William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne fall. The king and the Duke of Wellington urged him to stay on as prime minister. After Norton failed in court, Melbourne was vindicated, but he did stop seeing Norton. Nonetheless, as historian Boyd Hilton concludes, "it is irrefutable that Melbourne's personal life was problematic. Spanking sessions with aristocratic ladies were harmless, not so the whippings administered to orphan girls taken into his household as objects of charity." Melbourne was Prime Minister when Queen Victoria came to the throne (June 1837). Barely eighteen, she was only just breaking free from the domineering influence of her mother, the Duchess of Kent,
Lady Caroline Lamb of making poetesses of her pupils". In her early adult years, Lady Caroline not only wrote prose and poetry, but also took to sketching portraiture. These courtly skills stood her in good stead. She spoke French and Italian fluently, was skilled at Greek and Latin, and also enjoyed music and drama. In June 1805, at the age of nineteen, Lady Caroline Ponsonby married the Hon. William Lamb, an up-and-coming politician, and heir to the 1st Viscount Melbourne. Although their meeting had been shrewdly orchestrated by William Lamb's mother, theirs was a love match. The couple had become "mutually captivated" during