Soames was born in Penn, Buckinghamshire, England, the son of Captain Arthur Granville Soames (the brother of Olave Baden-Powell, World Chief Guide, both descendants of a brewing family who had joined the landed gentry) by his marriage to Hope Mary Woodbine Parish.

During the war, he served in France, Italy, and North Africa and was awarded the French Croix de Guerre for his actions at the Second Battle of El Alamein in 1942.

[1] He was the Conservative MP for Bedford from 1950 to 1966 and served under Anthony Eden as Under-Secretary of State for Air from 1955 to 1957 and under Harold Macmillan as Parliamentary and Financial Secretary to the Admiralty from 1957 to 1958.

[7] During his tenure as ambassador, he was involved in the February 1969 "Soames affair", following a private meeting between Soames and French president Charles de Gaulle, the latter offering bilateral talks concerning a partnership for Britain in a larger and looser European union, the talks not involving other members.

[9] He was created a life peer on 19 April 1978 as Baron Soames, of Fletching in the County of East Sussex.

[10] He served as the interim governor of Southern Rhodesia from 1979 to 1980, charged with administering the terms of the Lancaster House Agreement and overseeing its governmental transition into Zimbabwe.