Arthur Middleton (1795–1853), planter, attorney, and diplomat, was born in Gloucester, England. He was the son of TJ’s correspondent and former governor of South Carolina, Henry Middleton, and grandson of Arthur Middleton (1742–87), a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Middleton graduated from Harvard University in 1814, read law and was called to the bar, and operated a South Carolina plantation called Niewport (Newport). He served as secretary to the American legation at Madrid, 1833–42. In the absence of a minister, Middleton was chargé d’affaires there, 1836–37 and 1840. He married Paolina, countess Bentivoglio, in Rome in 1841. Middleton died in Naples (Langdon Cheves, “Middleton of South Carolina,” South Carolina Historical and Genealogical Magazine 1 [1900]: 243–5, 247; Harvard Catalogue [1925], 191; JEP description begins Journal of the Executive Proceedings of the Senate of the United States description ends , 4:344, 362, 511, 524 [21 Jan., 28 Feb. 1834, 25 Feb., 16 Mar. 1836]; Register of the Department of State [1871]: 79; [1874]: 99; U.S. Statutes at Large description begins Richard Peters, ed., The Public Statutes at Large of the United States … 1789 to March 3, 1845, 1845–67, 8 vols. description ends , 5:763; Eliza Cope Harrison, ed., Best Companions: Letters of Eliza Middleton Fisher and Her Mother, Mary Hering Middleton, from Charleston, Philadelphia, and Newport, 1839–1846 [2001], esp. 168, 225; Washington Daily National Intelligencer, 23 July 1853).

Middleton visited Monticello and the University of Virginia some months ago (Ellen W. Randolph [Coolidge] to Dolley Madison, [ca. 30 Sept. 1822] [MCR-S: Mary Elizabeth Estelle Cutts Collection]). On 23 Nov. 1822 he experienced the heaviest of all afflictions in the death of his first wife, Ann Elbertina (Van Ness) Middleton, who had recently given birth to a child who also did not survive (Washington Daily National Intelligencer, 25 Nov. 1822; Records of the Columbia Historical Society 22 [1919]: 157–8, 192).