[3] He was educated at Eton and at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich.

After George Tomline's death in 1889, he inherited the Orwell Park estate in Suffolk.

Pretyman served as Member of Parliament (MP) for Woodbridge, Suffolk from 1895 to 1906 and for Chelmsford from 1908 to 1923.

E. G. Pretyman made a Gramophone Company recording of an address "On the Navy" in 1908.

His most notable descendant today is Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 7th Marquess of Salisbury, sometime Tory leader of the House of Lords in the 1990s.