John Hervey, 7th Marquess of Bristol

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For other persons named John Hervey, see John Hervey (disambiguation).

For other persons named Frederick Hervey, see Frederick Hervey (disambiguation).

Frederick William John Augustus Hervey, 7th Marquess of Bristol (15 September 1954 – 10 January 1999) succeeded his father, Victor Hervey, the 6th Marquess. He was the half-brother of Lady Victoria Hervey and her younger sister Lady Isabella Hervey, both models and actresses who appear in the pages of tabloid newspapers and society magazines. He was also half-brother to the incumbent Frederick Hervey, 8th Marquess of Bristol, and his deceased first heir Lord Nicholas Hervey. He was married to Francesca Fisher for four years; they had no children.

Lord Bristol was educated at Harrow School, where he was criticised for his activities especially with regards to drugs and sex; the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography designates him a "wastrel".^[1] The 7th Marquess was described by his friend Jamie Spencer-Churchill, Marquess of Blandford, as a "complicated, reserved character, hiding behind a flamboyant personality".^{[citation needed]}

Bristol piloted his helicopter — without radar — while snorting cocaine off the map he was using for navigation. Lord Bristol was twice jailed for drugs offences. He claimed to have had sex with over two thousand male prostitutes, whom he referred to as twinkies.^[2].

Lord Bristol sold the remaining lease on the ancestral home of Ickworth House back to the National Trust in 1998 and died the following year at the age of 44. He was succeeded by his younger half-brother Frederick William Augustus Hervey, 8th Marquess of Bristol (born 19 October 1979).

The Spectator describes the 7th Marquess thusly:

Born with an inheritance which included millions of money, thousands of acres, and oodles of style at Ickworth, the family seat, this flamboyant homosexual, charming but empty of soul, allowed himself to sink into a brain-mincing addiction to heroin and cocaine. Before the end he could not pass two hours without a snort, was frequently in prison, and was reduced to penury. [1]