Stephen Ward, scapegoat : they all loved him ... but when it went wrong they killed him

Global hit maker Andrew Lloyd Webber's new musical spotlights the world of Stephen Ward - the social cavalier who knew everyone who mattered - and his enigmatic role in the great political scandal of the 20th Century.

Yet few truly know the rakish charmer who was the catalytic character of the Profumo affair.

A talented osteopath and artist, Stephen Ward treated, sketched and seduced the great and often not-so-good of the post-war years.

He healed Churchill and Gandhi, Frank Sinatra and Elizabeth Taylor; he drew Princess Margaret, the Duke of Edinburgh, Harold MacMillan, duke duchesses, maharajahs, and, of course, Christine Keeler, whose striking likeness by him hangs in the National Portrait Gallery in London.

Everyone loved the superbly well-connected Stephen Ward. But when Christine Keeler slept with two of his friends - British War Minister John Profumo and Soviet Superspy Eugene Ivanov - and President Kennedy's White House went haywire, suspicion and scandal cast a shroud over Stephen Ward and his world.