QUEEN VICTORIA A Personal History

by Christopher Hibbert

  The Queen's baby, a girl, to be christened Victoria Adelaide Mary Louisa and to be known in the family as 'Pussy', was born at Buckingham Palace, a fortnight before she was expected, on 21 November 1840, a 'dark, dull, windy, rainy day with smoking chimneys', after a labour of twelve hours during which the mother 'suffered severely' but was 'not at all nervous once it began'.9 The Duchess of Kent and the Prince, holding his wife's hand, were both in the room at the time with the obstetrician, Dr Locock, and a midwife. In the next room, the door to which was left open, were three other doctors; and, in a room beyond that, were various Ministers and dignitaries, including the Prime Minister, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishop of London and the Lord Steward of the Household, Lord Errol, who claimed that he could see the Queen plainly the whole time and hear what she said. The baby was brought into their room and placed, 'stark naked', upon a table for their inspection.

  The Queen admitted to being 'sadly disappointed' it was not a boy. Her husband, too, was disappointed; but when Dr Locock had called out, 'Oh Madam it is a princess', the mother had cheerfully replied, 'Never mind, the next will be a Prince.'10

  She fervently hoped, however, that there would not be too many more babies of either sex; and when King Leopold tactlessly wrote to say that he hoped that the little Princess Victoria would be the first of several children, she responded crossly:

  You cannot really wish me to be the Mamma d’une nombreuse famille for I think you will see with me the great inconvenience a large family would be to us all, and particularly to the country, independent of the hardship and inconvenience to myself; men never think, at least seldom think what a hard task it is for us women to go through this very often.11

  Throughout her confinement, and during the fortnight in which she was kept in bed after the birth, Prince Albert was 'just like a mother' to her; 'nor could there be a kinder, wiser or more judicious nurse'. 'He was content to sit by her in a darkened room, to read to her, or write for her. No one but himself ever lifted her from her bed to her sofa, and he always helped to wheel her on her bed or sofa into the next room. For this purpose he would come when sent for instantly from any part of the house.' In the evenings he dined with the Duchess of Kent.12

  He had his rewards. On the day of Princess Victoria's birth he represented the Queen at a Privy Council meeting and ten days later he wrote contentedly to his brother, 'I have my hands very full as I also look after Victoria's political affairs.13 According to his Private Secretary, George Anson, with whom the Prince was now (and would remain) on the best of terms, this advance in his status 'had been brought about by the fact of the Prince having received and made notes of all the Cabinet business during the Queen's confinement, this circumstance having evinced to the Queen his capacity for business and power to assist'. To the Duke of Wellington the Prince confessed that his aim was, in fact, to be far more than a kind of assistant to the Queen. He intended to be 'the natural head of the family, superintendent of her household, manager of her private affairs, her sole confidential advisor in politics, and only assistance in her communication with the officers of the Government... her private secretary and her permanent Minister'.14

  The satisfaction which the Prince felt at his growing influence was, however, soon overcast by his concern about the Queen's political sympathies. Her dear friend Melbourne's Government had been in trouble for some time when in the summer of 1841 the Tories won a decisive victory in a general election. During this election the Queen, choosing not to tell him of arrangements of which he was sure to disapprove, took the Prince on a tour of various Whig magnates to whose houses she had been introduced during those 'royal progresses' which had so exasperated King William IV. They went to Chatsworth and Woburn Abbey, to Pans-hanger, the house of Lord Melbourne's nephew, Earl Cowper, and to Lord Melbourne's own house, Brocket Hall. The Prince did not appear to advantage in any of them. He disapproved of the rivalries of adversarial politics which set 'families by the ears', 'demoralised the lower classes' and 'perverted many of the upper'.15 The Crown should be above such partisanship; and he told the Queen that it really was her duty to be so.16

  Yet when the Tories won their resounding victory she could not disguise her disappointment; nor did she attempt to do so. She declared that she would never send for 'that bad man Peel who had behaved so wickedly in the past'. She declined to attend the opening of the first session of the new Parliament; and did not conceal her strong reluctance to accept Sir Robert Peel as her Prime Minister in place of Lord Melbourne whom she had seen almost every day for four years. 'Eleven days was the longest I was ever without seeing him,' she told King Leopold, 'so you may imagine what this change must be.' She had grown so very accustomed to him, whereas Peel was always so shy and awkward with her. Charles Greville thought she would get on better with him if only he could keep his legs still.17 Melbourne tried to comfort and reassure her: he agreed to write to her regularly as what she termed a 'very useful and valuable friend out of office'; and so he did for some time, much to the concern of both Peel and of Baron Stockmar who spoke about it to Melbourne who burst out angrily, 'God eternally damn it!' But when Stockmar warned him that Peel was threatening to resign and that Melbourne's old friend, Mrs Norton, was entertaining dinner parties with stories based on what she was told of the correspondence, Melbourne wrote far less frequently and then not on delicate political matters.

  Certainly, as Melbourne admitted to the Queen, he hated the idea of not seeing her regularly and did not at all relish the thought of losing office; but he was tired, he told her, and the rest would do him good. Besides, he was leaving her in excellent hands. 'The Prince understands everything so well,' he said, 'and has a clever able head.' She could rely upon his advice and assistance with confidence. He had, so he said, formed 'the highest opinion of HRH's judgement, temper and discretion'.18

  To ease the way for them both, he had advice to give to Peel in his dealings with the Queen. Rather than give it to Peel himself, he asked Charles Greville, whom he met at a dinner at Stafford House, to pass it on for him.

  Whenever he does anything, or has anything to propose [Melbourne said] let him explain to her clearly his reasons. The Queen is not conceited; she is aware there are many things she does not understand, and she likes to have them explained to her elementarily, not at length and in detail, but shortly and clearly; neither does she like long audiences, and I never stayed with her a long time.19

  Some time later, on this occasion through George Anson, Melbourne added another piece of advice for Peel: Don't irritate her by 'talking at her about religion'.

  Urged to recognize his merits by the Prince, who had much more in common with the serious, stiff, happily married Peel than he had with the easy-going, amusing Melbourne, the Queen was more accommodating and gracious with her new Prime Minister than he had reason to expect and, at Prince Albert's urging, was prepared to be more accommodating than she had been in 1839 about the ladies of her Household. At the Council meeting at which the new Ministers were appointed and took over from their predecessors, she conducted herself, so Greville said, in a manner which excited his 'greatest admiration' and was 'really touching to see'. 'She looked very much flushed, and her heart evidently brim full, but she was composed, and throughout the whole of the proceedings, when her emotion might very well have overpowered her, she preserved complete self-possession, composure and dignity.'20

  'There was not one of the new Government who did not place the fullest confidence in Her Majesty's intended fairness towards them,' W. E. Gladstone, who had been appointed Vice-President of the Board of Trade, told George Anson. 'They admired the extreme dignity of the Queen ... It was evidently painful to her but her conduct was beautiful.'21 W. B. Baring, the new Secretary to the Board of Control, and Sir George Grey, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, were seen to be in tears. Lord Erroll dashed out of the room before he, too, broke down.22

  'Peel told me she had behaved perfectly to him,' Greville continued, 'and that He had s
aid to her that He considered it his first and greatest duty to consult her happiness and comfort; that no person would be proposed to her who could be disagreeable to her ... I asked him if She had taken this well, and met in a corresponding spirit and he said, "Perfectly." In short, he was more than satisfied; he was charmed with her.'

  Chapter 18

  THE PRINCE AND THE HOUSEHOLD

  'But you see, properly speaking, it is not our fault; for the Lord Steward lays the fire only and the Lord Chamberlain lights it.'

  'Really when one is so happy, blessed in one's home life, as I am,' the Queen wrote not long after Sir Robert Peel came into office, 'politics (provided my country is safe) must take only 2nd. place.' Already George Anson had noted that 'Her Majesty interests herself less and less about politics' and that 'her dislike is less than it was to her present Ministers'.1

  Victoria soon came to regard Peel far less unkindly and was able to recognize his great qualities. To be sure he was still rather stiff and irritating on occasions; but he could talk 'very interestingly' and strongly recommended himself to her by entertaining a high opinion of Prince Albert's character and attainments. He saw to it that the Prince, who now had keys to Cabinet boxes, was sent all important Government papers so that he could go through them with the Queen and explain to her any points she did not understand. Peel also made it possible for the Prince to be present when Ministers had audiences with her; indeed, on occasions, the Prince saw Ministers alone on the Queen's behalf, with her approval, and held receptions for her since, so she said, 'presentations to him should be considered the same as to me'.

  He wrote memoranda for her, drafted letters, took decisions, became, in effect, not only a highly competent and extremely hard-working private secretary, but an adviser of exceptional, indeed unique influence, intent, as Anson put it, upon 'reforming' the Queen's mind and 'drawing out her Powers'.2 Also, much to the annoyance of the old Royal Family who still considered him a meddlesome interloper, the Prince began to assume an importance in fields beyond the spheres of government and the Court. He was, for example, appointed to the chairmanship of an Arts Commission 'to take into consideration the promotion of the Fine Arts in connection with the rebuilding of the Houses of Parliament' which had been almost destroyed by fire in 1834.

  On his own initiative he set about reforming the Royal Household, an immense organization consisting of an astonishing variety of courtiers, attendants and servants.

  The Housekeeper was one of numerous senior servants and specialist officials, many of whose offices had been established centuries before and some of whose duties had long since been forgotten. There were Pages of the Presence and Pages of the Backstairs, Resident Bedchamber Women, Body Linen Laundresses and Linen Women, Fire Lighters, Livery Porters, Butlers, Under Butlers, Footmen, Cooks and Kitchen Boys, a Rat Killer and a Chimney Sweep. The large medical establishment included four Physicians to the Person, two Sergeant Surgeons, the Physician, Surgeon and Apothecary to the Household, the Dentist, the Chemist and Druggist to the Person.3

  The archaic administration of this large Household was examined by Baron Stockmar in one of those lengthy memoranda which poured from his busy pen. He explained the difficulties of running the royal palaces when daily life was ruled by three separate departments, those of the Lord Steward (consisting of no fewer than 445 persons), the Lord Chamberlain and the Master of the Horse, all of which changed with every administration. The heads of these departments no longer lived at Court but delegated their authority to 'servants very inferior in rank', none of whom was sure how far they might trespass upon the customary preserves of another department and all of whom went through an elaborate procedure before anything worthwhile was done. If, for instance, a pane of glass required replacing in the kitchen or a cupboard door mending, a requisition had to be prepared and signed by the Chief Cook; it had then to be countersigned by the Clerk of the Kitchen; then taken to be signed by the Master of the Household; then taken to the Lord Chamberlain's office, where it was authorized and passed on to the Clerk of the Works who was responsible to the Department of Woods and Forests. The consequence of this rigmarole was that many a window remained broken for months while many others were permanently opaque since the Lord Chamberlain was responsible for the inside and the Department of Woods and Forests for the outside and their cleaners very rarely worked simultaneously. One day Baron Stockmar, always susceptible himself to the cold at Windsor, was asked by the Queen to complain to the Master of the Household that the dining room was often icy. 'But you see,' he was told, 'properly speaking, it is not our fault; for the Lord Steward lays the fire only and the Lord Chamberlain lights it', the Lord Chamberlain being responsible for the numerous housemaids, while the porters, like the cooks, came under the Lord Steward's department, and the footmen, who slept 'ten and twelve in each room', under the Master of the Horse.4

  When guests arrived it was difficult to find anyone to show them to their apartments. It was often equally difficult for them to find the way down to the drawing room; and at night, if they happened to forget which corridor led to their rooms, they might wander about for minutes on end, helpless and unassisted. Once a visitor got lost on his way to bed and was forced to spend the night on a sofa in the State Gallery adjoining the Waterloo Gallery where a housemaid found him and, supposing him to be drunk, fetched a policeman.5 Another guest, who got lost one night, 'spent nearly an hour wandering about the corridors to try and identify his bedroom'. At length he opened a door which he imagined led to it and came upon the Queen having her hair brushed by a maid.[xviii]6

  Vast amounts of money were squandered in all the royal palaces and the system was frequently abused: it was discovered, for instance, that of the tens of thousands of people who were provided with dinners every year, only a proportion were actually entitled to them; that, when carriages were needed, the signatures of ladies-in-waiting would be forged in order to obtain them; that an under-butler was still being paid £1. 15s a week for 'Red Room Wine', a legacy from the days when officers on guard in George Ill's time were allowed this sum for wine served in a room hung with red wallpaper; and that all the candles were replaced every day in the principal rooms whether or not they had been used, the candles removed being appropriated by the staff as a traditional perquisite. Nor was it only candles that were appropriated or mysteriously disappeared. At Windsor, in one single representative quarter, no fewer than 184 new brushes, brooms and mops were purchased together with twenty-four new pairs of housemaid's gloves, twenty-four chamois leathers and ninety-six packing mats. At any one time there were between three and four hundred dozen dusters 'scattered all over the Castle'.7

  At Buckingham Palace drains were faulty; there were no sinks for the chambermaids on the bedroom floors; few of the lavatories were properly ventilated; the bells would not ring; some of the doors would not close; and many of the thousand windows would not open. The waste from a newly installed lavatory was discharged on to a roof outside the Queen's dressing room window.8 Yet officials and servants alike in the royal residences were far from poorly paid. In the first year of the Queen's reign - when in more modest households a domestic servant might earn about twelve pounds a year - the lowest of the four grades into which the Palace housemaids were divided received £15 15s. a year, the highest £45 10s. And these wages were increased by the Queen, who was always a tolerant and generous mistress to her domestic servants. Linen women received £60 a year, the First Page of the Backstairs £320; even the Fourth Page of the Presence, Second Class had £140. The Mistress of the Robes received £500 a year, the Lord Chamberlain £2,000.

  Nor were their wages and perquisites all that the lower servants received, for they were paid, in addition, 2s. a day board wages, and when they became too old or ill to perform their duties they might expect a pension which in 1837 was between £30 and £40 a year for twenty years' service. Apart from their regular emoluments they were often also given tips by foreign visitors to the Castle and these were usuall
y liberal. In 1842, for example, the King of Prussia left £500 for distribution and the share of a housemaid of the First Class was £5 15s. od. Tsar Nicholas I left £2,000, gave the Housekeeper a diamond parure worth another thousand pounds, and 'freely bestowed rings, watches and brooches'.9

  Having, with Baron Stockmar's help, come to realize the immense waste of money involved in the running of the Royal Household, Prince Albert methodically set about its reform. The Master of the Household was made responsible for the co-ordination of the activities of all the departments involved; and excessive manning was reduced to such an extent that savings were made of some £25,000 a year.

  Naturally the activities of the Prince, never the most tactful of men, did nothing to make him better liked in the Household, nor did they endear him to those outside it who were predisposed to dislike and distrust him. Caricaturists depicted him counting scrubbing brushes and ferreting for candle ends at Windsor where, it was said, he had given instructions that the servants must provide themselves not only with their own soap but with their own mops and brushes and that they must no longer be offered tea as an alternative to cocoa.10 Servants in the royal service had grown accustomed to their perquisites, official and assumed; while guests did not take kindly to being allowed only two candles in their rooms and on ringing for more being told by a maid, as Therese Tietjens was when she was summoned to Windsor to sing to the Queen, 'that the allowance to each room was just two candles and no more. "But," added the maid considerately, "there is no regulation which would prevent you cutting those two candles in halves and making four."'11