Mr Herbert was an Original Member of The Yacht Club.
The Herberts represent a story of rags to great riches and back again within some seven generations. Henry Arthur Herbert was a major landowner on the lake of Killarney in County Kerry, Ireland, and a member of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Born c.1756 Henry was the son of Thomas Herbert, who had amassed a fortune by exploiting the copper mines of the Muckross Peninsula and Ross Island areas of the Lakes of Killarney. Henry was educated at St John's College, Cambridge.
The Herbert family originated from Montgomeryshire but in 1656 Thomas uprooted to Ireland upon being appointed land agent for his cousin, the 3rd Lord Castleisland. Thomas settled at Kilcow, near Castleisland and his son, Edward, later leased the lands around Muckross from the native MacCarthys. Edward's son, also called Edward, may have been the first member of the Herbert family to actually live at Muckross. Certainly he was living on the Muckross Peninsula in 1735 with his wife Frances, a sister of Lord Kenmare - a leading Catholic family of Ireland. The working of the copper mines on the Muckross Peninsula brought great wealth to the family although it was not until 1770 that our Herberts actually came to own the freehold on the death of their last MacCarthy relation.
The Herbert family played an active role in both local and political life as part of the Irish 'establishment'. They were also enthusiastic land improvers. When Arthur Young visited Muckross in 1776 he was fulsome in his praise of the agricultural improvements initiated by the then owner, Thomas Herbert. His son, the first Henry Arthur Herbert - our Original Member - was responsible for extensive plantations of forest on Torc Mountain. He served as MP for Kerry & Tralee from 1806 to 1813 in the British Parliament.
The Herberts' financial situation appears to have become increasingly unstable upon three almost simultaneous events — the death of Henry, the introduction of potato blight and massive overspending on lavish refurbishments and hospitality for the visit of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert to Muckross House. Invoices record the vast level of preparatory spending including the complete renovation of the house, the acquisition of new tapestries and curtains, silverware, mirrors, linen, musical instruments and china –most of which was sourced from Paris. Activities put on for this three-day jamboree for the visitors were of a wide variety that included a stag hunt.
Shortly thereafter a sharp reduction in rental income combined with the negative effect of several ill-considered investments appears to have seriously aggravated the family's financial situation. In an effort to reverse this trend some extreme and high risk investments were entertained: one commercial flop involved the acquisition of special purpose boats and machinery in the expectation of manufacturing cotton reels from the timber grown alongside the lakes. However, the banks proved too steep and the lakes too shallow for the costly equipment! The estate was forfeited to the Standard Life Assurance Company of Scotland and was placed for sale in Dublin on 21 November 1899. Ahead of the sale Sir Thomas Lipton – the owner of the Shamrock, that challenged for the America's Cup five times between 1899 and 1930 and. whose parents had run a small grocery nearby, offered Standard Life £50,000 for the estate with the intention of gifting it to the Irish people, but this offer was rebutted. The ultimate price achieved at auction was £60,000 knocked down to Arthur Edward Guinness, 1st Baron Ardilaun, a. member of the brewing family. The house was ultimately presented to the Irish nation, but not until 1932, by its then American owners the gold-mining press and utilities magnate William Bowers Bourn of San Francisco and his son-in-law Arthur Vincent in memory of Miss Bowers Bourn. Today Muckross represents one of the most important visitor attractions in Ireland.
When not on his estate Henry lived in Smith Street, Westminster where he died on 21 Jue 1821 and was buried in the family vault in the Killegy churchyard close by Muckross. Henry specifically requested to he buried standing up in order for him to "cherish the memory of the views from the churchyard over the lakes" that he deemed "must be more beautiful than those in heaven".