Amelia Stewart, Viscountess Castlereagh

Well-connected by birth to the aristocracy and wife of a prominent politician who was Britain's leading diplomat during the close of the Napoleonic Wars, Lady Castlereagh was an influential member of Regency London's high society.

However, he had strained relations with the Stewarts as the author of a popular and politically pointed satire of the County Down landed-interest Billy Bluff, serialised in the United Irish paper, the Northern Star.

[2] In February 1798, he asked his Presbyterian congregation, next to Mount Stewart, then under armed guard, and with tenants withholding rent, why Ireland was at war.

Lady Londonderry, is reputed to have had a "strong but secret sympathy" for the United Irish cause evidenced in her friendship and correspondence with Jane Greg.

In a private audience on 9 August, Castlereagh had told the King that police officers were searching for him, that he was being "accused of the same crime as the Bishop of Clogher."

Afterwards, she was blamed, perhaps unfairly, by many of his friends and political colleagues for concealing the serious nature of his mental illness: Lord Liverpool, the Prime Minister, in particular accused her of deceiving him about the extent of the problem.

Credited with having introduced the quadrille to London, Lady Castlereagh is also remembered for having Almack's doors closed, without exception, at eleven o'clock, even once turning away the Duke of Wellington.

At their country home, Woollet Hall, North Cray, Lady Castlereagh kept a private zoo, which featured antelopes, ostriches, kangaroos, and a notably bad-tempered tiger.