Queen Victoria

by Bartley, Paula;

  Queen Victoria, who hated public events like these, ‘felt rather nervous about the coming days, and that all should go off well’.59 On 21 June she left Windsor for Buckingham Palace, and was thrilled by ‘a most enthusiastic reception. It was like a triumphal entry. . . The streets were beautifully decorated, also the balconies of the houses, with flowers, flags and draperies. . . . The streets, the windows, the roofs of the houses, were one mass of beaming faces and the cheers never ceased.’60 That night, Monday 21st, she hosted a dinner for visiting royalty: the first to be presented was Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, the heir to the Austrian throne who was later murdered at Sarajevo. Victoria dressed for the occasion in her familiar black but the front of her dress was embroidered in gold, diamonds sparkled in her widow’s cap, and she wore a diamond necklace.61

  On Tuesday 22nd the Queen drove in state from Buckingham Palace to St Paul’s Cathedral. Just before the Queen left the Palace, she felt a ‘good deal agitated for fear anything might be forgotten or go wrong’.62 There was no need to worry. The Diamond Jubilee, unlike previous celebrations, was meticulously planned by a committee chaired by the Prince of Wales. Even minutiae as to whether the Queen’s horses might defecate or urinate during the most solemn moments of the religious ceremony were discussed. At 11:15am the Queen set off in an open state carriage drawn by eight cream horses. Vicky, her eldest daughter, was in the next carriage. Sixteen royal carriages, containing other royal princesses, the odd duke, and top civil servants joined the procession. Her eldest son, Bertie, and her cousin, the Duke of Cambridge, commander-in-chief of the army, rode on each side of her carriage while her son Arthur rode a little at the rear. Just before she left the Palace, the Queen touched an electric button which started a message telegraphed throughout the whole empire saying ‘From my heart I thank my beloved people. May God bless them.’63

  By now the Queen was too frail and elderly to walk up the steps of St Paul’s Cathedral so she stayed in her carriage while a short service was held in the open air. Later she wrote that ‘in front of the Cathedral the scene was most impressive. All the Colonial troops, on foot, were drawn up round the Square. My carriage, surrounded by all the Royal Princes, was drawn up close to the steps, where the Clergy were assembled, the Bishops in rich copes, with their croziers.’64 After this, the Queen processed over London Bridge and along the Borough Road in order that the ‘very poor population’ could witness the event. The Jubilee Committee shared the belief that the appearance of the Queen in working-class districts might quell any remaining vestiges of Republicanism and bind her subjects more closely to the monarchy. Queen Victoria thought it a ‘never-to-be-forgotten day. No one, ever I believe, has met with such an ovation as was given to me, passing through those 6 miles of streets. . . . The crowds were quite indescribable, and their enthusiasm truly marvellous and deeply touching. The cheering was quite deafening, and every face seemed to be filled with real joy.’65

  All over Britain, as with the 1887 Jubilee, the population celebrated. In Liverpool, children who lived in institutions – from the Orphan Asylum, the Bluecoat Hospital, the Deaf and Dumb school – were taken to see the marine display; 66 a Jubilee parade of about 1,000 cyclists was held in Battersea Park;67 a Jubilee Regatta took place on the Clyde; at Hartlepool public houses stayed open an hour later; in Ireland 55 carcases of Australian mutton was given to the Catholic poor; in Paisley, Scotland, 13,000 children were treated to an afternoon of games and biscuits, cakes and sweets; a whole ox was roasted on a beach in Norfolk; and Alfred Austin, as poet laureate, wrote a curious commemorative poem, judged inexplicably by The Times as ‘graceful and appropriate’. One verse speaks of ‘And, panoplied alike for War or Peace/Victoria’s England furroweth still the foam/To harvest Empire, wiser than was Greece/Wider than Rome!’68 Nottingham, Bradford and Kingston-Upon-Hull were all given city status. Somewhere else, a painter was killed falling off a ladder when putting up Jubilee decorations, and a Mancunian woman who was fined half-a-crown for being drunk a few days earlier pleaded that she was only celebrating the Jubilee holiday early.69

  Not all shared the Jubilee enthusiasm. In Ireland, the leading Republican James Connelly presided over an anti-Jubilee meeting in Dublin where a black flag was flown. It had the inscription ‘The Record Reign, ’39–’97. Starved to death, 1,225,000. Evicted, 3,658,000. Forced to emigrate, 4,168,000.’70 One speaker proclaimed that Ireland might well curse the day that Victoria ruled the empire, as the first 60 years of her reign had brought more ruin, misery and death in their land than any previous period.71 In England too there were criticisms. Reynolds’s Weekly Newspaper predictably complained that:

  never has a Civil servant, whose establishment costs the nation about a million a year, been so shy of facing her employers. . . We are told by way of excuse that – She is an old woman. Then let her retire if she cannot fulfil the meagre duties of constitutional monarchies. . . . For 36 years since the death of the Prince Consort the royal family have drawn £36,000,000 out of the taxation of this country. . . . And now we are celebrating her Diamond Jubilee. . . for more than half the time she has failed to discharge her principal business, that is making a show of herself. It is a big sum to pay for half a reign, in which the sovereign has played so contemptible a part. We have no sympathy with those who say the monarch is not to be criticised because she is old, or because she is a woman. She is a servant of the State.72

  Foreign affairs

  Queen Victoria shared Salisbury’s approach to foreign affairs, and consequently his premiership marked a peak period of imperial expansion. For most of his time in office, Salisbury was more interested in foreign affairs than domestic policy. He led the British partition of Africa: the Queen was delighted when Kenya, Uganda, Nigeria and Rhodesia submitted to her imperial rule. Salisbury was a prime minister who would listen to her and, more importantly, take her advice. Even so he complained when more and more colonies were acquired, sure that they would be a burden rather than a benefit.

  Crises in the Ottoman Empire

  In August 1895 Queen Victoria and Prime Minister Salisbury were faced with renewed tension in the Balkans, an area still controlled by the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire. The Queen and her government, ever fearful of Russian expansion, always took care to support the Ottomans but an outbreak of Turkish atrocities against the Armenians shocked them both. The Armenian population who lived under Turkish rule wanted their freedom; the Ottomans responded to their demands with brutal repression. Thousands of Armenians lost their lives. ‘The state of Turkey’, the Queen noted ‘is dreadful. The shameful, savage massacres of the unfortunate Armenians, men, women and children and the misrule in Constantinople is too dreadful. The Ambassadors are at their wit’s end.’73

  The Queen begged the Sultan ‘for the cause of humanity and in obedience to God’s law; for the sake of your Imperial Majesty’s throne, and for the safety of the Ottoman Empire, I earnestly entreat your Imperial Majesty to exercise your great power to restore peace’.74 Salisbury was ‘not hopeful’ about the Queen’s appeal to the Sultan, believing that ‘he cares about two things only – 1. Himself 2. Islam. He has not what we call “human” feeling.’75 Salisbury’s apprehensions were valid: in August 1896 there were further massacres in Constantinople in full view of foreign ambassadors. The Ottomans ruthlessly suppressed the uprising, killing between 80,000 and 300,000 Armenians.

  In April 1897, just as the Armenian crisis was ending, war broke out between the Ottoman Empire and Greece over the status of the island of Crete. At the time, the Ottoman Empire controlled Crete but the largely Christian islanders wanted to be part of Christian Greece, not Islamic Turkey. Greece landed with an army on the island to support the Cretans. By now, Victoria was decidedly unsympathetic to the Ottoman Empire. Her instinctive sympathy towards countries which held members of her family was deeply ingrained in her emotional self. And some of her family ruled Greece: her granddaughter, Sophie (daughter of her eldest daughter Vicky and sister of Kaiser
Wilhelm) was married to the Crown Prince of Greece. Grandmother and granddaughter were very close: Sophie had often stayed with her grandmother whom she adored. Greece was eventually defeated by the Turks but the Great Powers – Britain, France, Italy and Russia – decided that Turkey was unable to govern Crete adequately. In December 1898 they appointed Prince George of Greece and Denmark – husband of Princess Bonaparte, cousin of Tsar Nicolas and a relation by marriage to Queen Victoria – as governor-general of an independent Crete. Queen Elizabeth II’s husband, the Duke of Edinburgh, is his direct descendant.

  Queen Victoria’s mounting hostility towards the Ottoman Empire may have also been influenced by her developing affection towards Russia and its rulers. In April 1894, another of the Queen’s much-loved granddaughters, Alexandra, the fourth daughter of Princess Alice, became engaged to Nicholas, the heir to the Russian throne. The Queen, who had disapproved of the match and had worked ceaselessly to prevent it, was ‘thunder-struck’.76 She confided to one granddaughter that the state of Russia was ‘ so bad, so rotten that at any moment something dreadful might happen’.77 Later she confessed that the more ‘I think of sweet Alicky’s marriage the more unhappy I am. Not as to the personality, for I like him very much but on account of the Country, the policy and differences with us and the awful insecurity to what that sweet Child will be exposed. . . my whole nature rises up against it’.78 In October that year, Nicholas succeeded to the Russian throne; in November, Nicholas and Alexandra married. The Queen’s thoughts were constantly with ‘dear Alicky, whose wedding takes place today. . . . I felt so sad I could not be with her. . . . I thought of Darling Alicky and how impossible it seemed that that gentle little simple Alicky should be the great Empress of Russia!’79 Once Alexandra was married to Nicolas, Queen Victoria’s feelings towards Russia softened and she began to view the country more favourably.

  Less than two years later, Nicolas and Alexandra were crowned on 26 May 1896. It was a disastrous event: Victoria was told of a most

  horrible and ghastly catastrophe. . . has cast quite a gloom over all the rejoicings. There was to be a great National Fete and unfortunately and inconceivably, no Police or troops were on the ground, where the people began to congregate in thousands. They got impatient to get to the booths where food was distributed, and special mugs given from the Emperor. In the stampede as many 1000s are reported to have been knocked down and killed.80

  Victoria’s Ambassador in St Petersburg told her of scenes and incidents ‘too terrible and harrowing for the Queen’s ears’.81 The next day Victoria received more sad accounts of the ‘awful tragedy at Moscow. . . . The papers say that the people of Moscow are showing signs of anger and exasperation at the frightful mismanagement of the authorities. It makes me anxious.’82 Certainly, the mayhem at the Russian coronation and the later reported death of 3,000 people as a result was an inauspicious start to a new regime. Tsar Nicholas and Tsarina Alexandra were the last Romanovs to rule Russia: in 1917 they were forced to abdicate and were later murdered by the Bolsheviks. Their cousin King George V and the British government had refused them asylum.

  Eastern and African affairs

  The Queen continued to take a personal interest in Indian affairs. In 1898 a new viceroy of India, George Curzon, was appointed. Victoria, possibly influenced by Abdul Karim, told her prime minister that the future viceroy must be free from his ‘red-tapist, narrow minded Council and entourage. He must be more independent, must hear for himself what the feelings of the Natives really are, and do what he thinks right, and not be guided by the snobbish and vulgar overbearing and offensive behaviour of many of our Civil and Political Agents.’83 In the Queen’s opinion, the British should avoid trampling on its foreign subjects and stop making them feel that they were a conquered people. They must feel ‘that we are masters’ she advised, but it should be done ‘kindly and not offensively’.84 For all that these sympathetic sentiments reflect those of a politically astute sovereign, Queen Victoria rarely thought to apply them to anywhere else but India.

  By the 1890s, the whole continent of Africa, apart from Liberia and Ethiopia, was under European control. The work of the explorers such as David Livingstone, who charted the rivers, provided maps and indicated the wealth that existed, convinced Europeans that Africa could yield high profits. Salisbury, a committed imperialist, issued Charters to British companies to exploit the Continent, in what is sometimes called ‘settler sub-imperialism’. They built harbours, roads and railways, cleared forests and jungles – and extracted gold from the mines. Not surprisingly, there was resistance from the indigenous people. In December 1895 the British declared war on the Ashanti Empire, a sovereign state located in what is now modern Ghana, because the Ashanti population had turned down an offer to become a British protectorate. To the Queen’s ‘astonishment and concern’ her son-in-law Prince Henry of Battenburg (Liko) told her that he wished to go on the Ashanti expedition. Victoria ‘told him it would never do’.85 Beatrice, Henry’s wife, persuaded Victoria to change her mind by telling her mother that Henry had ‘set his heart on going. He smarted under his enforced inactivity, and this was about the only occasion which presented no difficulties. . . . He felt he was a soldier, brought up as such.’86 Queen Victoria, who always had a soft spot for the army, relented, but her worst fears were confirmed when Henry died of malaria contracted while on duty. There was, the Queen recorded in her diary, ‘such grief in the house. Dear Liko was so much beloved. Went over to Beatrice’s room and sat a little while with her, she is so gentle, so piteous in her misery. . . . My heart aches for my darling child.’87 The war was brief and ended in February 1896 with Britain victorious.

  In April 1896, Salisbury informed the Queen that he wanted to recapture the Sudan.88 Victoria relished this turn of events since she shared Salisbury’s view of British imperialism. Gordon had lost the Sudan in 1884; Salisbury authorised the British army, under the command of Lord Kitchener, to re-conquer it. In April 1898 the army occupied Omdurman and then had taken Khartoum. Some 35,000 Dervishes attacked British troops with ‘great boldness and determination. . . . After one hour’s fighting the Dervishes were driven off with great loss. . . completely defeated. . . . the whole Dervish army has been practically destroyed.’89 The Dervish loss was 11,000; the British lost 23 men. It was an unsurprising victory: the Dervishes fought with rifles, bayonets and spears; Kitchener’s army fought with machine guns. A memorial service was held to the memory of Gordon ‘on the spot where he was killed! Surely he is avenged.’90 The Queen telegraphed Kitchener congratulating him ‘warmly on the brilliant victory so splendidly won’.91 The Sudan had been defeated but its leader, the Khalifa, remained at large until November 1899 when the Queen received ‘great and satisfactory’ news that the Khalifa was killed.92 She ‘rejoiced at the success. . . which gives us entire possession of the valley of the Nile’.93

  South Africa – the Boer War: 1899–1902

  The situation in South Africa had long been a pressing concern for Victoria and her government. The Dutch Boers (Boer was the Dutch word for farmer) and the British disagreed over who would control the South African Republic, known as the Transvaal, and the Orange Free State. In 1877 the British had annexed the Transvaal, hoping to bring it under British control. This led to the first open conflict in 1880–1, British defeat and Gladstone conceding self-government to the Transvaal.

  Britain was keen to re-establish its authority over the Transvaal; the Boers were intent on breaking away from Britain completely. In 1886, when gold was discovered in the Dutch-controlled Transvaal, hordes of developers, prospectors and carpet-baggers flooded in from British South Africa. They were known as Uitlanders, or outsiders, and the Dutch settlers did not like them. The president of the Transvaal, Paul Kruger, refused to grant Uitlanders equal civil rights, including the right to vote. Uitlanders were also taxed more heavily than the Boers, who were inclined to treat them as aliens.

  In 1894 Cecil Rhodes, multi-millionaire owner of the diamond mines
at Kimberley and ruler of the British Cape Colony, visited the Queen and told her ‘that the Transvaal, which we ought never to have given up, would ultimately come back to England’.94 In December 1895 Rhodes and the Uitlander leaders organised a rebellion in the Transvaal against Boer injustices. A ‘motley band of adventurers’ of between 400 and 500 men, under the command of Dr Jameson, the administrator of the British South Africa Company, was sent in to ‘protect’ British interests and help the Uitlanders. But the plot misfired. Jameson was soon forced to surrender and two days later Rhodes resigned his premiership of the Cape. Many British were outraged at Jameson’s unauthorised coup, believing it to be ‘a reckless, hopeless fiasco characterised by incompetence, amateurism and wishful thinking’.95