John Wilmot, 2nd Earl of Rochester

1647-1680. Courtier, satirist, wit and dramatist. Known for his rather outspoken poems (the play Sodom is often attributed to him, but his authorship is not certain) and his wild life. This started at an early age. When he was 18, Rochester abducted the rich heiress Elizabeth Mallet. This is what Samuel Pepys wrote in his diary:

"my Lord of Rochester’s running away on Friday night last with Mrs. Mallet, the great beauty and fortune of the [West], [later on Pepys says that she is worth ₤ 2500 per year; around 2,2 Million Euros] who had supped at Whitehall with Mrs. Stewart and was going home to her lodgings with her grandfather, my Lord Haly, by coach, and was at Charing cross seized on by both horse- and foot-men and forcibly taken from him, and put into a coach with six horses and two women provided to receive her, and carried away. Upon immediate pursuit, my Lord Rochester… was taken at Uxbridge; but the lady is not yet heard of, and the King mighty angry and the Lord sent to the Tower" (May 28, 1665).

After 18 months, Elizabeth married John, despite the protests of her family. And the couple had four children. This did not keep Rochester from having countless mistresses, among them the famous actress Elizabeth Barry.

Supposedly the model for Dorimant, the protagonist of Etherege's The Man of Mode (1676) and for the rake Wilmore in Aphra Behn's The Rover (1677). Flirting with atheism during his wild years, he repented and went back to the fold of the true church shortly before his death.