Passionate life of ‘saturnine’ lord’s loyal mistress...

SHe was a mesmerising beauty, the mother of two glamorous actresses and the mistress of one of Britain’s most controversial aristocrats.

But today, family and friends are in mourning for Claire Ward, who has died aged 83. Claire (right) was the lover of Lord Lambton and lived with him for more than 30 years at Villa Cetinale, a sumptuous 17th- century pile on a hill above Siena, in Tuscany, where they entertained everyone from the Prince of Wales to Mick Jagger.

Lambton was a defence minister under edward Heath until 1973, when his penchant for call-girls was exposed by a Sunday newspaper; he was snapped in bed with two prostitutes thanks to a peephole in a bedroom mirror. He resigned, but told interviewer Robin Day he ‘couldn’t think what all the fuss was about’, adding: ‘Surely all men visit whores?’ Claire seemed undeterred by Lambton’s proclivities and, divorcing Peter Ward — youngest son of the 3rd earl of Dudley — in 1974, she decamped to Italy. She had three children with Ward: actressturned-environmental activist Tracy; Rachel, who found fame in The Thorn Birds mini- series; and a younger son, Al. The diarist James Lees-Milne was bewildered by Claire’s devotion to Lambton — who never divorced his wife, Bindy — and remarked that Claire was ‘ as sweet as once her mother was’, while categorising the peer as ‘dark, balding, saturnine’.

But she remained loyal to Lambton until his death in 2006, when she returned to Britain.

She died peacefully, surrounded by family and friends.

Tracy, who divorced ‘ Bunter’ Worcester, now the Duke of Beaufort, last year, attributes her own passion for ethical farming to her mother.

‘Mum’s love of beautiful landscapes, family farms and traditional rural cultures inspired my campaign to protect farmers and rural communities,’ she tells me, adding that her mother shared her abhorrence of the ‘ravages of factory farming’.