Victoria

by Julia Baird

  “so dreadful an entail of disease”: Legg, A Treatise on Haemophilia.

  Victoria knew…but she allowed it: Rushton, “Leopold: The ‘Bleeder Prince,’ ” 486.

  “on the most important day of his life”: Potts and Potts, Queen Victoria’s Gene, 48.

  Chapter Twenty-Six: “Two Ironclads Colliding”:

  The Queen and Mr. Gladstone

  “One could do business with her!”: Vovk, Imperial Requiem, 61.

  without executing it himself: Jenkins, Gladstone, 511.

  “We are pianos”: Longford, Victoria R.I., 467.

  “Tell the inhabitants”: Zetland, Lord Cromer, 110.

  “but it is my nature, and I cannot help it”: Gordon, The Journals, 59.

  “acts even upon the sanest men like strong drink”: By September he was calling him “quite mad.” Jenkins, Gladstone, 212.

  “most extraordinary man”: Queen Victoria to Vicky, Windsor Castle, February 20, 1884, Fulford, Beloved Mama, 159.

  to ensure that the soldiers stayed in the Sudan: She also instructed him to burn her “so very confidential” letter. She placed similar demands on his wife, Lady Wolseley. “THREATEN to resign if he does not receive strong support. It must never appear or Lord Wolseley ever let out the hint I give you. But I really think they must be frightened.” May 28, 1885, Buckle, The Letters of Queen Victoria Between 1879 and 1885, 3:619.

  “till the pistol is pointed at their breast”: Queen Victoria to Vicky, February 27, 1884, Fulford, Beloved Mama, 160.

  “If anything befalls him the result will be awful”: Cited in Hibbert, Queen Victoria: A Personal History, 371.

  This was to her a deeply personal humiliation: Victoria wrote to Vicky on February 7, 1885, upon hearing Gordon had been captured, calling Gladstone an “old sinner” and crying: “We are just too late as we always are and it is I, who have, as the head of the nation, to bear the humiliation.” Fulford, Beloved Mama, 182.

  “will be forever branded with the blood of Gordon that heroic man”: Queen Victoria to Vicky, Osborne, February 11, 1885, ibid., 182.

  “upon the express application of General Gordon”: Jenkins, Gladstone, 514.

  his hands mottled with a rash: Matthew, Gladstone: 1809–1898, 400.

  “And now, gentlemen, to business”: Seaman, Victorian England, 447.

  he called Victoria’s views “quite worthless”: Jenkins, Gladstone, 501.

  “insisting on their meeting”: Kuhn, Henry and Mary Ponsonby, 205.

  “all I care to live for now”: Longford, Victoria R.I., 372.

  “squelching in too many imperial quagmires”: In South and North Africa and in Central Asia. Jenkins, Gladstone, 501.

  “Pleasure has for ever died out of my life”: June 20, 1884, Fulford, Beloved Mama, 168.

  “it is greatly valued but how rarely it lasts”: Queen Victoria to Vicky, January 15, 1879, Fulford, Beloved Mama, 34.

  it is remarkable that the biddable Beatrice did not: Dyhouse, Feminism and the Family, 27.

  “very sweet, pure & calm”: QVJ, July 23, 1885. She was more moved than she had been at any of the other eight of her children’s weddings, she said, “but full of confidence.”

  hugged her hard, crying: Ibid.

  “like a schoolgirl set free from school”: Lady Geraldine Somerset, quoted in Hibbert, Queen Victoria: A Personal History, 373.

  “not excepting Disraeli”: Roberts, Salisbury, 795.

  “their polished manners and deference”: Ibid., 793.

  “especially the middle class of her subjects”: Longford, Victoria R.I., 567.

  in a report called The Bitter Cry of Outcast London: Ibid., 461.

  if an inquiry would be conducted into it: October 30, 1883, Buckle, The Letters of Queen Victoria Between 1879 and 1885, 3:451–52.

  “I am terrified for the country”: Queen Victoria to Mr. Goschen, January 27, 1886, RA, VIC/MAIN/C/37/158.

  “Lord Salisbury for the Country—the World—and me!”: Memorandum by Queen Victoria, January 28, 1886, RA, VIC/MAIN/C/37/163.

  discourage Gladstone from standing in the upcoming election: Queen Victoria to Lord Tennyson, Osborne, July 12, 1885, Dyson and Tennyson, Dear and Honoured Lady, 120.

  Tennyson protested he had little influence over him: Lord Tennyson to Queen Victoria, Freshwater, Isle of Wight, July 20, 1885, ibid., 121.

  a view for which she chastised him: Queen Victoria to Mr. Goschen, Osborne, January 31, 1886, RA, VIC/MAIN/C/37/204.

  “put an end to the nervous excitement”: Memorandum by General Sir Henry Ponsonby to Queen Victoria, Osborne, January 29, 1886, RA, VIC/MAIN/C/37/176.

  “she left him free to accept or not”: Memorandum by Henry Ponsonby, St. James Palace, London, January 30, 1886, RA, VIC/MAIN/C/37/199.

  which he considered a “great sacrifice”: Sir Henry Ponsonby to Queen Victoria, St. James, February 3, 1886, RA, VIC/MAIN/C/37/228.

  not for her own sake, but “for the country’s”: Telegram from Queen Victoria to Henry Ponsonby, March 2, 1886, RA, VIC/MAIN/C/37/239b.

  Or was this just a diplomatic paving of the way toward implementation: Memorandum from Lord Goschen to Queen Victoria, January 29, 1886, RA, VIC/MAIN/C/37/192.

  his greatest, most farsighted, and yet most self-destructive quest: As early as 1845, he wrote to his wife: “Ireland, Ireland! that cloud in the west, that coming storm.” Jenkins, Gladstone, 276.

  when he disestablished the Church of Ireland in 1869: He had also, crucially, introduced secret voting in Ireland.

  The bulk of Irish farmers: Samuel Clark, Social Origins of the Irish Land War (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1979), 120.

  Gladstone was “always excusing the Irish”: Longford, Victoria R.I., 446.

  the opposition to his “dreadful” bill: QVJ, July 9, 1880.

  The queen advocated martial law: The violence was so bad, especially against landlords, that it might even, she wrote, “become necessary to propose martial law.” (QVJ, December 11, 1880.) She also encouraged the Chief Secretary to Ireland, Forster, to threaten to resign if he was not given enough resources to stomp out the “lawlessness and terrorism.” (QVJ, December 16, 1880.) Four months later, Gladstone introduced a Coercion Act that temporarily suspended habeas corpus, so those suspected of criminal activity could be arrested without trial. While expanding police powers, Gladstone also introduced laws to clear poor farmers of rent arrears.

  protect the empire and defeat the Home Rule bill: Kuhn, Henry and Mary Ponsonby, 208–9.

  write a memorandum on his precise intentions: Queen Victoria to William Gladstone, Osborne, February 4, 1886, RA, VIC/MAIN/C/37/240.

  Gladstone’s letter…did not placate her: QVJ, February 3, 1886.

  “the Empire is in danger of disintegration and serious disturbance”: QVJ, May 6, 1886.

  “those who may have the honor to be Your Majesty’s advisers”: Letter from Gladstone, May 8, 1886, excerpted in QVJ, May 8, 1886.

  “This, if I understand it”: Matthew, Gladstone: 1809–1898, 508.

  “I cannot help feeling very thankful”: QVJ, July 20, 1886.

  “sacrificing himself for Ireland”: QVJ, February 1, 1886.

  “One prayer absorbs all others”: Matthew, Gladstone: 1809–1898, 558.

  “who was in some things an excellent woman of business”: Arthur Ponsonby, Henry Ponsonby, 80–81.

  it was just surprising to see it done at all: Samuel Johnson, who, when a friend told him he had heard a woman preach at a Quakers’ meeting, said, “Sir, a woman’s preaching is like a dog’s walking on his hinder legs. It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all.” July 31, 1768, Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson, 405.

  wrote Sir Edmund Gosse in 1901: Gosse, “The Character of Queen Victoria,” 333. He continued: “She regarded herself, professionally, as the pivot round which the whole machine of state revolves. This sense, this perhaps even chimerical conviction of her own indispensability, greatly helped to ke
ep her on her lofty plane of daily, untiring duty. And gradually she hypnotized the public imagination.” Ibid., 337.

  “She knows what she is talking about”: Creston, The Youthful Queen Victoria, 5.

  “not always yield at once to the opinion of a single Minister”: Brett, Journals and Letters, 1:74: “The Queen has several times this session remonstrated with her Ministers, and I must confess that on every occasion I think her interference has been justified. She always gives way before the authority of the cabinet but she will not always yield at once to the opinion of a single Minister. Mr. Gladstone is indignant with her and asserts that he would never be surprised to see her turn the Government out after the manner of her uncles.”

  “she will become one combatant among many”: Bagehot, The English Constitution, 48.

  “the right to encourage; and the right to warn”: Ibid., 60.

  But it was not until after Bertie ascended the throne: It could also be argued that Bagehot’s formulation took hold during the reign of King George V. See Heffer, Power and Place, 463.

  “the seasonable addition of nice and pretty events”: Bagehot, The English Constitution, 37.

  “those still so imperfectly educated as to need a symbol”: Ibid., 41.

  provided the monarch was unprejudiced: Ibid., 54.

  But who would be the judge of the monarch’s discernment?: Ibid., 65.

  “show itself in well-considered inaction”: Ibid., 57.

  to form a separate group of Liberal Unionists: Hardie, Political Influence, 91–92.

  “but whether it is wise…must depend on circumstances”: Longford, Victoria R.I., 516.

  “permanent Premier”: Martin, The Prince Consort, 2:445.

  Henry Ponsonby tacked in the other direction: Aronson, Victoria and Disraeli, 192.

  view his queen as “somewhat unmannerly”: Ibid., 565.

  “had I the power, to break through”: Jenkins, Gladstone, 468–69.

  “I am convinced, from a hundred tokens”: Jenkins, Dilke: A Victorian Tragedy.

  she told him to be “very cautious,” in 1883: Buckle, The Letters of Queen Victoria Between the Years 1879 and 1885, 3:241.

  to be “very guarded in his language”: Ibid., 395.

  “She feels, as he [Gladstone] puts it, aggrieved”: Bahlmann, The Diary of Hamilton, 486–87.

  “finger in between two ironclads colliding”: Kuhn, Henry and Mary Ponsonby, 202.

  “the elevation of her own nature”: Gladstone to Samuel Smith, April 11, 1892, quoted in Bell and Offen, Women, the Family, and Freedom, 2:224.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven: The Monarch in a Bonnet

  The symbol that unites this vast Empire: Arthur Ponsonby, Henry Ponsonby, 79.

  she was the Queen who wore a bonnet, not a crown: Ibid.

  “masses and millions of people”: Williams, Becoming Queen, 343.

  “You done it well! You done it well!”: Housman, The Unexpected Years, 220.

  “in no way wore them around her person”: Illustrated London News, June 25, 1887.

  “to make bejeweled bonnets their wear at garden-parties”: Ibid., July 9, 1887, 38.

  ten thousand little balloons, and forty-two thousand other toys: Pearce et al., “Queen Victoria’s Golden Jubilee,” 597.

  “bonfires were lighted and kept blazing until daybreak”: Rusk, Reign of Queen Victoria, 304.

  the skies were still light with the midnight summer sun: Illustrated London News, July 2, 1887.

  “have been appreciated by my people”: Ibid.

  gave the bulk of the money to establish the Queen’s Jubilee Nursing Institute: See qni.org.uk/​about_qni/​our_history.

  “risk of admitting American women of light character”: December 11, 1887, quoted in Longford, Victoria R.I., 497.

  “Will the Prince of Wales…ever reign over us?”: Quoted in Ridley, Bertie, 248.

  he would never forgive her: John Röhl, emeritus history professor at the University of Sussex, also believes Wilhelm had an erotic obsession with his mother when he was a boy, expressed in sexual dreams that made him hate her when she failed to respond to his longing, or inappropriate comments. See independent.co.uk/​news/​uk/​home-news/​kaiser-wilhelm-iis-unnatural-love-for-his-mother-led-to-a-hatred-of-britain-8943556.html.

  “plunge Germany into war without foreseeing or wishing it”: Corti, The English Empress, 259.

  switched to support their brother: Pakula, An Uncommon Woman, 471.

  “It does seem an impossible dream”: Ramm, Beloved and Darling Child, 64.

  that might mean a disastrous foreign policy: Corti, The English Empress, 266.

  “must not allow themselves to be led by a woman”: Pakula, An Uncommon Woman, 470.

  “One could do business with her!”: Vovk, Imperial Requiem, 61.

  “Grandmama behaved quite sensibly at Charlottenburg”: Victoria wrote in her diary on April 25, 1888: “I appealed to Pce Bismarck to stand by poor Vicky, & he assured me he would, that hers was a hard fate.”

  “high time the old lady died”: Pakula, An Uncommon Woman, 483.

  He was, by then, a “perfect skeleton”: Corti, The English Empress, 280.

  “What is happening to me?”: Ibid., 301.

  and the unification of his homeland: Pakula, An Uncommon Woman, 439.

  “How am I to bear it? You did, and I will do”: Hibbert, Queen Victoria: A Personal History, 388.

  “after which they may be cast aside”: Pakula, An Uncommon Woman, 441.

  “it is enough to make one quite giddy”: Emperor William II to Sir Edward Malet, June 14, 1889, Buckle, The Letters of Queen Victoria Between 1879 and 1885, 3:504.

  he tried to counter it where he could: Statement of the Empress Frederick, 1888, in Corti, The English Empress, 293.

  The father would certainly have fought what the son fostered: Pakula, An Uncommon Woman, 457.

  “on account of the number of votes”: Kronberg Letters, July 6, 1892, cited in Longford, Victoria R.I., 518.

  “an old, wild incomprehensible man of eighty-two and a half”: Jackson, Harcourt and Son, 213

  “a feeble expression about the mouth, & the voice altered”: QVJ, August 15, 1892.

  “but she knows he would not accept it”: Windsor Castle, March 3, 1894, Buckle, The Letters of Queen Victoria Between 1886 and 1901, 2:372–73.

  “I could neither love nor like it”: Magnus, Gladstone: A Biography, 425–26.

  “I kissed her when she left”: QVJ, March 3, 1894.

  “settling a tradesman’s bill”: March 10, 1894, Matthew, Gladstone: 1809–1898, 610.

  “I have not been able to fathom, and probably never shall”: Ibid.

  her descendants thronged the courts of the Continent: When the Duke and Duchess of York had a baby, who would become Edward VIII (and then Duke of Windsor), there were, for the first time, Victoria thought, “three direct heirs as well as the Sovereign alive.” Other European matches included those of Princess Sophie of Prussia (daughter of Vicky), who married King Constantine I of Greece; Princess Maud (daughter of Bertie), who married Prince Carl of Denmark; Princess Marie (daughter of Alfred), who married Ferdinand of Romania; Princess Margaret of Connaught (daughter of Arthur), who married Prince Gustaf Adolf of Sweden; and Princess Victoria Eugenie (daughter of Beatrice), who married King Alfonso XIII of Spain.

  would later die in the Russian Revolution: In 1917, she and her husband—Nicholas II—were imprisoned, then executed in the basement of their prison. Alix, who had stirred the anger of the starving peasants with her curious attachment to Rasputin, the hermit who cared for her hemophiliac son, was making the sign of the cross as she turned from the gunfire. In 2000, the Greek Orthodox Church canonized her.

  “native doctor at Agra”: QVJ, June 23, 1887.

  “Indians always wait now, & do so, so well & quietly”: QVJ, June 28, 1887.

  “and being of rather a different class to the others”: QVJ, August 11, 1888.

  “interests & amuses me very
much”: QVJ, August 30, 1887.

  “very handy and useful in many ways”: QVJ, November 2, 1888.

  Karim made increasingly outrageous requests: When Victoria instituted the Most Exalted Star of India and the Most Eminent Order of the British Empire she insisted that they carry no Christian symbols so that they would be acceptable to her Hindu and Muslim subjects.

  estimated to be sufficient to kill fifteen thousand men: Reid, Ask Sir James, 137.

  “examining his neck, smoothing his pillows, etc”: Ibid., 133.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight: The “Poor Munshi”

  “The Queen seems off her head”: Reid, Ask Sir James, 132.

  “we are all jealous of the poor Munshi”: Fritz Ponsonby—Henry’s son, and now a junior equerry in the household—about Karim Abdul, April 27, 1897, Longford, 539.

  the Munshi was bringing on: Reid, Ask Sir James, 143.

  craving for some kind of excitement: Ibid., 154.

  so they might report on him more: Ibid., 139.

  “everyone avoided him”: Ibid., 140.

  “interspersed with still perfectly green trees”: QVJ, October 23, 1891.

  Queen of Sheba, Carmen, and The Winter’s Tale: January 6, 1888, Balliol College, Marie Mallet Archives, Lady in Waiting, Mallet V 1-11, Envelope marked “Mallet V i. First Waiting as Maid of Honor, 1887, Letters to her Mother.”

  “who were sons respectively of a Butcher & a Grocer”: Arthur Ponsonby, Henry Ponsonby, 131.

  “Performing functions in sitting rooms, etc.”: Reid, Ask Sir James, 139.

  could contain the spirit of Christ: Longford, Victoria R.I., 509.

  “to allow other Indians in any part of the same railway carriage as himself”: Reid, Ask Sir James, 139.

  “Progression by antagonism”: Ibid., 138.

  “about whom the Queen seems off her head”: Ibid., 132.

  she thought required only a polite refusal: Longford, Victoria R.I., 508.

  “any letters of importance that come from India”: Letter from Fritz Ponsonby about Karim Abdul, April 27, 1897.

  “been questioned as to her sanity”: Reid, Ask Sir James, 144.