make no difference in the consumption by the rich; but the poorer classes will be constantly irritated by this increased expense. . . it seems certain that the tax will seriously affect the manufacture and sale of matches, which is said to be the sole means of support of a vast number of the very poorest people and little children.18
The tax was withdrawn, in response to the Queen’s remonstrances as much as to the match-girls opposition. At the time, no one appeared concerned about the health of the workers whose jaw bones abscessed, glowed a greenish-white colour in the dark and later rotted away, all caused from working with phosphorous. Many years later, in 1888, the match-girls rebelled against their poor working conditions by refusing to work.
In 1868 the National Union for Women’s Suffrage was formed to campaign for votes for women. For once, Queen Victoria and her prime minister found themselves on the same side of the argument. In 1870 Victoria wrote to Albert’s biographer, Sir Theodore Martin, that she was ‘most anxious to enlist everyone who can speak or write to join in checking this mad, wicked folly of “Woman’s Rights”, with all its attendant horrors, on which her poor feeble sex is bent, forgetting every sense of womanly feeling and propriety. Lady *** ought to get a good whipping.'19 It is a subject, the Queen insisted, that made her so furious that she could not contain herself. God, she insisted, had created men and women different and each should remain in their own position. She wrote to Gladstone to call attention ‘to the mad and utterly demoralising movement of the present day to place women in the same position as to professions – as men. . . . Woman would become the most hateful, heartless, and disgusting of human beings were she allowed to unsex herself.’20 Gladstone, who believed that women’s place was within the home not the House of Commons, similarly disliked the idea of women’s suffrage and let it be known that he, and any governments he formed, would resist any amendment to enfranchise women. He later defended his view saying that ‘the fear I have is, we should invite her unwittingly to trespass upon the delicacy, the purity, the refinement, the elevation of her own nature’.21 The fact that the Queen – herself a member of the delicate sex – was head of the most powerful country in the world did not appear to strike either of them as ironic.
The main domestic conflict between Gladstone and Victoria concerned army reform. Queen Victoria was constitutionally head of the armed services and was keen to be involved in any changes affecting them. In 1868 she was caught up in a conflict between her cousin the Duke of Cambridge, commander-in-chief of the army, and Edward Cardwell, secretary of state for war. As cousin as well as commander in chief, the Duke of Cambridge kept the Queen informed fully and frequently on all army matters, ‘whether the subject was the design of the gold lace worn by field marshals and generals or the preservation of flogging as a form of army discipline’.22 However, the government believed that the army was inefficient, unprofessional and badly led by old and often imbecilic officers who had purchased their commissions rather than received them on merit. The Crimean War had all too clearly revealed the failures of the British army and the ineffectiveness of the officers who led it.
In 1870 Cardwell began to re-organise the War Office and placed the commander-in-chief of the army under War Office control. In effect, the government wanted the commander-in-chief to lose his independence and become subordinate to the war secretary. Victoria, who feared that any diminution in the authority of the commander-in-chief would be highly injurious to the Crown, met with Cardwell several times and tried to prevent some of the reforms from taking place. For example, the Queen objected to the suggestion that the commander-in-chief held office for only five years, not for life.23 She met with Lord Grey, the elder son of the former prime minister and leading Liberal politician, and ‘talked to him very strongly on the subject, begging him to tell Mr Gladstone and Mr Cardwell, that unless George was entirely satisfied and his position remained unimpaired, I could not consent to the proposals’.24 In the end, her private secretary had to remind his sovereign that she was a constitutional monarch who needed to support the government of the day. Queen Victoria had chosen to forget that she was only titular head of the army and could do little to alter reforms put forward by parliament.
The Irish question
Throughout Ireland people continued to live in wretched poverty exacerbated by the high rents demanded by English landlords and by the taxes which they were required to pay to the Anglican Church. Not surprisingly, dissent was widespread yet no one could agree on what action to be taken, or how to heal the divisions which had unsettled the island for centuries. Certainly, Queen Victoria and Gladstone disagreed over what to do about it all. When he became prime minister, Gladstone said ‘My mission is to pacify Ireland.’ He thought that there were three main areas to reform – the Church, land and education – before peace would come to Ireland. Queen Victoria opposed Gladstone’s first proposal, the Disestablishment of the Church of Ireland.25 Her bishops had advised her that ‘what the Irish peasantry wanted, was the settlement of their land and not this measure’.26 Moreover, the Queen’s ‘principal concern was to safeguard the rights of the crown’.27 As head of the Anglican Church, she wanted to keep her church firmly united to the state.
On 31 May 1869 the Disestablishment Bill passed its third reading with a comfortable majority in the House of Commons. However, the Bill was opposed by the Conservative-dominated House of Lords: in the nineteenth century, the Lords had the right to veto any Bill put forward by the Commons. Victoria thought ‘the danger of a collision with the House of Commons is very serious especially at a moment when many of the highest Peers are ruined by gambling and betting and their prestige stands very low. – Wrote to Lord Derby very earnestly, asking him to desist from this mad course.’28 The Queen feared the potential conflict between the two Houses more than she did Disestablishment, particularly when the Liberals threatened to take away some of the powers of the Lords if they blocked legislation put forward by the House of Commons. Fortunately for the House of Lords, this did not happen. The Queen acted as mediator in the dispute, and after a lot of behind-the-scenes negotiations, the Bill was eventually passed. In 1869 the Irish Church was disestablished, its bishops lost their seats in the House of Lords and the Church lost its state funding. ‘How thankful I feel!’ commented the Queen. ‘I warned strongly against any imprudence for the future, or doing anything respecting land, in Ireland, or affairs in general, which might lead to a belief that more things were to be disestablished.’29 For the moment, the House of Lords was safe, partly because of the Queen’s negotiating skills.
In an attempt to pacify the Irish still further, Gladstone tried to link the royal family more positively to Ireland. He recommended that the Queen buy a royal residence in Ireland and to visit it occasionally instead of going to Balmoral. Queen Victoria refused on the grounds of health. Then Gladstone tried to establish a viceroy for Ireland and appoint the Prince of Wales to it. He advised the Queen that a princely viceroy would improve relations between Monarchy and Nation, thinking perhaps that it might quell unrest if the royal family were seen there. Queen Victoria refused his requests because she wanted her son to remain in England. Consequently, an opportunity to meld Ireland more tightly to the rest of the UK through a visible royal presence was scuppered. Ireland felt ignored and unwanted and Gladstone was forced to try other means to pacify the country. It has even been argued that as a result of her neglect of Ireland, Queen Victoria lost the country for Britain.30
In 1870 Gladstone put forward his Irish Land Act to give Irish tenants greater rights. This Act had three main areas: first, tenants could not be evicted if they paid their rent; second, tenants could be re-imbursed for any improvements they had made; and third, tenants would be helped to buy the land they rented. The Queen thought Gladstone had brought in the Irish Land Act very successfully and had made a ‘fine speech’ in its support.31 Unfortunately for Anglo-Irish relationships, the Land Act was bound to fail: landlords found it easy to circumvent the Act by p
utting up rents so high that tenants could not afford them.
In March 1873 Gladstone tried to re-organise higher education in Ireland. His Irish University Bill aimed to annex a number of colleges to Dublin University and transform it into a secular national university. The Bill was defeated by three votes because of a religious controversy over the syllabus. Gladstone graciously submitted his resignation but Victoria, persuaded by Disraeli to exercise her constitutional prerogative, refused to accept it. Gladstone, whose government could legitimately run on for another two years, agreed to continue in office.
Foreign affairs: the Franco-Prussian War, July 1870–May 1871
Meanwhile, on 19 July 1870 war broke out between France and Prussia, sparked off by French fears of further Prussian expansionism. During the Franco-Prussian conflict, Victoria reminded her government of the need for ‘for great prudence and for not departing from our neutral position’.32 However, unofficially, the Queen’s sympathies remained with Prussia. France, who had expected to win the war, was swiftly beaten by the better equipped and disciplined German army with its up-to-date, efficient technology. Privately, Victoria was jubilant: while she ‘was dressing for dinner came the astounding overwhelming news, of a great battle fought and victory gained today. . . Fritz [son-in-law] commanding in person. . . . What wonderful news! I am so thankful he is safe! . . . Everyone was full of and discussing the news, being greatly struck at the unexpected failure and defeat of the French.’33 Victoria took pleasure in the French loss, commenting ‘What a tremendous defeat! 4,000 French prisoners, 30 guns, 6 of the supposed invincible and murderous Mitrailleuses and 2 Eagles taken! A great panic at Paris.’34 Fritz thanked his mother-in-law for ‘the warm good wishes you have always shown for Germany, and for our Army’.35 His father, now the German emperor, wrote saying ‘Dear Sister, The lively sympathy with the unexpected and glorious successes of the war, which you have several times expressed through Fritz, has been a source of much gratification to me.’36
The drama continued throughout the autumn until the spring of 1871. On 2 September 1870, Napoleon III surrendered to Otto von Bismarck, the German chancellor. In the Queen’s opinion, ‘the cause of the complete failure and total defeat of the French army was the great lack of discipline. . . the ruin and disorganisation of France were so complete’.37 The limitations of the French army were evident but it was the superior strength of the well-trained Prussian army that was the decisive factor. Nonetheless, the capture of Napoleon did not stop the war. The next day – 3 September – angry crowds flooded the Parisian streets, a Third Republic was declared and the French continued to resist the Prussians. The Queen heard news ‘that the mob at Paris had rushed into the Senate and proclaimed a Republic!! This was received with acclamation, and the proclamation was made from the Hotel de Ville. Not one voice was raised in favour of the unfortunate Emperor! How ungrateful!’38 In January 1871, after a long siege during which the starving citizens were forced to eat the local zoo’s animals and later even rats, an armistice was signed with the Germans. The German Emperor ignored Queen Victoria’s appeal ‘for the sake of our old friendship, to allow me to express the hope he would make the terms of peace such as could be accepted by his vanquished enemies’.39
On 18 January 1871 at the Palace of Versailles, leaders of the German states proclaimed their union: along with the recently conquered Schleswig-Holstein and Alsace-Lorraine, they now formed part of the German Reich under the Prussian king, Wilhelm I. Bismarck’s dream of a united Germany was realised, a dream which had serious repercussions for the balance of power in Europe. Gladstone, who feared a strong Germany, begged Bismarck not to annex Alsace-Lorraine; his pleas were ignored. In a long memorandum to her government, the Queen reassured them that ‘a powerful Germany can never be dangerous to England, but the very reverse’.40 In this instance, Queen Victoria was proved wrong. The German invasion of France and the imposed treaty not only poisoned Franco-German relationships but some attribute French determination to regain its lost territory as a cause of the First World War. In 1919, France regained Alsace-Lorraine when Germany was forced to sign its own humiliating treaty in the same Palace: the Treaty of Versailles.
War is often the midwife of revolution. In the wake of Napoleon III’s defeat, a left-wing revolt broke out in Paris. It was sparked off by the French provisional government’s decision to disarm the National Guard and spurred on by a fear that the Orleans dynasty might be re-instated. A few days later, on 26 March 1871, the revolutionaries won the municipal elections and formed the ‘Commune’. The Paris Commune was an idealistic venture: its leaders wanted a secular state, increased democracy, the right of employees to take over businesses – and the abolition of night work in the Paris bakeries. Feminist leaders advocated gender equality, the right of divorce for women and the elimination of prostitution. When the news of the Paris uprising reached Victoria, she thought it ‘very bad news from Paris. . . . The Red Republicans had refused to give up the guns. . . Great alarm.’41 In her view, the Paris Communards ‘go on quite as in the days of the old Revolution in the last century, though they have not yet proceeded to commit all the same horrors. They have however thrown Priests into prison etc. They have burnt the guillotine and shoot people instead.’42 Each day, Victoria lamented the ‘very bad news from Paris. The Arch Bishop and many priests put in prison and the Churches shamefully sacked! Atheism openly avowed!’43 In her view nothing could ‘exceed its state of Moral and physical degradation’44 of the Paris Commune. She believed that the women were the ‘most ferocious’,45 and dreaded the accounts from Paris ‘of the bloodshed and cruelty, endless people being shot and I fear many innocent ones. The savageness of the prisoners, especially that of the women is too dreadful, and fills one with horror.’46 At the end of May 1871 the Paris Commune was brutally crushed by the French army.
The deposed emperor, Napoleon III and his wife, escaped to Britain where, like many ousted foreign rulers, they were welcomed by Victoria: the Queen may have supported Germany in the war against France but she loathed emperors being toppled even more. When Queen Victoria saw the Empress, she contrasted it to her last visit here where it ‘was all state and pomp, wild excitement and enthusiasm, and now?? How strange that I should have seen these 2 Revolutions in 48, and in 70!’47 Queen Victoria liked Napoleon, going to the door to meet him and embracing him ‘comme de rigeur’. It was a moving moment for Victoria who remembered
the last time he came here in 55, in perfect triumph, dearest Albert bringing him from Dover, the whole country mad to receive him, – and now! He seemed much depressed and had tears in his eyes. . . He is grown very stout and grey and his moustaches are no longer curled or waxed as formerly, but otherwise there was the same pleasing, gentle and gracious manner.48
In a poignant twist of fate, the French royal family who had been given asylum in England for 23 years departed for France. Louis d’Orleans, the son of the deposed King Louis-Philippe and the Queen’s cousin by marriage, and his family came to visit the Queen, and bid goodbye. They had been allowed to return to France from exile.
At the beginning of 1874 Gladstone, who was temporarily depressed, unexpectedly asked the Queen to dissolve parliament and call for a general election.49 The Queen relished Gladstone’s resignation. She had earlier told her private secretary, Ponsonby, that she felt that ‘Mr Gladstone would have liked to govern HER as Bismarck governs the Emperor. . . she always felt in his manner an overbearing obstinacy and imperiousness.’50 The Queen, although still professing to be a Liberal, disliked Gladstone’s politics, disapproved of his democratic leanings and his support for radical change. Moreover, Queen Victoria disliked Gladstone personally for not being able to explain politics simply. The Queen may have been glad to get rid of Gladstone but she was not happy about the timing, commenting on the inconvenience of doing so when she was about to receive her son Alfred and his new wife, Princess Marie, the Emperor of Russia’s only daughter. ‘People are apt’, she told Gladstone ‘to forget
that the Queen is a woman, who has far more on her hands, and far more to try mind and body, than is good for any one of her sex and age’.51 This time the Queen’s pleas were ignored and new elections were called. The Liberals were defeated.
The return of the Tories: Benjamin Disraeli, 1874–1880
In February 1874 Disraeli became prime minister once more with a majority of 50 over the other parties. The Queen thought it ‘a triumph’.52 And she was especially delighted when Disraeli fell to his knees to kiss her hand and ‘repeatedly said whatever I wished SHOULD be done’. It is widely believed that whereas Gladstone rather carelessly lost the favour of the Queen, Disraeli, with care, style and attention, actively cultivated it. The Queen
was struck by his [Gladstone’s] want of foresight, and a strange lack of knowledge of men and human nature. . . which does not give me the idea of his having any great grasp of mind. . . . I think that Mr Disraeli’s is the larger mind. He is not such an earnest man, nor has he such strong conviction as Mr Gladstone but he seems to me, almost more unselfish.53
Disraeli’s position was strengthened by his ‘unscrupulous encouragement of the Queen’s partisan tendencies which were very feminine but quite unconstitutional’.54 Gladstone called him the ‘artful dodger.’55
The 54-year-old Queen grew to like the 69-year-old Disraeli more and more. Victoria once again had a prime minister with whom she could work amicably, who made her feel good and flattered her intellectual accomplishments. Disraeli wore his learning lightly and brought, as Melbourne had once done, a sense of fun to politics. No longer would Victoria be lectured and hectored. The Queen enjoyed Disraeli’s relaxed, charming and courteous manner and responded well to his more personal approach. She loved his extravagant style and may have even been amused by Disraeli’s theatricality and his over-the-top flowery compliments. Certainly, ministerial visits became a pleasure again. Disraeli reached beyond Victoria’s role as monarch. In effect, he wooed her. For the first time since the death of Albert, a man ‘made her feel desirable, ready for a little gentle flirtation’.56 And he definitely enhanced her self-esteem. Each Valentine’s Day the two exchanged small gifts: Victoria told Lord Rosebery how touched she had been when Disraeli sent her a small trinket box with a heart on one side and the word Fideliter on the other. In return she sent him primroses to which he ‘gratefully thanks your Majesty for your Majesty’s delightful present. He likes the primroses so much better for their being wild: they seem an offering from the fauns and dryads of the woods of Osborne; and camellias, blooming in the natural air, become your Majesty’s Faery Isle.’57 He called the now seriously overweight, frumpy Victoria his Faery Queen. Disraeli did not treat Queen Victoria as an intellectual equal, preferring to pander to her whims and preferences and treating her like an empty-headed female while at the same time giving Queen Victoria an inflated sense of her role as head of state.
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