The youngest son of
George Villiers, 4th Earl of Clarendon, Francis Villiers was educated at
Harrow School and entered the
Foreign Office in 1870. He was appointed Acting Second Secretary in the
Diplomatic Service in 1885, and served as
Private Secretary to the
Foreign Secretary,
Lord Rosebery, in 1886 and 1892–94, and Acting Private Secretary to
Lord Salisbury in 1887. From 1896 to 1905 he was Assistant
Under Secretary at the Foreign Office. In 1906 he was appointed to be
Minister to
Portugal, and in 1911 he was transferred to be Minister to
Belgium. When the
German army invaded Belgium in 1914 the Belgian Government retreated first to
Antwerp and then to
Le Havre (although
King Albert remained in
De Panne commanding the Belgian Army) and Villiers accompanied it until the end of the war, when he returned to Brussels. After the
peace treaty had been signed, the British
Legation at Brussels was raised to an Embassy and Villiers was promoted to
Ambassador in October 1919. He retired in August 1920. ==Honours==