Lamb, Lady Caroline

(1785-1828)

   The only daughter of Frederick Ponsonby, third earl of Bessborough, and granddaughter of John, first earl of Spencer, she married the Hon. William Lamb, afterwards Lord Melbourne, in 1805. Throughout her life her mental health was precarious. She met Lord Byron in 1812 and they had short-lived, very public, and passionate affair. When Byron broke it off Lady Caroline entered into what today would be a stalking relationship, and spent the next four years pursuing him. She and her husband separated three years before she died at Melbourne House, Whitehall. She was buried at Hatfield, Hertfordshire. Her first and most well-known dark novel, Glenarvon, was published anonymously in 1816. Her life was made into the film Lady Caroline Lamb in 1973, starring Sarah Miles, Richard Chamberlain, Margaret Leighton and Laurence Olivier. Some of her poems: "A New Canto," "Amidst the Flowers Rich and Gay," "As the Flower Early Gathered," "By Those Eyes Where Sweet Expression," "Duet," "Fugitive Pieces and Reminiscences," "If Thou Couldst Know What 'Tis to Weep," "Sing Not for Others, But for Me," "Would I Had Seen Thee Dead and Cold."

   Sources: Dictionary of National Biography. Electronic Edition 1.1. Oxford University Press, 1997. English Poetry: Author Search. Chadwyck-Healey Ltd., 1995 (http://www.lib.utexas.edu:8080/search/epoetry/author.html). The National Portrait Gallery (www.npg.org.uk). Regency Personalities, Lady Caroline Lamb (http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/Lamb, Lady Carolineawoodley/regency/caro.html). Romantic Women Poets: An Antholog y. Duncan Wu, ed. Blackwell Publishers, 1997. Romanticism. Duncan Wu, ed. Blackwell, 1994. The Columbia Granger's Index to Poetry. 11th ed. The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry, Columbia University Press, 2005 (http://www.columbiagrangers.org). The Oxford Companion to English Literature. 6th edition. Margaret Drabble, ed. Oxford University Press, 2000.