Permanent Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs

This is a list of Permanent Under-Secretaries in the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office (and its predecessors) since 1790.

Not to be confused with Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs

Permanent Under-Secretaries at the Foreign Office, 1790 to present

These are the Permanent Secretaries or senior civil servants at the Foreign Office.

• February 1790: George Aust
• October 1795: George Hammond (resigned 1806)
• March 1807: George Hammond
• October 1809: William Richard Hamilton
• July 1817: Joseph Planta
• April 1827: John Backhouse
• 1842: Henry Unwin Addington
• 1854: Edmund Hammond (later Lord Hammond)
• 1873: Lord Tenterden
• 1882: Sir Julian Pauncefote (later Lord Pauncefote)
• 1889: Sir Philip Currie
• 1894: Sir Thomas Henry Sanderson, 1st Baron Sanderson
• 1906: Sir Charles Hardinge (later Lord Hardinge of Penshurst)
• 1910: Sir Arthur Nicolson
• 1916: Lord Hardinge of Penshurst
• 1920: Sir Eyre Crowe
• 1925: Sir William Tyrrell
• 1928: Sir Ronald Lindsay
• 1930: Sir Robert Vansittart
• 1938: Sir Alexander Cadogan
• 1946: Sir Orme Sargent (jointly with Sir William Strang, Head of the German Section 1947-1949)
• 1949: Sir William Strang (jointly with the Heads of the German Section: Sir Ivone Kirkpatrick 1949-1950, Sir D. Gainer 1950-1951)
• 1953: Sir Ivone Kirkpatrick
• 1957: Sir Frederick Hoyer Millar
• 1962: Sir Harold Caccia
• 1965: Sir Paul Gore-Booth (also Head of the Diplomatic Service from 1968; later created Baron Gore-Booth of Maltby)
• 1969: Sir Denis Greenhill
• 1973: Sir Thomas Brimelow
• 1975: Sir Michael Palliser
• 1982: Sir Antony Acland
• 1986: Sir Patrick Wright (later Lord Wright of Richmond)
• 1991: Sir David Gillmore (later Lord Gillmore of Thamesfield)
• 1994: Sir John Coles
• 1997: Sir John Kerr (later Lord Kerr of Kinlochard)
• 2002: Sir Michael Jay (later Lord Jay of Ewelme)
• 2006: Sir Peter Ricketts
• 2010: Sir Simon Fraser
• 2015: Sir Simon McDonald