J. Butler Wright

Joshua Butler Wright (October 18, 1877 – December 4, 1939) was a United States diplomat who served as representative of the US in Hungary, Uruguay, Czechoslovakia, and Cuba. He was the twentieth and last Third Assistant Secretary of State.

Wright was born in Irvington, in Westchester County, New York, on 18 October 1877, the son of C. R. Wright. He attended the Lawrenceville School and then Princeton University, graduating with a B.S. degree in 1899. Wright worked as a banker in New York City from 1899 to 1906 and served in the New York National Guard from 1901 to 1907. He married Maude A. Wolfe of Tuxedo Park, in June 1902.

In 1907, Wright became a rancher in Wyoming. While living in Cody, Wyoming, he passed the foreign service examination on May 17, 1909, and became a career diplomat. His first posting was in Honduras. Wright later served in Belgium, Brazil, Russia and the United Kingdom. In May 1916, he married Harriet R. Southerland, the daughter of retired Rear Admiral William H. H. Southerland, in Washington, D.C. Wright and his second wife had two daughters.

In 1925, Wright was serving as Assistant Secretary of State under president Calvin Coolidge and Secretary of State Charles Evans Hughes. Coolidge appointed Wright to serve as Envoy to Hungary in 1927. Herbert Hoover appointed Wright as Envoy to Uruguay in 1930, and Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed Wright as Envoy to Czechoslovakia in 1934, and afterwards as the U.S. Ambassador to Cuba from 1937 to 1939. During his stint as ambassador to Cuba, the SS St. Louis with its cargo of mostly German Jewish refugees tried to land in Havana in 1939. This incident was the basis for the 1976 film Voyage of the Damned.

Wright died at his post in Havana on December 4, 1939, after an operation. His remains were returned to the United States at the Washington Navy Yard aboard the cruiser USS Omaha (CL-4). He was interred at the Washington National Cathedral on December 11, 1939.