He was born the eldest son of William Tufnell of Chichester (MP for Colchester, 1806) and was educated at Eton College and Christ Church, Oxford, where he graduated B.A.
[1] Whilst at Oxford, he, along with George Cornewall Lewis, translated Karl Otfried Müller's book The History and Antiquities of the Doric Race into English.
He was appointed secretary to Sir Robert Wilmot-Horton when the latter was Governor of Ceylon and from 1835 to 1839 was Private Secretary to Lord Minto when that Earl was First Lord of the Admiralty.
[2] He entered the House of Commons in 1837 as a member for Ipswich, having previously been defeated in the Colchester election in 1835, but lost that seat a year later.
He had married 3 times; firstly in 1830 Anne Augusta, the daughter of the Rt Hon.