The Creevey Papers
Earl of Sefton to Thomas Creevey, 26 November 1833
“Croxteth, Nov. 26th.
“Pray write everything you hear. What do you think
of the rumours of changes? Somehow or
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another I feel that things are not quite
right and that Grey’s long absence was
injurious. He certainly seemed rather bitter about Palmerston’s intimacy with Ly.
J[ersey], and I think with reason. Thank God she is gone, and
that she was reduced to take [Sir Robert] Wilson as an escort. . . . Stanley has had several fainting fits, but is
much better. They say it is stomach. If anything was to happen to him, what
would become of us in the H. of C.?”
Emily Mary Cowper, countess Cowper [née Lamb] (1787-1869)
Whig hostess, the daughter of Sir Peniston Lamb, first Viscount Melbourne; she married
(1) in 1805 Sir Peter Leopold Louis Francis Nassau Cowper, fifth Earl Cowper, and (2) in
1839, her long-time lover, Henry John Temple, third Viscount Palmerston.
Thomas Creevey (1768-1838)
Whig politician aligned with Charles James Fox and Henry Brougham; he was MP for Thetford
(1802-06, 1807-18) Appleby (1820-26) and Downton (1831-32). He was convicted of libel in
1813.
Charles Grey, second earl Grey (1764-1845)
Whig statesman and lover of the Duchess of Devonshire; the second son of the first earl
(d. 1807), he was prime minister (1831-34).
Henry John Temple, third viscount Palmerston (1784-1865)
After education at Harrow and Edinburgh University he was MP for Newport (1807-11) and
Cambridge University (1811-31), foreign minister (1830-41), and prime minister (1855-58,
1859-65).
Sir Robert Thomas Wilson (1777-1849)
Soldier, author, radical Whig MP for Southwark (1818-31), and diplomat; he wrote
History of the British Expedition to Egypt (1802) and was governor
of Gibraltar (1842).
