John Ridgely Carter was
born in Baltimore on November 28, 1862. He married Alice Morgan (1865–1933) in
1897. Carter, who was secretary of the U.S. Embassy in London between 1894 and
1909 and U.S. minister to the Balkan States (Bulgaria, Romania, and Serbia)
between 1909 and 1911, was painted by John Singer Sargent in 1901. In 1911, he
was offered the post of U.S. minister to Argentina, but he refused it on the
grounds that, without the government providing him a house, the post would be
too expensive for his annual salary of $12,000. It was estimated that Minister
Charles Hitchcock Sherrill (1867–1936), whom he would replace and under whom
Robert Woods Bliss served as secretary of the legation in Buenos Aires, spent
$100,000 yearly to maintain his position. Carter left the diplomatic service
and joined the Parisian bank of J. P. Morgan & Cie., where he became a
partner in 1914. He died on June 3, 1944.