Everything about Lord Castlereagh totally explained
Robert Stewart, 2nd Marquess of Londonderry,
KG,
GCH,
PC (
18 June 1769 in
Dublin –
12 August 1822 at
Loring Hall,
Kent), generally known by his courtesy title of
Viscount Castlereagh, which he held until 1821, was an
Anglo-Irish politician who represented the
United Kingdom at the
Congress of Vienna. He was also intimately involved in securing the passage of the controversial
Irish Act of Union.
Robert Stewart acquired the
courtesy title Viscount Castlereagh in 1796 when his father was created Earl of Londonderry, and is generally known to history by that title, even though he was to become the Marquess of Londonderry before his death. The elder Robert Stewart was also known as
The Viscount Castlereagh for about one year. He briefly became 2nd
Marquess of Londonderry in the
Peerage of Ireland on the death of his father in 1821. Stewart was born with a
club foot which was successfully treated.
He received his secondary education at
The Royal School, Armagh, and later attended
St. John's College, Cambridge for one year.
In 1794, Stewart married Emily Hobart, a woman noted in contemporary accounts for her attractiveness and
eccentricity. By all accounts, the two remained devoted to each other to the end, but they'd no children. They did, however, care for the young
Frederick Stewart, Stewart's nephew, while
his father was serving in the
army.
Percy Jocelyn, the
Bishop of Clogher until that July, was prosecuted for
homosexuality, and Castlereagh believed he was being blackmailed for the same reason. Whether this was true or a function of his paranoia is still unclear. The King is said to have advised Castlereagh to "consult a physician". On
12 August, Castlereagh committed
suicide by cutting his throat with a
letter opener.
In a retrospective and therefore necessarily speculative diagnosis, a thoughtful recent study has linked various instances of (at the time) little explained illness to syphilis, possibly contracted at
Cambridge: here Stewart’s undergraduate studies were interrupted by a mysterious illness first apparent during the closing months of 1787, and which kept him away from Cambridge through the summer of 1788. Later, there were unexplained illnesses in 1801 and 1807, the first described by a contemporary as ‘brain fever’ which would be consistent with
syphilitic meningitis. In addition to the events surrounding the suicide itself, towards the end of his life there are increasing reports of exceptionally powerful rages and sudden bouts of uncharacteristic forgetfulness.
An inquest concluded that the act had been committed whilst insane, avoiding the harsh strictures of the
felo de se verdict that would have seen the suicide victim buried with a stake in his heart at a crossroads – an action that last occurred in 1823 before the law was amended in the same year. Some radicals, notably
William Cobbett, construed this to be indicative of a "cover-up" within the government and a damning indictment of the elitism and privilege of the unreformed electoral system. His funeral on
20 August was greeted with jeering and insults along the processional route, although not to the level of unanimity projected in the radical press. Lord Londonderry was buried in the Abbey in the shadow of his mentor,
William Pitt the Younger. A funeral monument wasn't erected until 1850 by his half-brother and successor, the
3rd Marquess of Londonderry.
Sometime after Castlereagh's death,
Lord Byron wrote a sarcastic quip about his grave:
» Posterity will ne'er survey
A nobler grave than this:
» Here lie the bones of Castlereagh:
Stop, traveller, and piss.
And yet, some of Castlereagh's political opponents were gracious in their epigrams.
Henry Brougham, a Whig politician and later the
Lord Chancellor, wrote:
» Put all their other men together in one scale, and poor Castlereagh in the other – single he plainly weighed them down... One can't help feeling a little for him, after being pitted against him for several years, pretty regularly. It is like losing a connection suddenly. Also he was a gentleman, and the only one amongst them.
A
blue plaque is displayed at the entrance to Loring Hall, now a mental health facility and listed mansion, in commemoration of its most famous resident, who occupied the property from 1811.
Titles
Castlereagh's titles from birth to death:
Further Information
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