Lord Dudley Coutts Stuart (London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, 11 January 1803 – 17 November 1854, Stockholm

Stockholm

Stockholm is the capital and the largest city of Sweden and constitutes the most populated urban area in Scandinavia. Stockholm is the most populous city in Sweden, with a population of 851,155 in the municipality , 1.37 million in the urban area , and around 2.1 million in the metropolitan area...

) was a British politician.

Stuart was the youngest son of John Stuart, 1st Marquess of Bute

John Stuart, 1st Marquess of Bute

John Stuart, 1st Marquess of Bute, PC, FRS was a British nobleman.He was the son of the 3rd Earl of Bute and the former Mary Wortley Montagu, a granddaughter of the 1st Duke of Kingston-upon-Hull and great-granddaughter of the 1st Earl of Sandwich...

 and Frances Coutts.

In 1820, he was admitted to Christ Church, Oxford

Christ Church, Oxford

Christ Church or house of Christ, and thus sometimes known as The House), is one of the largest constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England...

.

On 20 July 1824, he married Princess Christine Bonaparte (d. 1847), daughter of Lucien Bonaparte

Lucien Bonaparte

Lucien Bonaparte, Prince Français, 1st Prince of Canino and Musignano , born Luciano Buonaparte, was the third surviving son of Carlo Buonaparte and his wife Letizia Ramolino....

, and had one son.

He was a member of the Whittington Club. He was a member of the Literary Association of the Friends of Poland

Literary Association of the Friends of Poland

Literary Association of the Friends of Poland is a British organization of solidarity with Poles, co-founded February 25, 1832 in United Kingdom by Prince Adam Jerzy Czartoryski and the Scottish poet Thomas Campbell.-History:...

 as well.

A Whig

British Whig Party

The Whigs were a party in the Parliament of England, Parliament of Great Britain, and Parliament of the United Kingdom, who contested power with the rival Tories from the 1680s to the 1850s. The Whigs' origin lay in constitutional monarchism and opposition to absolute rule...

 and subsequently Liberal

Liberal Party (UK)

The Liberal Party was one of the two major political parties of the United Kingdom during the 19th and early 20th centuries. It was a third party of negligible importance throughout the latter half of the 20th Century, before merging with the Social Democratic Party in 1988 to form the present day...

, he was a passionate advocate of Polish

Poland

Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...

 independence, and sympathetic in general to the cause of the Eastern European peoples against Russia

Russia

Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

. He received Lajos Kossuth

Lajos Kossuth

Lajos Kossuth de Udvard et Kossuthfalva was a Hungarian lawyer, journalist, politician and Regent-President of Hungary in 1849. He was widely honored during his lifetime, including in the United Kingdom and the United States, as a freedom fighter and bellwether of democracy in Europe.-Family:Lajos...

 in England after his exile from Hungary

Hungary

Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...

. In the election of 1857, Richard Cobden told an anecdote referring to this event:

I will tell you what happend with my knowledge -- it is no breach of confidence to say it. When that illustrious Hungarian was expected in England, after his imprisonment in Turkey, my lamented friend Lord Dudley Stuart -- whose devotion to the cause of these foreign refugees was as unbounded as it was sincere - went down to Southampton to meet Kossuth, and receive him on his arrival. Having to wait a day or two there, and being in the neighbourhood of Broadlands, where Lord Palmerston lives, he went there and saw the noble lord, and received from him a request to bring Kossuth over to Broadlands, to see him. I remember receiveing a letter from Lord Dudley Stuart, announcing to me this piece of intelligence with the greatest glee. He was delighted at the opportunity of taking Kossuth over to the Lord Palmerston; and as soon as he arrived he announced to him the pleasing information. To his astonishment he found Kossuth would not accept it. He would not go near Lord Palmerston -- (cheers); and I have got a letter from Lord Dudley Stuart, asking me to use all my influence with Kossuth to induce him to go and call upon Lord Palmerston. He would not do it; and my answer was this, "You may depend upon it, Kossuth knows a great deal more about Lord Palmerston than you do." (Laughter).

A critic of the Metropolitan Police

Metropolitan police

Metropolitan Police is a generic title for the municipal police force for a major metropolitan area, and it may be part of the official title of the force...

, he suggested a reduction of the strength of the force in 1853.

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