Mysterious Slayings & Crimes Of The Victorian Era

The Victorian Prime Minister Who Died While Getting It on With a Maid

Henry John Templeton (1784 – 1865) Lord Palmerston, formally the 3^rd Viscount Palmerston, dominated the Victorian era’s foreign policy from 1830 to 1865, when Britain stood at the height of her power. He served as Secretary at War from 1809 to 1828, as Foreign Secretary from 1830 to 1841 and again from 1846 to 1851, and twice as Prime Minister, from 1855 to 1858, and again from 1859 to 1865. In his private life, he seems to have been a randy old goat who tried to get it on whenever and wherever he could, with eventually fatal consequences.

Lord Palmerston is the only British Prime Minister to have ever died in office, and oh what a death it was. On October 18^th, 1865, the eighty-year-old Prime Minister, who enjoyed robust health well past his biblical three score and ten, reportedly was getting it on with one of his maids on a billiard table. He seems to have overexerted himself, which led to his demise in the midst of his passionate endeavors, just two days short of his eighty first birthday.

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Where Did We Find This Stuff? Some Sources and Further Reading

BBC – Story of Boy Jones Who Stole Queen Victoria’s Underwear

Bondeson, Jan – Queen Victoria’s Stalker: The Strange Story of the Boy Jones (2012)

British Battles – Battle of Kabul and the Retreat to Gandamak

Canadian Encyclopedia – The 1885 Montreal Smallpox Epidemic

Carlson, W. Bernard – Tesla: Inventor of the Electrical Age (2013)

Cheney, Margaret – Tesla: Man Out of Time (2011)

Conversation, The, October 4^th, 2020 – Covid-19 Anti-Vaxxers Use the Same Arguments From 135 Years Ago

Courier Evening Telegraph, November 15^th, 2021 – Love and Arsenic: The Strange Affair of Madeleine Smith

Culture Trip – The Story Behind London’s Notorious Girl Gang, the Forty Elephants

Daily Best – What the Hell Has Hollywood Got Against Nikola Tesla?