Queen Victoria & Prince Albert--Photos and Information

[katmaxoz]

The third photo posted by Katmaxoz...just extraordinarily candid!  I've never seen QV like this...I just love it...you can almost imagine being in the very room with her. 

I agree, I think it is a very interesting image of Victoria. However, I also like the painting by Tuxen because I'm pretty sure it's a sketch from life and gives a good impression of the colours her formal portraits should show. Katenka_Fyodorovna  image is also unusual. From what I understand QV was quite inclined to tears and wasn't above using them to get what she wanted, but you don't normally see her depicted crying.

[historyfan]

If you zoom in on that image of her crying, there's something written under her skirt.  I think it says "The Queen and the Sightless Captain"?  Anyone know who that might refer to, and what time period?  Was there a war on, or something else of significance?

Also, is that Princess Beatrice standing on the far right?

[katmaxoz]

If you zoom in on that image of her crying, there's something written under her skirt.  I think it says "The Queen and the Sightless Captain"?  Anyone know who that might refer to, and what time period?  Was there a war on, or something else of significance?

Also, is that Princess Beatrice standing on the far right?

Yes, I think that is Beatrice. It looks like it is a Boer war cabinet card.

http://www.national-army-museum.ac.uk/education/yourVisit/files/boerImpact.pdf

gives the following information on this image:

“The Queen and the Sightless Captain - A Touching Episode/ South African
Victoria Cross Heroes, 1901” Chromolithograph, artist unknown

Capt Ernest Towse being presented to Queen Victoria. Her interest in the war and soldiers’
welfare reinforced support of the war as an act of patriotism. Captain Ernest Towse of the
Gordon Highlanders was featured in the London Gazette on 6th July, 1900. The first act of
bravery Towse was noted for concerned trying to carry mortally wounded Colonel Dowman
away from fighting at Magersfontein on 11th December 1899. The second act resulted in
Towse losing his sight while involved in a skirmish on mount Thaba, 30th April 1900.

[Carolath Habsburg]

I was looking for some info about Patsy Cornwallis west (Mother of Daisy von pless and Mistress of Edward VII) and stumbled with this info that her was daughter of a mistress of Prince Albert.


for what i know he didnt have any mistress. or he did (Prior or during his marriage with Victoria )? Im confused

Source

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/3598927/A-sexually-lawless-royal-mistress-and-her-shell-shocked-sergeant.html

[historyfan]

I was looking for some info about Patsy Cornwallis west (Mother of Daisy von pless and Mistress of Edward VII) and stumbled with this info that her was daughter of a mistress of Prince Albert.


for what i know he didnt have any mistress. or he did (Prior or during his marriage with Victoria )? Im confused

Source

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/3598927/A-sexually-lawless-royal-mistress-and-her-shell-shocked-sergeant.html

I'm confused also.  Where would anyone have gotten that kind of information?  I know I haven't read everything out there, but I've certainly not read anything like this.

[CountessKate]

Tim Coates in the book referred to seems to have gone into a sort of fantasy about 'Patsy's' mother on the basis of an anecdote in the book 'Daisy Princess of Pless by herself'.  Daisy wrote of a visit in 1909 paid by Edward VII to her grandmother, Lady Olivia Fitzpatrick (a woman he had never previously met),  where "in a few minutes they were both flirting desperately.  Granny could never resist flirting and neither could the King." (To put this in perspective, 'Granny' was 85 at the time).  "The King said: 'Is it true that my Mother sent you away from Court for trying to flirt with my father?' 'I can't quite remember Sir; most likely I wanted to flirt with your father: he was a very good-looking man - besides, all the Coburgs inherited a roving eye.  How humiliating it would be for a man to think that no woman ever wanted to flirt with him.' 'I doubt, Lady Olivia, if that is a form of humiliation on which either you or I could pose as an authority.' "

There is no form of evidence presented by Mr Coates of any kind whatsoever to support the notion that the entirely respectable (despite the flirting) Lady Olivia Taylour, daughter of the 2nd Marquess of Headfort and wife of a clergyman was ever the mistress of Prince Albert with whom the anecdote in any case only ever accused her of flirting, certainly not of being Prince Albert's mistress.  Nor indeed did Lady Olivia actually confirm the suggestion made by Edward VII - and he himself did not say for a second that his father flirted with her.  However, Mr Coates seems to have taken a rather sweet story of King Edward VII charming an elderly lady (albeit in a rather laborious way to our eyes today) and come to an extraordinary conclusion.   It is rather horrifying how this suggestion has whipped around the internet so that it has on a number of occasions been presented as fact. 

[Astraea]

The idea that Albert ever had ANY mistress is most assuredly utter fiction. I also highly doubt that he even ever would have seriously "flirted" with any woman. It would have been just completely uncharacteristic of him. He was the polar-opposite of his brother and father, and was disgusted by even the thought of an affair on the part of anyone. This "immorality" on the part of the former Hanoverian court was also what he desperately tried to change when he married Victoria. He wanted to create a moral court above love affairs. That was why at his wedding he demanded that no one of "questionable" character be invited -- a demand Victoria could of course not meet. This obsession with morality even spilled over into politics as well, not just at court, for this was why Albert disliked Viscount Palmerston (later PM) so much -- for again Albert had heard stories of his affairs, in particular one episode where Palmerston supposedly "raped" a woman. This extreme aversion to "immorality" as Albert saw it was precisely why, shortly before his death in 1861, he was so heartbroken and reacted so strongly when he discovered that his son, Bertie, had had an affair with an actress named Nellie Clifden. Indeed, Albert being comfortable in the company of women other than close family members was worthy of comment. Victoria herself was taken aback when in the 1850s Emperor Napoleon III and Empress Eugenie of France visited England, and Albert seemed to really like Eugenie.

[CountessKate]

The idea that Albert ever had ANY mistress is most assuredly utter fiction. I also highly doubt that he even ever would have seriously "flirted" with any woman. It would have been just completely uncharacteristic of him. He was the polar-opposite of his brother and father, and was disgusted by even the thought of an affair on the part of anyone. This "immorality" on the part of the former Hanoverian court was also what he desperately tried to change when he married Victoria. He wanted to create a moral court above love affairs. That was why at his wedding he demanded that no one of "questionable" character be invited -- a demand Victoria could of course not meet. This obsession with morality even spilled over into politics as well, not just at court, for this was why Albert disliked Viscount Palmerston (later PM) so much -- for again Albert had heard stories of his affairs, in particular one episode where Palmerston supposedly "raped" a woman. This extreme aversion to "immorality" as Albert saw it was precisely why, shortly before his death in 1861, he was so heartbroken and reacted so strongly when he discovered that his son, Bertie, had had an affair with an actress named Nellie Clifden. Indeed, Albert being comfortable in the company of women other than close family members was worthy of comment. Victoria herself was taken aback when in the 1850s Emperor Napoleon III and Empress Eugenie of France visited England, and Albert seemed to really like Eugenie.

While I fully agree that the idea of Albert having any mistress or indeed flirted with a woman was completely fictitious, I would just observe that Albert's moral values were not quite as absolute as all that.  His dislike of Palmerston, for example, was based more on Palmerston's lack of reference to the Queen and Prince in politics rather than the Lady Dacre incident (while staying at Windsor, Palmerston entered Lady Dacre's bedroom, locked the door, turned and realising his mistake, muttered an apology and left.  Since Lady Cowper (his longtime mistress whom he subsequently married) was also staying at Windsor at the time, the obvious inference is that Palmerston had mistaken Lady Dacre's room for Lady Cowper's.  Lady Dacre was shocked and horrified but not in the least raped, or even ‘seduced’ which is the other version.  The Queen and Prince used the incident to try to oust Palmerston, unsuccessfully).  In this respect, Albert was not above expressing a rather hypocritical moral outrage for a political end – not least because his brother Ernest’s morals were certainly no better than Palmerston’s, of which Albert was perfectly well aware.  He scolded his brother, and attempted reforms, but had to accept that Ernest was incorrigible, and it caused no breach between them.  His reaction to the Nellie Clifden affair was indeed considered rather over the top and his biographers have speculated whether the horror came from the onset of his illness coupled with recent bereavements which had depressed his spirits and lead to an unbalanced view of the matter which he might not have taken had he been in a more robust state of mind and health.  However, it would be fair to say that Albert would never have regarded sexual misconduct lightly or considered it appropriate to overlook it in his son – just that his more absolute attitudes aged 20 were not necessarily those of 10 or 20 years later.

[Carolath Habsburg]

Thanks for all the info!!!

For me it sounded ridiculous too. I wonder where the telegraph got that info and is this a reliable source in general?

[CountessKate]

Thanks for all the info!!!

For me it sounded ridiculous too. I wonder where the telegraph got that info and is this a reliable source in general?

As far as I can see, the Telegraph was simply reviewing the book and reproducing the sensational statements made by the author.  Having read the book, I recall no evidence presented for his assertion and indeed, had I not read Daisy Pless's various volumes of diaries and memoires many years ago I would not have recalled the incident which is the only place I can ever recall Prince Albert's name being coupled with that of Patsy Cornwallis-West's mother - and not in any improper way at all.  Hence my supposition that Tim Coates put 2 and 2 together and made .38789, or indeed whatever number you care to mention except 4.  But LadyAstraea's interesting observation about Lord Palmerston/Lady Dacre shows the pervasiveness of myth - as any reputable biography of Palmerston will show, Lady Dacre was neither raped nor seduced, but once the story is out there it gets repeated until it has the weight of fact.  The Telegraph reviewer naturally didn't know or care about the likelihood of the story which in any case was presented as almost incidental to the rather sad and sordid little incident Tim Coates was depicting, but it makes a tasty note in the dish the author was serving up.  'Patsy' was a very short-term mistress of Edward VII's and not in the same class as either Daisy Warwick or Alice Keppel, and in 1914 she was very much a has-been.  But a royal mistress and the daughter of another, is presumably a hook for the reading public which might otherwise take little interest in the goings-on of a no longer youthful socialite who made an indiscreet pass at a young soldier who was too unsophisticated to either take up her offer or say no without giving offense.  As the reviewer indicated, a proper biography of Patsy would have actually been more interesting. 

[GrandDuchessIzabella]

I have read that five of V+A's nine children were present when he died. I am assuming that Alice and Bertie were two, but who were the others? Sorry to be a pest, but I am writing about Princess Beatrice and need some details.
Thanks, GDI

[historyfan]

I'm pretty sure the five remaining were Bertie, Alice, Arthur, Helena, and possibly Alfred (although I'm not sure about him).

Beatrice was too young to be at a deathbed.  I think Leopold was considered so too, although he may have been recovering from an attack of hemophilia at the time also.  Vicky couldn't come from Prussia - she may have been expecting at the time.  If Alfred was away, it was probably Louise who was also present.

I'm pretty sure the book "We Two" has loads of information on the topic, as well as Christopher Hibbert's books.

[Robert_Hall]

Marlene is the expert on QV,  try asking her or cher her books.

[CountessKate]

Elizabeth Longford wrote that the children, "except for the baby" came in ("one by one" according to Lady Augusta Bruce) and kissed his hand some hours prior to his death but at the end, the Queen, who had stepped out of the room for a few minutes, was called back by Princess Alice and she knelt at the other side of the bed from the Queen, with the Prince of Wales and Princess Helena at the foot of the bed.  The Queen in her own account mentioned Alice, "Bertie and Lenchen", and Lady Augusta also wrote that these three were present.  Apart from the four of the immediate family, in the room were Ernest and Marie Leiningen, Albert's valet Lohlein, his private secretary Sir Charles Phipps, Dean Wellesley, General Bruce and Lady Augusta Bruce, Miss Hildyard, and "the doctors" - as Drs Watson, Brown, Sir James Clark, Sir William Jenner and Sir Henry Holland were consulted in the case they may all have been in the room as it would have been difficult to omit any of them - so possibly the younger children were omitted as they had already said their farewells and were deemed to young to stay up late for this distressing event (he died at a quarter to eleven at night).  Indeed, Lady Augusta wrote that Princess Helena "could not bear it" and the doctors "did not like her to be near her father" presumably because she showed her distress too greatly, another reason why the presence of the younger children might have not seemed appropriate  in what was an already very crowded room.  
Prince Alfred was at sea and did not return until March, according to Lady Augusta's account.  

[AnnieB]

Leopold had been sent to the South of France to convalesce during the winter, so was not present
Vicky and Alfred were absent for the reasons given above
I think Beatrice had been put to bed earlier.   Albert dies late in the evening of Dec 14th. After Albert died, Q V went to the sleeping child and took her into her own bed for comfort

AnnieB