The Life of Lord Byron

(1788-1824)

The Byron family were descended from Ralph de Burun, who came to England with William the Conqueror. He is mentioned in the Doomsday Book as a landowner in Nottinghamshire. Later on he acquired land and family estates in Derbyshire, and in the reign of Edward I property in Rochdale and Norfolk. At the time of the dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII, the  monastery and priory of Newstead was sold to John Byron of Colwyke for the sum of £810.  Sir John Byron was given a knighthood by  Queen Elizabeth I in 1579, and he converted the monastic quarters around the cloisters into a mansion.

In the seventeenth century the Byrons married into the Chaworth family who lived very near to Newstead at Annesley Hall. William who was born in 1722, later became known as "The Wicked Lord". His brother John, born in 1723  was later to become an Admiral and was the poet’s grandfather. John, Admiral Byron later became known as "Foulweather Jack" due to his turbulent career in the Navy, his  son also called John, known as "Mad Jack,"  married  Lady Amelia d'Arcy , they had two daughters, but only one of them , Augusta Mary, survived. Lady Amelia did not survive the birth, and eventually  John married again to Catherine Gordon of Gight, who would be the poet’s mother, at St Michael's Church in Bath on May 13th 1785.

John Byron squandered  Catherine's money and eventually all her estates were sold off to pay his debts. In July 1785  he was arrested for debt and taken to King's Bench Prison.  Toward the end of 1787 Catherine settled in temporary  furnished accommodation at 16 Holles Street in London, and there, on 22 January 1788,  George Gordon Byron, the poet, was born. He was born with a caul over his head which was considered a mark of distinction or good luck.  He was christened at Marylebone Parish Church on February 29th.  Within days of his birth Catherine called in a surgeon called John Hunter to examine a foot deformity and inoculate the child against smallpox. It became known that his right foot was inclined to the inner side, caused by a shortening of his tendon. As time went on many painful hours  were spent in trying to straighten it.

John Byron went to France to escape his creditors and in July 1792 he died of consumption, leaving his penniless son, aged four, responsible for his debts. Byron spent most of his childhood living in Aberdeen with his Mother. In 1792  Catherine  enrolled young Byron in school in Long Acre  for a guinea a year. He was a quick learner and could read fluently by the time he was five.  In 1794, when he was six, he was sent to the Aberdeen Grammar School. The fifth Lord Byron, William, died at Newstead Abbey on 21 May 1798. His ten-year-old son became the sixth Baron Byron of Rochdale and heir to Newstead.

In 1799 he was sent to a preparatory school at Dulwich, where he remained till 1801,and then went on to Harrow where he learnt Latin and Greek. He also became a champion swimmer in spite of his lameness. He remained at Harrow till 1805,  developing his love of poetry and history. It is interesting to note that during his time at Harrow in 1803 in his sixteenth year he visited his distant relative Mary Anne Chaworth who lived at Annesley Hall,  near Newstead, and fell hopelessly in love with her.  His infatuation for Mary was ended by his over-hearing  her speak of him to her maid as "That lame boy". The sting given by this remark was a serious blow to his pride and some think that it was the cause of his future philandering, although it should be remembered that he was from childhood, extremely susceptible to feminine influence. Whatever the truth might be, Byron never forgot his first love whom he named "The Morning Star of Annesley." She is the subject of at least five of his early poems. In 1765, the fifth Lord Byron, known as “The Wicked Lord,” had killed a relation of Mary Chaworth in a duel.

In October 1805 Byron entered Trinity College, Cambridge, which did him no good. "The place is the devil", he would remark. That notwithstanding,  during his time there he made many and lasting friends. Among them were the scholar-dandy Scrope Berdmore Davies, Francis Hodgson, and undoubtedly his best friend of all, John Cam Hobhouse. Also there was another friend, a chorister named Edleston who died while Byron was abroad in May 1811. Others died, and each death would affect Byron.

In April 1808 he entered upon his inheritance, before this the Abbey at Newstead had been occupied by a tenant, Lord Grey de Ruthven. Various parts of the Abbey were uninhabitable, including the banqueting hall, and the grand drawing room. By borrowing money, two sets of apartments were refurnished for Byron and his mother. On the 13 March 1809, being of age, he took his seat in the House of Lords. Byron invited Hobhouse and three others to a house-warming. One of the party, C S Matthews, describes a day at Newstead: "Host and guests lay in bed till one, the afternoon was passed in various diversions, fencing, single stick, riding, cricket, sailing on the lake." "They dined at eight, and after the cloth was removed they handed round a human skull filled with burgundy. This was a skull that had been found in the gardens, which Byron had sent to Nottingham to be polished to a very high shine and of a mottled colour like tortoiseshell, it had been set in heavy silver resting on four balls. The bill for this was £17 17s.  Byron wrote a poem of the event.

Start not-nor deem my spirit fled:
In me behold the only skull,
From which, unlike a living head,
Whatever flows is never dull.

"After dinner they buffooned about the house in a set of monkish dresses, and retired to bed some time between one and three in the morning".  Next to Byron's bedroom was a small room, which was known as the haunted chamber, in which visitors to the Abbey were said to have seen a headless monk. This room was occupied by Robert Rushton, the boy whom Byron had employed as a page.

After some time, accompanied by Hobhouse and a small set of  retainers, including William Fletcher his faithful valet (who was to serve Byron until his master’s death in Missolonghi) and Robert Rushton,  he set out on his travels. They sailed from Falmouth on July 2nd and reached Lisbon on 7 July 1809. The first two cantos of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage contains a record of the main events of his first year of  absence. Byron decided to  go to Greece, which was in the throes of  a war of independence. The revolutionary Greeks were split up into parties, and there were several different leaders. It was a question to which leader he should attach himself. He sailed from Argostoli on 29 December 1823 and after a rather adventurous voyage landed at Missolonghi on the 5 January 1824. He was met with a royal reception. Byron may have sought a soldier’s end but this was not to be. He advanced large sums of money for the payment of troops, and for medical provisions. He brought opposing parties into line and served as a link between Odysseus, the democratic leader of the insurgents, and the "prince" Mavrocordato. He was so eager to take to the field, but was never to fire a shot or unsheath his sword in battle.

His health had deteriorated, but he did not realise that his life was in danger. On 15 February 1824 he was struck down with a fit, which left him speechless though not motionless. He gradually recovered enough to continue his business as usual, but he suffered from dizziness and spasms in the chest, and a few days later he was seized with a second convulsion. These attacks may have hastened, but they did not cause his death. On April 9th,  feeling better he took a ride, but soon after the weather turned and he was soaked to the skin. He insisted on dismounting and took an open boat to the quay in front of his house.  Two hours later he was struck down with ague and violent rheumatic pains.  On the 11th he rode out again, but he gradually  grew worse and fell into a comatose sleep. It was reported that during  his delirium he had called out, half in English, half in Italian, "Forward ~ forward ~ courage! Follow my example ~ don't be afraid!" And then he tried to send a  last message to his sister and to his wife. He died at six o'clock on the evening of 19 April 1824, aged 36 years and three months.

The Greeks were heartbroken. Mavrocordato gave orders that thirty-seven minute guns should be fired at  daylight and decreed a general mourning of twenty one days. His body was embalmed and lay in state. On May 25th his remains, all but the heart, which is buried in Missolonghi, were sent back to England where they were finally laid beneath the chancel of the village church of Hucknall Torkard on 16 July 1824, nearly three months after his death. The authorities of the day would not sanction burial in Westminster Abbey, and there is neither bust nor statue of Lord Byron in Poet's Corner.

The flagstone above Byron’s tomb at Hucknall Torkard.