Baron Byron Baron, killed his cousin and neighbour William Chaworth in a duel on 26 January 1765. He was brought before his peers in the House of Lords but under the statute of Edward VI he was found guilty only of manslaughter and forced to pay a small fine. Byron henceforth became known as "the Wicked Lord" and "the Devil Byron". He was succeeded by his great-nephew, George Gordon Byron, the sixth Baron, the famous Romantic poet. He was the son of John "Mad Jack" Byron, son of Vice-Admiral the Hon. John "Foulweather Jack" Byron, second son of the fourth Baron and
Lord Byron her. The offer was not accepted. Byron made his way to Smyrna, where he and Hobhouse cadged a ride to Constantinople on HMS "Salsette". While "Salsette" was anchored awaiting Ottoman permission to dock at the city, on 3 May 1810 Byron and Lieutenant Ekenhead, of "Salsette"s Marines, swam the Hellespont. Byron commemorated this feat in the second canto of "Don Juan". He returned to England from Malta in July 1811 aboard . Byron became a celebrity with the publication of the first two cantos of "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" (1812). "He rapidly became the most brilliant star in the dazzling world