The Creevey Papers
Thomas Creevey to Elizabeth Ord, 7 August 1820
“Knowsley, 7th August, 1820.
“. . . I came here on Saturday. I like Lady Mary* better every time I see her. You know
what a d——d ramshackle of a library they have here, so I was
complaining at breakfast this morning that they had no State Trials in the
house; upon which Lady Mary said she was sure she could
find some, and accordingly flew from her breakfast and came back in triumph at
having found them for me. Upon the subject of the Queen, my lord and my
lady are both substantially right, i.e., in thinking there
is not a pin to chuse between them, and that the latter has been always
ill-used, and that nobody but the King could get redress in such a case against
his wife. Little Derby goes further than the Countess,
when she is not by; but she thinks it proper to
deprecate all violence, and says, tho’ Bennet and I are excellent men, and she likes us both
extremely, still, that we are like Dives,
and that Lazarus ought to come occasionally
and cool our tongues. Is not this the image of her?”
Henry Grey Bennet (1777-1836)
The son of Charles Bennet, fourth earl of Tankerville; educated at Eton and Peterhouse,
Cambridge, he was a Whig MP for MP for Shrewsbury (1806-07, 1811-26) and a legal
reformer.
Queen Caroline of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel (1768-1821)
Married the Prince of Wales in 1795 and separated in 1796; her husband instituted
unsuccessful divorce proceedings in 1820 when she refused to surrender her rights as
queen.
Elizabeth Farren, countess of Derby (1759-1829)
Comic actress; she was courted by Charles James Fox but became the lover and later the
wife of the Earl of Derby upon the death of Elizabeth Hamilton in 1797.
Edward Smith Stanley, twelfth earl of Derby (1752-1834)
Grandson of the eleventh earl (d. 1776); educated at Eton and Trinity College, Cambridge,
he was a Whig MP for Lancashire, a friend of Charles James Fox, nephew of John Burgoyne,
and a committed sportsman.
