Augustus George Vernon Harcourt FRS (24 December 1834 – 23 August 1919) was an English chemist who spent his career at Oxford University.

Augustus Harcourt was educated at Harrow School before enrolling at Balliol College, Oxford, where he took a degree in Natural Science in 1858, working with Henry Smith and Benjamin Brodie.

[4] In 1879, Harcourt sat on the committee which was formed to create an Oxford women's college "in which no distinction will be made between students on the ground of their belonging to different religious denominations."

His wife became the inaugural joint secretary of the Somerville Council together with the novelist Mary Augusta Ward,[5] both of whom are remembered by name each year in the college's Commemoration Service.

Harcourt's other activities included inventing a device to safely administer chloroform as an anesthetic, and the analysis and purification of coal gas, used for illumination.