This officer entered the army, as ensign in the second (Coldstream) foot guards, on the 21st April, 1786, and on the 25th February, 1793, embarked for Flanders, and served during the campaign in that country; on the 25th April, 1793, he obtained a lieutenancy, and on the 1st September the adjutancy. He continued to serve with his regiment on the Continent till May, 1795, when the troops returned to England. He was wounded at the battle of St. Amand; and was present at the siege and capture of Valenciennes, action of Lincelles, and siege of Dunkirk. On the 30th of December, 1797, he was promoted to a captain-lieutenancy; and to a company on the 25th of July, 1799. On the 13th of June, 1793, he was appointed major of brigade to the foot guards sent to Ireland, where he served during the whole of the rebellion. In August, 1799, he served in the same capacity with the expedition to Holland, and was present in all the actions. On the 1st of July, 1801, he was deputed to act as inspector-general of foreign corps during the absence from England of Colonel W. Clinton; and on that officer’s return he was appointed on the 25th of February, 1802, deputy inspector-general of foreign corps; on that office being abolished, he was nominated commandant of the foreign depôt. On the 1st of January, 1805, he was appointed Aide-de-Camp to the King, and received the rank of colonel; on the 4th of August, 1808, second major in his regiment; and on the 25th of July, 1810, major-general. He joined the army in the Peninsula on the 9th of January, 1811, and was appointed to the command of a brigade in the first division, and was present with it at the action at Fuentes d’Onor on the 5th of May; he was afterwards transferred with his brigade to the second division, the command of which he held, as senior officer, from July, 1811, to April, 1812; he commanded the right column at the action of Arroyo dos Molinos; stormed and took with part of his brigade the forts Napoleon and Ragusa at Almaraz. In November, 1812, he was appointed to the command of the first brigade of foot guards in the first division, and in June, 1813, to the command of the division, which he held until the end of the Peninsular war in 1814, being present at the battle of Vittoria, attack on Tolosa, passage of the Bidassoa, Nivelle, Nive, and Adour; investment of Bayonne, and repulse of the sortie, besides various minor actions. Major-General Howard received a medal and one clasp for Vittoria and Nive. He was subsequently appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Portsmouth,--a Knight Companion of the Most Honorable Military Order of the Bath,--and, on the 24th of October, 1816, he was appointed by the Prince Regent, in the name, and on the behalf, of His Majesty King George III., Colonel of the SEVENTIETH regiment. He succeeded Richard, the late Earl of Effingham, in the Barony, when the earldom became extinct, on the 11th of December, 1816. On the 12th of August, 1819, Lord Howard