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- BIOGRAPHY
Like his father he suffered from delicate health and, even in his Eton days, made frequent trips to Italy, Sicily, Spain, Egypt and Palestine in search of the sun. On leaving school and before attaining his majority, he made two voyages to the South Pacific. The second voyage, undertaken in 1870, ended in shipwreck and the loss of their yacht on a coral reef in the Ringgold Islands. Together with his physician, George Henry Kingsley, Pembroke wrote an amusing account of their experiences which went into many editions.
In Tahiti they met the famous Queen Pomare, then an old lady. From Tahiti they went to Eimeo, or Morea, and so to Huahine. There they were presented with a penal code 'elegantly written in and ancient copy book'. 'After studying it carefully, we came to the conclusion that it was all a matter of dollars, and that having dollars you could do what you liked as at home.'
On 19 August 1874, in Westminster Abbey, he married Lady Gertrude Talbot, daughter of the Earl of Shrewsbury. In the same year he became Under-Secretary for War but, finding the train of office too much for his weak constitution, resigned his post in the following year. Although he lived for twenty years more, he never again accepted office. He died childless in 1895 from tuberculosis, aged forty-four, and was succeeded by his brother Sidney.
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