Born: 15 March 1779 at Melbourne House, Piccadilly, London

First entered Parliament: 31 January 1806

Age he became PM: 55 years, 123 days and 56 years and 34 days

Maiden speech: 19 December 1806 in the reply to the King's speech

Total time as PM: Six years, 255 days

Died: 24 November 1848 at Brocket Hall, Hertfordshire

Facts and figures

Education: Eton and Trinity College, Cambridge

Family: Melbourne was the second born of six children

Interests: Conversation, reading, shooting

Biography

Queen Victoria's mentor

Viscount Melbourne had two lives - the first as the cuckolded husband in one of the most scandalous affairs of the nineteenth century, and the second as senior statesman and mentor to Queen Victoria.

Born William Lamb, in 1805 he succeeded his elder brother as heir to his father's title. Now known as Lord Melbourne, he married Lady Caroline Ponsonby. It was a marriage which was to cause him no small amount of grief.

He first came to general notice for reasons he would rather have avoided, when his wife had a public affair with poet Lord Byron. The resulting scandal was the talk of Britain in 1812.

In 1806 he was elected to the Commons as the Whig MP for Leominster, where he served 1806-1812 and 1816-1829, before joining the House of Lords on his father's death.

He was Secretary for Ireland 1827-28, and Home Secretary 1830-34, during which time he cracked down severely on agricultural unrest.

On Grey's resignation in 1834, King William IV appointed Melbourne as the Prime Minister who would be the 'least bad choice', and he remained in office for seven years, except for five months following November 1834 when Peel was in charge.

Without any strong political convictions, he held together a difficult and divided Cabinet, and sustained support in the House of Commons through an alliance of Whigs, Radicals and Irish MPs.

He was not a reformer, although the Municipal Corporations Act of 1835 did ensure that the growing middle class secured control of local government.

Efficient PM

But he was efficient in keeping order, raising taxes and conducting foreign policy.

Melbourne also had a close relationship to the monarch. He was Queen Victoria's first prime minister, and she trusted him greatly. Their close relationship was founded in his responsibility for tutoring her in the world of politics and instructing her in her role, but ran much deeper than this suggests.

Victoria came to regard Melbourne as a mentor and personal friend and he was given a private apartment at Windsor Castle.

Later in his premiership, Melbourne's support in Parliament declined, and in 1840 it grew difficult to hold the Cabinet together.

His unpopular and scandal-hit term ended in August 1841, when he resigned after a series of parliamentary defeats.liuxuepaper.com