Benjamin Moran
Encyclopedia
Benjamin Moran worked at the United States Legation (later the US Embassy) in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 from 1853 to 1874.

Moran first visited England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 in 1851. In 1853, around the time that James Buchanan
James Buchanan
James Buchanan, Jr. was the 15th President of the United States . He is the only president from Pennsylvania, the only president who remained a lifelong bachelor and the last to be born in the 18th century....

, who was from the same county in Pennsylvania as Moran, became US ambassador in London, Moran returned to England, becoming a temporary clerk at the legation. In 1854, he gained a permanent post and, in 1857, he was appointed Assistant Secretary, a post he kept until 1864, when he was promoted to Secretary, serving until 1874. From 1857, he kept a private diary which was subsequently published; the diary is of interest mainly because it documents how the US Civil War was seen in the UK.

In 1875, he was made Minister Resident to Portugal
Portugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...

 and, since this was the first instance of this kind of promotion in US diplomatic history, some regard him as the first American career diplomat. When the office of Minister Resident was discontinued in 1876, Moran was made Chargé d'Affaires at Lisbon
Lisbon
Lisbon is the capital city and largest city of Portugal with a population of 545,245 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Lisbon extends beyond the administrative city limits with a population of 3 million on an area of , making it the 9th most populous urban...

, serving until 1882 when ill health forced him to resign and return to England. He never went back to the US, settling, instead, at Braintree in Essex, where he died.
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