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Edward Law, 2nd Baron &
1st Earl of Ellenborough, (1790-1871)
son of Edward Law, 1st Baron Ellenborough and Ann Towry
Born 8 September 1790
Died 22 December 1871 Southam Delabere, Gloucester
Married 15 September 1824 London Div.1830
Jane Elizabeth Digby
Born 3 April 1807
Died 11 August 1881 Damascus
Buried Damascus |
Probably to assist his ambition to become foreign minister, he married
Lord Castlereagh's sister, Lady Octavia Stewart. While on their honeymoon
in Vienna, Castlereagh introduced him to the assembled diplomats attending
the Congress. However, five years later Lady Octavia died childlessly and
Lord Ellenborough was soon in the marriage market. Mrs. Harriet Arbuthnot
accused him of "having flirted and made himself ridiculous with all the
girls in London." Thomas Creevey claimed that Edward had been refused by
a Miss Russell, along with several others. However, Lady Octavia's mother
encouraged her son-in-law to take another wife, writing to him in 1823:
"You must marry a young and beautiful companion for an improved noblesse.
You must again be happy in married life, for no other can make you so."
In the dazzling Jane Digby he found his beautiful companion and, once
he was accepted, his mother-in-law wrote to Jane's mother to congratulate
her on the engagement of her daughter to a man she regarded as a son, and
who had made Lady Octavia very happy during their five years together.
Edward Law, Lord Ellenborough, was not a popular man even among his
own set. Thomas Creevey said of him in his diary: "Lady Anson will have
it that he was a very good husband to his first wife, but all my impressions
are that he is a damned fellow!" Creevey was not alone in that opinion.
Harriette Wilson, a celebrated English courtesan who published her
memoirs in 1825, described him: "Young Law, Lord Ellenborough's son, was
a very smart, fine young gentleman and his impatience of temper passed,
I dare say, occasionally for quickness. His wig was never on straight on
his head. I rather fancy he liked to show his own good
head of hair under it.
Ellenborough was notorious for his acid tongue, which multiplied his
enemies on both sides of the political fence. To many of his associates
in the House of Lords he was an arrogant parvenu, whose peerage dated back
only to 1802. However, he was an able administrator
and a brilliant orator, but he believed implicitly that only the aristocracy
was fit to govern. He dreaded the advent of socially inferior men in the
House of Commons.
In his political career (which won him the posts of Viceroy of India
and First Lord of the Admiralty, as well as an earldom) he was accused
by his associates of "overbearing demeanor," "shabby behaviour," and "theatrical
love of display." Even Queen Victoria, who
bestowed many honors on him, said, "It is a pity that Ellenborough,with
his knowledge, experience, activity and cleverness, should be so entirely
unable to submit to general rules of conduct."
He was lacking in humour and warmth, and he seemed to court unpopularity
as he found it gentlemanly and convenient. Their honeymoon was apparently
a failure and, according to rumour, Edward paid more attention to the daughter
of the hotel's pastry-cook than to his bewildered bride. Occupied in his
political world, after the birth of a son he neglected his wife and, when
she fell in love However, in 1830, his only child, Arthur Dudley, died
aged only two.For a while it seemed that Ellenborough was looking for a
new wife,as it seemed he was courting Lord Clare's sister but nothing came
of it.
Many believed that the humiliation he suffered in the divorce was the
main reason he never married again, anxious though he was for an heir.
However, after the divorce he had a long affaire with an unknown woman,
who provided him with two sons and a daughter. It was rumoured that his
daughter was the Madame Hamilton who became the mistress of
Victor Emmanuel II, King of Sardinia and Italy.
As he grew older, he professed his devotion to his first wife, Lady
Octavia Stewart. In the village of Oxenton near his estate, he restored
an ancient Saxon chapel and erected in it an elaborate memorial to her,
attributring whatever good he had thought or done to her influence. As
he neared eighty, he was said to be "younger in spirit and more likeable
than he had been at twenty." His divorced wife, known as Lady Ellenborough,
shocked Victorian
society by having lovers and three more husbands, the last taking her
to the Lebanon where she died.
Source: Leo van de Pas |
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