The Lady Caroline Lamb (13 November 1785 – 26 January 1828) was a British aristocrat and novelist, best known for her 1812 affair with Lord Byron. Her husband was the 2nd Viscount Melbourne, the Prime Minister, however, she was never the Viscountess Melbourne because she died before he succeeded to the peerage; hence, she is known to history as Lady Caroline Lamb.
She was the only daughter of the 3rd Earl of Bessborough and Henrietta, Countess of Bessborough. Her social credentials also included being niece of Georgiana Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire, and cousin (by marriage) of Annabella, Lady Byron.
Youth and education
Lady Caroline's mother,
Henrietta, Countess of Bessborough
She was born the Honourable Caroline Ponsonby, and became Lady Caroline when her father succeeded to the earldom in 1793. As a small child she was considered delicate and for her health spent much time in the country, but from 1794 she lived at Devonshire House with her cousins: Lord Hartington (later the 6th Duke of Devonshire), Lady Georgiana, and Lady Harriet Cavendish; and two children of Lady Elizabeth Foster and the Duke of Devonshire. With these children she was educated at Devonshire House, and was particularly close during childhood to Lady Harriet, who was only three months older.[1]
Lady Morgan reported in her memoirs that Lady Caroline told her that she had grown up as a tomboy, and quite unable to read or write until adolescence.[2] While many scholars have accepted this (and other melodramatic claims made by Lady Morgan) at face value,[3] published works of correspondence and about her family members make it extremely unlikely. The grandmother she shared with her Cavendish cousins, the formidable Dowager Lady Spencer, was zealously dedicated to promoting education, and later employed their governess as her own companion. This governess was Miss Selina Trimmer, who was the daughter of Mrs Sarah Trimmer, a well-known and respected author of moral tales for children. She taught them an extensive curriculum, considerably beyond mere literacy. There is a published letter Lady Caroline wrote on 31 October 1796 (just before her eleventh birthday) that not only demonstrates her literacy, but also a merciless wit and talent for mimicry.[1] Lady Caroline was exceptionally well educated at home, and also attended a school in Hans Place, London. In her early adult years, she not only wrote prose and poetry, but also took to sketch portraiture. These courtly skills stood her in good stead. She spoke French and Italian fluently, was skilled at Greek and Latin, and also enjoyed music and drama.
Marriage and family
Lady Caroline Lamb
In June, 1805, at the age of nineteen, she married the Hon. William Lamb, an up-and-coming young politician, and heir to the 1st Viscount Melbourne. They had been "mutually captivated" in the summer of 1802 during a visit to Brocket Hall, the Melbournes's country house.[1] Her union with Lamb produced a son in 1807 and a premature daughter in 1809 who died within 24 hours.[4] The loss of two children and the health problems of the surviving boy teamed with Lamb's consuming career ambitions to drive a wedge between the couple. The Lamb family also sought a formal separation of William and Caroline.
Lord Byron
In 1812, Lady Caroline embarked on her well-publicized affair with Lord Byron. She had attracted the attention of the poet through her accomplished wit and vivacity, and he in turn obsessed over her, actively trying to destroy her marriage to Lamb so that he might have her to himself. He was 24 and she 27. It was she who described the poet as "mad, bad, and dangerous to know."
Contrary to legend, Lady Caroline was not blackballed at Almack's in 1812 for her affair with Byron. Rather, her vouchers to that exclusive club were rescinded in 1816 after she published Glenarvon. Her cousin Harriet (by then Lady Granville), with whom her relationship had deteriorated after childhood, visited her in December 1816 and was so incredulous of her unrepentant behavior that she ended her description of the visit in a letter to her sister with: "I mean my visit to be annual."[5]
Literary career
After her liaison with Byron, Lady Caroline enjoyed some success as a novelist. Glenarvon, a Gothic novel, was published anonymously in 1816, and included a thinly disguised pen-picture of her former lover. She published two further novels, Graham Hamilton in 1822 and Ada Reis in 1823, and two narrative poems, mostly anonymously, during the following decade.
Later life and death
In 1824, she accidentally came across Byron's funeral cortège on its way to his burial place, and this incident drove her to a nervous breakdown, and rumoured insanity. She lived her last years in seclusion at Brocket Hall.
Popular culture
She is somewhat unfairly portrayed by Camilla Power in the BBC drama Byron. Lamb's decendants were so upset over her portrayal in the film they sued the BBC for it's 'cruel mockery' of their ancestor.
Further reading
- Paul Douglass (2004) Lady Caroline Lamb: A Biography. Palgrave Macmillan.
Notes and references
- ^ a b c Leveson-Gower, Sir George (Ed.), Hary-O: the Letters of Lady Harriet Cavendish 1796-1809, London: John Murray (1940).
- ^ Owenson, Sydney (Lady Morgan) (1862). Lady Morgan's memoirs autobiography, diaries and correspondence. Wm. H. Allen & Co. ISBN 0-4045-6793-2. |editor=Dixon, William Hepworth
- ^ "Lady Caroline Lamb," The Literary Encyclopedia,
- ^ Paul Douglass (1999). "The madness of writing: Lady Caroline Lamb's Byronic identity". Pacific Coast Philology 34 (1): 53–71. doi:10.2307/1316621. http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0078-7469%281999%2934%3A1%3C53%3ATMOWLC%3E2.0.CO%3B2-Y.
- ^ Leveson-Gower, F. (Ed.), Letters of Harriet Countess Granville 1810-1845, London: Longmans, Green, and Co. (1894).
External links
