Author Topic: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2  (Read 257503 times)

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Offline Grace

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #450 on: May 01, 2011, 04:54:39 PM »
"A rather brash American historian" comes on the internet to help some radio host "sneer at the British Royal Family in general and the recent wedding in particular" and you believe every word?  Are you really that naive?  Who is this historian and what are his credentials?  By the way, all of these stories are old, old, old.

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #451 on: May 02, 2011, 09:53:41 AM »
Webster Tarpley

Robert_Hall

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #452 on: May 02, 2011, 10:23:03 AM »
WT is a conspiracy nut. I would not take anything he says seriously.

Offline Kalafrana

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #453 on: May 03, 2011, 08:14:00 AM »
'Then he  dropped in.... " and Prince Eddy  died of  syphilis   !!!"
which, when I think of it, makes sense ... his  dissolute life style, the prevalence of
syphilis in Victorian society... a sexually transmitted disease.... yes it all fits together
and of course, The Royal  Family of the time would move  heaven and  hell  to cover up the shocking fact 
and prevent a scandal .'

I think this is unlikely. Albert Victor was 28 (just) when he died, and untreated syphilis typically takes 20 years plus to kill. Typically, the victim has a minor illness at the time he contracts it, then recovers for a number of years while the disease is in its dormant phase. Then it flares up again, producing florid mental symptoms, various physical manifestations and finally what used to be called General Paralysis of the Insane (GPI). Interestingly, a friend of mine, now dead, who was a retired naval Commander told me that in 1940 his unit was temporarily accommodated in a mental hospital. Some of the patients were still there, and a fair number had syphilis with grandiose delusions that they were Jesus Christ, Napoleon etc. Things got a bit awkward when two Napoleons met up!

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Offline Tdora1

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #454 on: May 03, 2011, 04:32:03 PM »
I think this is unlikely. Albert Victor was 28 (just) when he died, and untreated syphilis typically takes 20 years plus to kill. Typically, the victim has a minor illness at the time he contracts it, then recovers for a number of years while the disease is in its dormant phase. Then it flares up again, producing florid mental symptoms, various physical manifestations and finally what used to be called General Paralysis of the Insane (GPI).


 Treponema Pallidum has had quite an eventful history. One thing that is certain is that the disease it produces has become less virulent over time. When first described in Europe at the end of the 15th century, its victims were subject to a horrifying acute disease that was invariably fatal within a matter of months. Although it had settled into its well-known "3 stages" by the end of the 19th century, it was still then entirely possible that it could prove fatal within a few years: it is not correct to assume that all syphilis at the end of the 19th century resembled the current descriptions. Available medical resources demonstrate how the bacteria and resultant course of illness has shifted in response to antibiotic treatment (and see also its 1970s re-emergence and its effect as a concurrent infection in those who are also HIV+). Remember too that syphilis was known as the Great Imitator, as symptoms affecting the heart and circulation, the bones and brain were - in the days before cat scans and blood workups and penicillin and anti-psychotics - not easy to ascribe or diagnose.

This is not to say that Eddy died of - or even had - syphilis although given the risk of congenital infection, it would have made good sense for a hereditary monarchy to get rid of him before he produced a saddle nosed, snaggle-toothed, tabes-limping heir! But given its then prevalence and his amorous habits, it would not be a shock if he indeed did contract it. But whatever his habits and health, it must be stressed that the usual course of the disease as seen and described now doesn't automatically apply to the 1890s.

Anyone interested in this subject (and who ain't?) night find it worth looking over the theory that Fletcher Christian's mutiny madness was in large part because of his neuro-syphilis (the Tahiti strain back then was infamously virulent and it pretty much could go from chancre to brain-fester in months).

Or that Kaiser Frederick III's laryngeal cancer wasn't cancer after all (which would explain both McKenzie's not diagnosing cancer and Virchow not detecting abnormal cells) and thus McKenzie had to do the impossible - defend himself whilst not revealing the saintly Emperor's naughty secret. Syphilis was well-known to cause laryngeal ulceration and during Frederick's infamous dalliance with a courtesan in Egypt in the 1860's it was rumoured that he did contract it.

Or that Queen Alexandra's famous limp had nothing to with the arthritic after-effects of rheumatic fever but was syphiliptic tabes dorsalis affecting her heel (a very common sequelae then). What ever it was, Alexandra's long illness of 1866/7 resulted in a sickly baby (Louise) who grew into a feeble woman - as were the two daughters born afterwards. (Although I think that if porphyria was symptomatic anywhere in the RF in the late Victorian era then it was with Maud and Victoria Wales as both were plagued by illness and Maud with mobility problems - ones that could also have been caused by the Great Imitator! ) Anyway, RF affects the heart and in serious cases (which QA's would have been, given that she was bedridden for months) rendered the afflicted the life of a semi-invalid ever after - just that there didn't seem to be any of the RF cardiac after-effects.

And given the rollcall of afflcied continental monarchs and royals, it would be strange indeed if the not-as-uxorious-as-they'd-have-us-oiks-believe British RF always escaped entirely :)
Acts of injustice done
Between the setting and the rising sun
In history lie like bones, each one.

W.H. Auden The Ascent of F6

Offline Grace

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #455 on: May 03, 2011, 04:34:09 PM »
I wish people who continually bring up rumours about long dead royals on various threads would just do a bit of reading and research themselves.  Regarding the syphilis story, it's not "unlikely" Albert Victor died from it, it's impossible.  The man carried out public duties, became engaged and was seen publicly right up to his death.  There are very detailed surviving accounts of his final illness by his relatives and at least one doctor so clearly, even some "historians" are not doing their homework.  Then again, I suppose anyone can call themselves a historian.

This and the Jack the Ripper story keep getting trotted out year after year.  I can never quite understand why.

Offline Tdora1

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #456 on: May 03, 2011, 05:03:07 PM »
Grace - it is not impossible that Eddy died from syphilis. Its then unpredictable course means it could remain dormant in infected organs for many years or - much less likely but still possibly - do the opposite: with the bacterium reaching the meninges or myocardium causing acute infection and death either directly or along with the many possible opportunistic infections that would not necessarily have been serious in an entirely healthy individual.

Anyway, FWIW based upon the same contemporary medical situation means I am sure he died from pneumonia caused by influenza (of the early 1890s pandemic). A young man, living and moving in crowded surroundings (barracks for eg) and encountering many people and therefore sources of infection (socialising in the weeks following the engagement) - he was alas a good candidate to get infected; he was not in the most robust of health; was not given the best of contemporary medical or nursing care (Laking was a smooth-talking "spa" type, basically) and nor in the best surroundings: his room was little bigger than a cupboard, the weather was clammily sub-zero requiring constant open fires in his room for warmth and hence less fresh air and IIRC the Duke of Teck eventually discovered a gas leak had been going on all this time - none of which helps in acute respiratory illness at all.

Poor Eddy.
Acts of injustice done
Between the setting and the rising sun
In history lie like bones, each one.

W.H. Auden The Ascent of F6

Offline Grace

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #457 on: May 04, 2011, 06:57:45 AM »
From what I have read, it would be very unusual indeed to die from a syphilis-related cause without the disease manifesting itself in other ways that would be difficult if not impossible to hide.  Eddy was treated for gonorrhoea - there is a letter in his handwriting asking his doctor for some more capsules for “this tiresome glete” so I’m well aware he was no saint!  There is just no evidence other than rumour for the syphilis story.

I do refute, though, the long-held view that he was physically feeble, because there doesn’t seem the evidence to back this up.  His nurse said he was a healthy infant from birth and in childhood and young adulthood there were no more illnesses documented for him than for his supposedly more robust younger brother George.  A relation said he looked “thin and yellow” on his return from India in 1889, probably not all that surprising, given the heat of India and the fact that the tour went for a full five months at a demanding schedule.  

Also, it seems unlikely to me that he would have been sent on a world trip (Bacchante), put into the army with the instruction that he be treated like everyone else, plus the India trip if he was somehow going to show himself and the royal family up with some sort of constitutional weakness.

Offline CountessKate

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #458 on: May 04, 2011, 09:31:58 AM »
Grace - it is not impossible that Eddy died from syphilis. Its then unpredictable course means it could remain dormant in infected organs for many years or - much less likely but still possibly - do the opposite: with the bacterium reaching the meninges or myocardium causing acute infection and death either directly or along with the many possible opportunistic infections that would not necessarily have been serious in an entirely healthy individual.

Anyway, FWIW based upon the same contemporary medical situation means I am sure he died from pneumonia caused by influenza (of the early 1890s pandemic). A young man, living and moving in crowded surroundings (barracks for eg) and encountering many people and therefore sources of infection (socialising in the weeks following the engagement) - he was alas a good candidate to get infected; he was not in the most robust of health; was not given the best of contemporary medical or nursing care (Laking was a smooth-talking "spa" type, basically) and nor in the best surroundings: his room was little bigger than a cupboard, the weather was clammily sub-zero requiring constant open fires in his room for warmth and hence less fresh air and IIRC the Duke of Teck eventually discovered a gas leak had been going on all this time - none of which helps in acute respiratory illness at all.

Poor Eddy.


According to James Pope-Hennessy's biography of Queen Mary, there appeared to be a clear chain of viral infection of influenza in the household of the Prince of Wales from Princess Victoria to Sir Francis Knollys, the Prince's secretary, to Captain Holford, Eddy's equerry and thence, naturally enough, to Eddy himself.   Other members of the party at Sandringham including Alexandra and Princess Mary were affected by bad colds which might have been milder versions of the same virus.  He didn't need to socialise with anyone but his own family and immediate household staff and fiancee to aquire the infection which killed him.

Offline grandduchessella

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #459 on: May 05, 2011, 12:41:56 PM »
There was an influenza epidemic when Eddy died. One famous Cardinal died at the same time.
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Offline CountessKate

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #460 on: May 06, 2011, 04:31:53 AM »
There was an influenza epidemic when Eddy died. One famous Cardinal died at the same time.

However, as Cardinal Manning was 84 at the time, it cannot have been quite the same shock as occasioned by Eddy's death.

Offline Grace

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #461 on: May 06, 2011, 05:01:29 AM »
I think what was particularly shocking about the influenza epidemics of 1891/92 and 1918/19 in particular was that literally thousands of influenza victims were young, otherwise healthy people and they DIED from its effects.  You didn't always need to be old/feeble at all.  
« Last Edit: May 06, 2011, 05:04:44 AM by Grace »

Offline CountessKate

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #462 on: May 06, 2011, 05:55:49 AM »
I think what was particularly shocking about the influenza epidemics of 1891/92 and 1918/19 in particular was that literally thousands of influenza victims were young, otherwise healthy people and they DIED from its effects.  You didn't always need to be old/feeble at all. 

I think nevertheless it's hard for people to accept that a virus like influenza can kill the young and healthy - hence the scepticism seen today when governments devote significant sums to vaccines and other precautionary measures against modern pandemics, although the threats can be very real.  And similarly I think people find it difficult to believe that Eddy could actually have died of a silly little thing like the 'flu - much easier to find all sorts of exciting and scandalous diseases, albeit unsupported by any facts, as the cause of his untimely death.

Offline Kalafrana

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #463 on: May 06, 2011, 06:31:53 AM »
'I think nevertheless it's hard for people to accept that a virus like influenza can kill the young and healthy - hence the scepticism seen today when governments devote significant sums to vaccines and other precautionary measures against modern pandemics, although the threats can be very real.  And similarly I think people find it difficult to believe that Eddy could actually have died of a silly little thing like the 'flu - much easier to find all sorts of exciting and scandalous diseases, albeit unsupported by any facts, as the cause of his untimely death.'

I agree. I think it is in part because the term 'flu' is so debased nowadays. None of my students get colds these days - it's always flu! I tell them that the difference is that with a cold you are coughing, sneezing and spluttering, but can function. With flu the only place to be is bed. Further, although antibiotics do nothing against viruses, flu tended to be taken more seriously in pre-antibiotic days because of the potential complications.

Ann

Offline grandduchessella

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Re: Prince Albert Victor 'Eddy' Part 2
« Reply #464 on: May 06, 2011, 02:40:10 PM »
I think what was particularly shocking about the influenza epidemics of 1891/92 and 1918/19 in particular was that literally thousands of influenza victims were young, otherwise healthy people and they DIED from its effects.  You didn't always need to be old/feeble at all.  

That was my point--an influenza epidemic was raging so it's no surprised that Eddy fell victim. He was also supposedly weakened from a violent head cold caught when he attended Prince Victor Hohenlohe's funeral days prior in the freezing rain and wind--with no hat.
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