On January 1, 1847, Lady John wrote in her diary that the year was beginning most prosperously for her and those dearest to her. "Within my own home all is peace and happiness." About a month later she became dangerously ill in London.
LONDON, February 21, 1847
I have been very ill since I last wrote.... I felt that life was still dear to me for the sake of those I love and of those who depend on me.... I saw the look of agony of my dearest husband; I thought of my heart's treasure--my darling boy; I thought of my other beloved children; I thought of those still earlier loved--my dear, dear Papa and Mama, brothers and sisters. But I was calm and ready to go, if such should be God's will.... Dr. Rigby has been not only the most skilful doctor, but the kindest friend.
In the spring of this year, 1847, the Queen offered Pembroke Lodge to the Prime Minister. He accepted with thankfulness, and throughout life both he and Lady John felt deep gratitude to the Queen for their beautiful home.
Pembroke Lodge is a long, low, irregular white house on the edge of the high ground which forms the western limit of Richmond Park. Added to and altered many times, it has no unity of plan, but it has kept a character of its own, an air of cheerful seclusion and homely eighteenth-century dignity. On the eastern side it is screened from the road by shrubs and trees; on the other side, standing as it does upon the top of the steep, wooded ridge above the Thames Valley, its windows overlook a thousand fields, through which the placid river winds, now flowing between flat open banks, now past groups of trees, or by gardens where here and there the corner of an old brick house shows among cedars. The grounds are long rather than wide, and comprise the slope towards the valley and the stretch along the summit of the ridge, where beech, oak, and chestnut shade with their green and solemn presences a garden of shorn turf and border flowers. Walking beneath them, you see between their stems part of some slow-sailing cloud or glimpses of the distant plain; as you descend, the gardens, village, and river near below. There is a peculiar charm in these steep woods, where the tops of some trees are level with the eye, while the branches of others are overhead. As the paths go down the slope they lose their garden-like trimness among bracken and brambles. An oak fence separates the grounds of Pembroke Lodge from the surrounding park.
It was indeed a perfect home for a statesman. When wearied or troubled with political cares and anxieties, the fresh breezes, the natural beauties, and the peace of Pembroke Lodge often helped to bring calm and repose to his mind. What better prospect can his windows command than the valley of the Thames from Richmond Hill, the view Argyll showed Jeanie Deans, which drew from her the admission "it was braw rich feeding for the cows," though she herself would as soon have been looking at "the craigs of Arthur's Seat and the sea coming ayont them, as at a' that muckle trees." Certainly no home was ever more appreciated and loved than Pembroke Lodge, both by Lord and Lady John Russell and their children. Long afterwards Lady John wrote:
In March, 1847, the Queen offered him Pembroke Lodge for life, a deed for which we have been yearly and daily more grateful. He and I were convinced that it added years to his life, and the happiness it has given us all cannot be measured. I think it was a year or two before the Queen offered us Pembroke Lodge that we came down for a few days for a change of air for some of the children to the Star and Garter. John and I, in one of our strolls in the park, sat under a big oak-tree while the children played round us. We were at that time often in perplexity about a country home for the summer and autumn, to which we could send them before we ourselves could leave London.... From our bench under the oak we looked into the grounds of Pembroke Lodge, and we said to one another that would be the place for us. When it became ours indeed we often thought of this, and the oak has ever since been called the "Wishing Tree."[31] ... From the time that Pembroke Lodge became ours we used only to keep the children in town from the meeting of Parliament till Easter, and settle the younger ones at Pembroke Lodge, and we ourselves slept there Wednesdays, Saturdays, and Sundays with as much regularity as other engagements allowed. This obliged us to give up most dinner engagements in London, and we regretted the consequent loss of society. At the same time he always felt the need of those evenings and mornings of rest and change and country air (besides those welcome and blessed Sundays) after Parliamentary and official toil, rather than of heated and crowded rooms and late hours; and he had the happy power of throwing off public cares and giving his whole heart to the enjoyment of his strolls in the garden, walks and rides in the park, and the little interests of the children.[32]
The short Whitsuntide holiday was spent in settling in at Pembroke Lodge.