Lord Melbourne is a character based on British statesman William George Lamb.Born on March 15, 1779 in London, the Eton and Cambridge-educated Lamb was called to the bar in 1804. He took his seat in the House of Commons in 1805, and married Caroline Ponsonby, daughter of Frederick Ponsonby, 3rd Earl of Bessborough, that June 3rd. Caroline's maternal grandfather, John Spencer, 1st Earl Spencer, was the 6th great-grandfather of Princess Diana.After 2 miscarriages, Caroline gave birth to a son, George Augustus Frederick, on August 28, 1807. Tragically, was he epileptic and mentally handicapped. But instead of placing him in an asylum, as other couples of their rank would have done, Lamb and Caroline cared for him themselves. George died on November 22, 1836.Despite the heartbreak of George's condition, and the loss of their daughter, who died 24 hours after she was born, the pair were happy. Then Caroline met Lord Byron in 1812 at a party she was hosting. Although she would famously note in her diary later that evening that he was mad, bad, and dangerous to know , she soon succumbed to the notorious libertine. Caroline became so obsessed with Byron, after he broke with her, she staged rituals with little girls dressed in white dancing around a bonfire chanting curses on him, and attempted suicide. An exasperated Byron sought help from Lamb's mother in extricating himself from the situation. Lady Melbourne (who had carried on with the future King George IV) waged a blatant campaign to rid her son of his wife. It was Caroline who finally prevailed upon Lamb to agree to a formal separation, nine years after Byron left England. He undertook the perlious voyage from Ireland to Brocket Hall, his family's estate, to be with her before she died on January 25, 1828; he never remarried. Upon the death of his father that July 23rd, he was styled 2nd Viscount Melbourne, of Kilmore in the County of Cavan. He became the 27th Prime Minister of the United Kingdom on April 18, 1835 upon the resignation of Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey.In 1836, the husband of society beauty and author Caroline Norton, attempted to blackmail him. When Lamb refused to pay out, Norton accused him of having an affair with his wife. Owing to Lamb's reputation for integrity, not only did his government not fall, King William IV and the Duke of Wellington urged him to stay on. Lamb was ultimately vindicated, however, he did stop seeing Mrs. Norton. Historian Boyd Hilton concluded: it is irrefutable that Melbourne's personal life was problematic. Spanking sessions with aristocratic ladies were harmless, not so the whippings administered to orphan girls taken into his household as objects of charity. In June 1837, the now-58 year old Lamb became the then-18 year old Queen Victoria's first Prime Minister. The Young Victoria depicts Lamb as having little compassion for the poor while the movie Victoria speaks of being their champion. His foreign secretary Lord Palmerston's obsession with British identity was a thorn in his side, and Ireland was a constant worry. Conservative and cautious, he had mastered the art of doing next to nothing. Biographer Dorothy Marshall noted: Lamb's capacity to do absolutely nothing unless driven, and then do as little as possible, was a definite asset. Victoria's marriage to Prince Albert in 1840 effectively ended Lamb's role as her advisor and mentor. Trouble between British and French settlers in Canada, and unrest in Jamaica as a result of his decision to abolish slavery, were his undoing. Lamb wanted to suspend Jamaica's constitution due to the unrest over the slavery issue; when his majority fell to just four, he resigned on August 30, 1841.He died of a stroke on November 24, 1848 at Melbourne House, in Derbyshire. Melbourne, Austrailia is named after him. Show less «