.C.V.O. in 1905, and the G.C.M.G. in 1906. He was raised to the peerage on his retirement, and took the title of Baron Carnock. He published in 1873 a History of the German Constitution.
