Queen Victoria - The UK's Longest Reigning Monarch Queen Victoria Queen Victoria The Longest Ruling Monarch of the United Kingdom Queen Victoria of Great Britain. Original Artist: By T H Maquire. (1852). (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images) By Patricia Daniels, Contributing Writer Updated July 26, 2016. Who Was Queen Victoria? Ascending to the throne at only 18 years old, Queen Victoria ruled the United Kingdom for nearly 64 years -- the longest of any British monarch. During her reign, Great Britain became a powerful industrial nation and boasted an empire that stretched across the globe. Despite the early loss of her beloved husband, Queen Victoria provided a reassuring stability during much of the 19th century - an era of great social and technological change. The years of her reign are referred to as the Victorian Era.

Dates: May 24, 1819 - January 22, 1901 Reign: 1837 - 1901 Also Known As: Alexandrina Victoria of the House of Hanover; "the Grandmother of Europe" The Girl Who Would Be Queen Queen Victoria was born at Kensington Palace on May 24, 1819 to Edward, the Duke of Kent (and fourth son of King George III) and German Princess Victoire of Leiningen. Although Victoria was fifth in line to the throne - unlikely to become monarch - the duke feared that any future claim to the throne might be challenged if she were born abroad. continue reading below our video Profile of Queen Victoria He ensured that his daughter was born on British soil, moving with his pregnant wife from Germany to England. Christened Alexandrina Victoria at birth, the child came to be called Victoria. Despite being born into royalty, she did not grow up surrounded by wealth. Edward's spendthrift ways had left him with many debts. The duke and duchess, in an attempt to reduce expenses, moved with their infant daughter to a modest home.

Not long after the move, Edward became ill and died of pneumonia on January 23, 1820 (Victoria was just eight months old). Six days later, King George III died as well, thus making George IV King of England. Victoria was now third in line to the throne behind her two uncles, who had failed to produce heirs. Victoria's Less Than Royal Childhood King George IV , whose only legitimate child had died in childbirth, was resentful of his brother's daughter. He begrudgingly allowed Victoria and her mother to move into an apartment at Kensington Palace, but would only approve a small allowance. The duchess’s brother, Prince Leopold (later King Leopold I of Belgium ), agreed to pay for Victoria's upbringing and education. Tutors were hired to school Victoria in history, math, drawing, and languages. Raised by a German mother who spoke little English, Victoria spoke mostly German the first few years of her life, but readily learned both English and French. In 1827, when Victoria was eight, her Uncle Frederick, the Duke of York, died, placing her one step closer to the throne.

A Scheming Pair When newly widowed, Victoria's mother had turned for advice to John Conroy, a colleague of her late husband. In the years following the duke's death, the self-serving Conroy convinced the duchess that she should have herself declared Victoria's regent (an agent acting on behalf of an incapacitated or underage monarch) in the event that Victoria became queen while still a minor. In this way, Conroy - through the duchess - could essentially control the throne. When King George IV (who loathed Conroy and the duchess) died in 1830, the pair believed they could easily persuade newly-crowned King William IV to name the duchess as Victoria's regent. But King William did not trust the duchess and refused her request. The duchess petitioned Parliament, winning approval as Victoria's sole regent in 1831. The regency proved unnecessary. On June 20, 1837, a month after Victoria's eighteenth birthday, King William died, making Victoria queen of England. The Young Queen Weeks after assuming the throne, Queen Victoria moved to Buckingham Palace , where she began the business of ruling the nation.

The young queen's composure and confidence impressed the prime minister and the Privy Council (a group of high government officials and advisers to a monarch). The official coronation was held on June 28, 1838 amid great celebration. The public was enchanted by the new queen, who seemed more eager to please them than her predecessors had been. A scandalous incident, however, would soon sway public opinion against her. The "Lady Flora affair," as it came to be known, was the product of the young queen's immaturity and lack of discretion. Victoria, among others, had noticed that her mother's lady-in-waiting, Flora Hastings - an unmarried woman - appeared to have a bulging abdomen. Queen Victoria jumped to the conclusion that Lady Flora was pregnant, and began to make comments about her to various members of her staff. The rumor circulated beyond palace walls. Within months, Lady Flora was gravely ill. When she died of an apparent abdominal tumor, the queen was blamed for having started the rumors that had brought dishonor upon a dying woman. The public was outraged; many of her detractors actually booed the queen when she went out in public.

It would take an engagement and marriage for Queen Victoria to regain her reputation. Queen Victoria and Prince Albert: Courtship and Marriage Victoria's Uncle Leopold had long favored his German nephew Prince Albert - first cousin to Victoria - as the perfect candidate for marriage to the queen. When the prince and Victoria had met two years earlier, she had been impressed by Albert's looks and demeanor. Upon meeting with him a second time in October 1839, Victoria seemed smitten. Within days, she proposed to him (protocol would not allow him to propose to her), and the engagement was announced. Even before the wedding a debate arose as to what title Prince Albert should hold. Queen Victoria preferred "King Consort," so that Albert could rule by her side, but members of Parliament were opposed to giving that power to a foreigner. Parliament decided to award the prince no rank or title whatsoever; he was simply made a British subject. Prince Albert was immensely disappointed, and the queen was furious, but could not oppose the decision. The wedding was held on February 10, 1840 . Despite rainy weather, large crowds lined the streets to watch the procession from Buckingham Palace.

Later, the crowd cheered as the newly-married couple rode past in their carriage. The Royal Offspring Queen Victoria and Prince Albert welcomed the birth of their first child, Princess Victoria in November 1840. However, the queen was not happy that she'd become pregnant so soon after the wedding, and often complained in her journal about the difficulties of motherhood. Queen Victoria gave birth to a male heir, Albert ("Bertie"), a year later. Between 1843 and 1857, the queen had seven more children, completing her family of five daughters and four sons . All survived to adulthood, a rare outcome at a time when many children did not survive infancy. The queen's fourth son, Leopold, born in 1853, was diagnosed at an early age with hemophilia , a genetically-transmitted bleeding disorder. He died in his thirties of the disease. Through the marriages of Victoria's children, hemophilia later re-emerged in several European royal families, most notably in the son of Czar Nicholas II of Russia and his wife Alexandra (Victoria's granddaughter).

It was later determined that Queen Victoria and two of her daughters (as well as Alexandra) were carriers of the gene, which was passed on to their sons. Prince Albert's Role Prince Albert enjoyed being a father and found that having children had necessitated that he take on more responsibilities in the royal household. Queen Victoria increasingly relied upon him for advice, and he welcomed this new role. The prince was widely praised for organizing palace finances and eliminating wasteful spending. Prince Albert earned the admiration of the British public following an assassination attempt upon the queen in 1840. When a gunman shot at the royal carriage, Albert acted quickly, pushing his wife to the carriage floor to avoid the bullet. (Queen Victoria would survive seven assassination attempts.) After initial reservations about Albert's capabilities, Parliament appointed him regent in July 1840 during the queen's pregnancy. As regent, Prince Albert would be in charge of the heir if Queen Victoria were to die in childbirth, or otherwise. The prince was not awarded the title of "prince consort" until 1857. War and Rebellion The British became involved in the Crimean War from 1854 to 1856.

Most of the fighting took place in Russian-held Crimea, where bitter cold and disease took as many lives as battle wounds. The queen, lacking any power in military situations, felt compelled to help. She organized relief efforts, knitted socks and mittens, and visited soldiers in hospitals. In her official capacity, Queen Victoria wrote letters of condolence to war widows. British presence in India stirred up a rebellion of Indian soldiers, called "sepoys," in 1857. The uprising resulted in the deaths of hundreds of European civilians. When the rebellion was finally subdued by British troops, all of India came under the control of the Crown of England. Queen Victoria proudly referred to India as a "jewel of her crown." She was proclaimed Empress of India in 1877, when Parliament passed the Royal Titles Act. The Death of Prince Albert Queen Victoria endured the darkest year of her life in 1861, beginning with the death of her mother in March. Later in the year, her oldest son, Bertie - first in line to the throne - created a scandal by becoming romantically involved with an actress. Prince Albert traveled to Cambridge to chastise his son, despite feeling weak and feverish.

He returned to Windsor Castle, where his condition deteriorated over the next few weeks. Prince Albert died on December 14, 1861 at age 42, from probable stomach cancer. A widow at 42, the queen was devastated. Faced with her official duties as well as the care of her children, she felt incapable of carrying on. Queen Victoria became a recluse, avoiding public events and social engagements and even refusing foreign visitors. Victoria's children suffered as well. They had lost their father; now their mother, too, seemed to abandon them in her grief. Some of the younger children became depressed and withdrawn, and Bertie became the object of his mother's anger. The queen blamed the 21-year-old prince for his father's death. She felt that her son's misbehavior had compelled Prince Albert to make the trip to Cambridge, worsening his illness. The public and Parliament began to lose patience with the queen, who neglected her duties and remained in mourning for more than three years. Queen Victoria and John Brown Desperate to help the grieving queen, the royal physician suggested that she go horseback riding to improve her health. He sent for the groom from the queen's stables in Scotland.

John Brown arrived in early 1865. The handsome 39 year old sported a kilt and had a straightforward, somewhat rough way of talking with the queen. She responded well to him and began venturing out in public for the first time in years. Although it was clear that the queen was in better spirits since Brown's arrival, he was unpopular with both the queen's family and the public. Rumors abounded that the two were having an affair, but no proof has ever been found to support that notion. John Brown remained the queen's servant until 1883, when he died of a streptococcal infection. Later Years Over the years, Queen Victoria regained her popularity by making more of an effort to attend public functions and by becoming involved in charitable causes. She kept close contact with an ever-changing roster of prime ministers, always ready with an opinion on the issues of the day. The queen celebrated her Diamond Jubilee in 1897, marking sixty years as monarch. She was proud of the many jubilee biographies that were written about her, several of which described her as a virtuous woman who set a good example.

Queen Victoria died of a stroke on January 22, 1901 at the age of 81. Her eldest son, Albert, succeeded her as King Edward VII . PBS : Empires : Queen Victoria : Her Majesty : Queen Victoria Portrait of Queen Victoria. The Royal Collection Windsor. Princess Alexandrina Victoria was not only born to be Queen of England: she was conceived to be Queen. Once Princess Charlotte, the only legitimate child of the Prince of Wales, the future George IV, died in childbirth late in 1817, her son stillborn, the nation was plunged into mourning and her unmarried uncles stirred into competition to sire an heir to the throne. With the Prince of Wales, Prince Regent for his insane father, George III, separated from the future (but uncrowned) Queen Caroline, no lawful successor would come that way. To solve the succession dilemma, the royal brothers, princes of the blood, most of them with mistresses and illegitimate progeny, were ordered to marry and beget, with their reward for success a promised cancellation of their heavy debts.

Although William IV, the Duke of Clarence (1830-37), duly married a minor German princess, no child of his survived early infancy. Next in line, Edward, Duke of Kent, would jettison his mistress of many years and marry the widowed Victoire, Duchess of Amorbach, who had proved her fertility during her first marriage. When she became pregnant, it became necessary, once she could travel, to leave her small German dukedom and give birth on English soil to establish unquestionable credentials for the child's likely inheritance. But beset by debt unresolved by the Regent, the Duke encountered delays in raising the money to get his entourage across the Channel. On 28 March 1819, in her eighth month, the Duchess set off, arriving at Dover on 24 April, barely in time for the accouchement. At Kensington Palace, in apartments reluctantly granted by the Regent, who disliked his improvident brother, the future queen was born on 24 May. The new princess was christened a month later, with none of the usual royal names available to her parents because of the Regent's refusal to permit another Charlotte or Elizabeth or Georgina.

Since the Russian tsar, Alexander I, was godfather in absentia, his name was available, and even as late as the morning of her accession, at eighteen, on June 20, 1837, the public was unsure of the official name of the new queen. She had always been known as Victoria, however, and was so proclaimed. Fatherless as an infant-her father had died on January 23, 1820, only six days before his own father, George III-she was dominated by her ambitious mother, who hoped for a Regency for herself if William IV died before Victoria's eighteenth birthday. Stubbornly, the ailing king held on just long enough for his niece to reign in her own right. But she proved wilful and difficult, creating embarrassments at Court that led her advisers, notably the avuncular Viscount Melbourne, the Prime Minister, to press her to marry. A husband might control her, and in any case the nation needed a guaranteed succession. Victoria's mother and her Coburg brothers arranged to keep the prospective marriage within the family.

Yet they were assisted by the dearth of acceptable Protestant candidates among European royals, some of whom the young Queen interviewed to her disappointment. Late in 1839, however, when she met Prince Albert, the younger son of her uncle Ernest, the Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, for only the second time (three years earlier he had been a callow teen-ager), she was smitten. A student at the University of Bonn, he was clearly her intellectual superior-and, she thought, beautiful. She proposed (he could not, as she was Queen), and they were married in February 1840. At first, Albert only wielded the blotting paper as she signed documents. He was uneasy about his lack of occupation and status; but he had been employed to ensure the succession. Biology thereafter ensured his role. When Victoria became so visibly pregnant that she could not appear ceremonially, Albert assumed her functions. Once she became heavy and listless, he also became, in effect, the senior partner (although five months her junior) in a dual monarchy.

After nine children through 1856, he had established himself as her primary adviser, often drafting memoranda that she recopied in her own hand and signed. Impressed by his abilities, the aging Duke of Wellington, eager to retire, even invited him to become chief of the army, but Albert, an honorary field marshal, resisted the temptation, explaining that he had to subsume his personality and his ambitions in the interests of the Queen. Portrait of young Queen Victoria. The Royal Collection Windsor. But for the period of the Crimean War (1853-54), when the couple, especially Albert, were suspected falsely of Russian sympathies, the dual monarchy worked efficiently. England in any case was evolving, after the first Reform Bill (1832), into a constitutional monarchy, with the sovereign's powers becoming more moral and symbolic than legislative. The authority of the throne now rested more and more in popular respect for its occupant. That situation ended abruptly when Albert, at 42 in December 1861, died of what was very likely stomach cancer.

His incompetent physicians called it typhoid, but no other cases existed in the area, rendering that diagnosis suspect, and although Victoria knew nothing of his long-standing symptoms, and was prostrated by his death, Albert was aware that he had been suffering from something inoperable. The Prince Consort's death altered the monarchy irreparably. Victoria was inconsolable, out of shock, out of loss, and out of her realization that she had depended so long upon Albert's advice and support that she was unsure she could be sovereign alone. She went into purdah, for years failing to perform even her ceremonial functions on grounds that she was in perpetual mourning. The monarchy accordingly declined in authority and in esteem, and public perception was summed up by a cartoon in the press that showed the royal robes draped over an empty throne. Twenty at Albert's death-the same age as were Victoria and Albert at their marriage, Albert Edward ("Bertie"), the Prince of Wales was given no compensatory duties to fill some of the void left by his father's death and his mother's disappearance into grief.

Just before his father's last illness the young prince had been discovered in a liaison with a lady of the evening, and Victoria believed that the shock and the potential scandal had led to Albert's decline. Bertie was pronounced as unfit to be king, and unfit to assume any national role. Bertie's lack of anything to do, and his incapacity to invent serious work for himself led to his life as playboy prince, despite a marriage that was supposed to settle him down. (Alexandra was beautiful but brainless, with no ability to rein in her husband.) His increasing notoriety as "Edward the Caresser" (in Henry James's phrase) and Victoria's invisibility as sovereign would lead to a decade of republican agitation that ended fortuitously in 1871 when Bertie came down with authentic typhoid fever, and nearly died. The weeks of public agitation over his possible demise, and his seemingly miraculous recovery, exploded the thin but widespread anti-monarchical sentiment in Britain.

It did not make the Prince more moral or even more circumspect, but the second ministry of Benjamin Disraeli beginning in 1874 engineered the rehabilitation of the throne by drawing the queen back into public life and in finding acceptable roles for her heir. Victoria and Albert. The Royal Collection Windsor. The costly Indian Mutiny in 1856-57 had led to reorganization of imperial rule in the subcontinent, and on Victoria's return to visibility in the 1870s she began to yearn for a title that would prevent her eldest daughter, Vicky, married to the heir to the German throne, from-as empress--outranking her proud mother. The Queen wanted to be Empress of India, and as part of the price for her increasing public role pressed Disraeli into arranging an imperial title representing the jewel in her crown. At about the same time, the Prince of Wales, eager for a junket to India with his cronies, to hunt elephants and tigers, convinced the Prime Minister to arrange a royal tour.

Despite all likelihood that the princely progress would be a disaster, it was a triumph, demonstrating Bertie's diplomatic and impresario qualities, which he would employ with brio thereafter. As he was embarking home, news arrived that the Queen had indeed been styled Empress of India. Fortunately for the Queen's reputation, her Scots manservant John Brown had died early in 1883. For Victoria, Brown's much-lamented passing severed a link with Albert in life and in death. He had been the Prince's gillie, and to extricate the Queen from self-imposed purdah her doctors recommended importing Brown from Balmoral to care for her personal horses and get her out riding. The gruff, bearded Scot became her favorite, accompanying her publicly almost everywhere. He also become a barrier -- as she wanted -- to intrusions from staff, and even from her children. (They despised him.) He sat in on table-turning seances in that heyday of spiritualism to help summon up a very dubious hint of the Prince.

She despised smoking but Brown could appear before her in a haze of tobacco, and often tipsy as well with whiskey -- and he taught Victoria how to put a nip of Scotch in her tea. Class vanished. In an age of sentimental effusions, she sent him valentines by post, and awarded him a special medal for loyal service to the Queen. Rumor had it that he was sexually intimate with her, even that they were secretly married, and in 1869 a scandal sheet claimed that the Queen (in her 50th year) had gone to Switzerland to covertly bear his child. Her very openness about Brown belied such intimacies, but without a husband to embrace she seems to have savored being clutched by him as he helped on and off her horses, and in and out of her carriages. When he was dying, protocol forbade her to visit him (contrary to an episode in the film "Mrs. Brown"), and in any event a fall had lamed one of her knees, and she could not have climbed stairs to his quarters.

"If he had been a more ambitious man," said Sir William Knollys, the Prince of Wales's comptroller, of Brown, "there is no doubt . . . he might have meddled in more important matters. I presume the family will rejoice at his death, but I think very probably they are shortsighted." Yet Brown's disappearance from the Victorian scene helped restore the Queen's public image. She could better embody middle-class values and become the symbolic mother of her country. Victoria's Funeral Pathe The 1880s and 1890s were decades of Victoria's increasing visibility as symbol of Britain and of Empire, as-with the Prince of Wales often acting as impresario-she celebrated her Golden Jubilee as Queen, and then, turning it into an imperial festival, she marked her Diamond Jubilee in 1897. She had become an icon of Empire, ironically just as the Anglo-Boer War was about to erupt in South Africa, adding to the red areas on the globe but embarrassing the nation by showing how difficult it was to win and control colonies in a dawning age of nationalism.

In her waning years, Victoria, calling herself a soldier's daughter, went out, although wheelchair-bound by age and frailty, to bid departing troops godspeed. The war was still ongoing when, incapacitated by a series of small strokes, she died in January 1901, the first month of the new century. But Victoria's world of simple values and simple loyalties, and her rigid view of the Crown, had preceded her in death. Loading Page...

Queen Victoria | Britroyals Born: May 24, 1819 at Kensington Palace Parents: Edward, Duke of Kent (son of George III) and Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld Relation to Elizabeth II: great-great-grandmother House of: Hanover Ascended to the throne: June 20, 1837 aged 18 years Crowned: June 28, 1838 at Westminster Abbey Married: Albert, son of Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha Children: Four sons including Edward VII, and five daughters Died: January 22, 1901 at Osborne, Isle of Wight, aged 81 years, 7 months, and 29 days Buried at: Frogmore Reigned for: 63 years, 7 months, and 2 days Succeeded by: her son Edward VII Named Alexandrina Victoria but known as Victoria, she was the only child of Edward Duke of Kent and Victoria Saxe-Coburg. Her father died when she was 1 year old and her domineering mother kept her away from her �wicked� uncles Kings George and William.

She had a sheltered upbringing, and came to the throne shortly after her 18th birthday in 1837 on the death of her uncle William IV who had no surviving legitimate children. She was at the time unmarried and not crowned until June 28, 1838. In February 1840 she married her cousin and love of her life Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. The British Empire was at the height of its power and she ruled over 450 million people, one quarter of the world�s population and approximately one quarter of the work�s landmass. It stretched so far around the globe from Canada to the Caribbean, Africa, India, Australia and New Zealand that it was said that the sun never set on the British Empire. India was Jewel in the Crown and in 1876 she was given the title Empress of India. The Victorian era was a time of immense industrial, political, trade, scientific and military progress for Great Britain. In her early years she was dependent on her Prime Minister Lord Melbourne and her uncle King Leopold of Belgium for advice, but increasingly her husband Albert became her main advisor.

He was involved in organising the Great Exhibition in 1851, and persuaded her to take a more constitutional role in leaving the rule of the nation and Empire to Parliament. She was strong willed and her relations with her prime ministers ranged from the affectionate (Melbourne and Disraeli) to the stormy (Peel, Palmerston, and Gladstone). Victoria and Albert had four sons, five daughters and 42 grandchildren who were married to royalty across Europe making her the �grandmother of Europe�. Her daughter Victoria was mother of the German Emperor Kaiser Wilhelm II, and her grand-daughter Alexandria was the wife of Nicholas II Emperor and last Tzar of Russia. The death of Albert from typhoid in 1861 plunged Victoria into mourning and she withdrew almost completely from public life spending her time at Balmoral Castle in Scotland and Osborne house on the Isle of Wight where she spent time with her favourite Scottish servant John Brown. This encouraged republican sentiments and she was the target of several assassination attempts. However she kept control of affairs, refusing her son Edward, Prince of Wales (who became Edward VII) any active role.

Her golden jubilee in 1887 and diamond jubilee in 1897 regained her popular support and matriarchal role as Queen of the nation and Empire. She died at Osborne House on 22 January 1901, and was buried at Windsor. Her reign lasted 63 years and 7 months which is the second longest of any British monarch.

Queen Victoria's Signature Quotes: �Great events make me quiet and calm; it is only trifles that irritate my nerves� - Queen Victoria �Being pregnant is an occupational hazard of being a wife� - Queen Victoria� (she had 9 children) �The Queen is most anxious to enlist everyone who can speak or write or 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� � Queen Victoria (she was against women�s rights despite being matriarch to nearly a quarter of the world�s population) �The important thing is not what they think of me, but what I think of them.� - Queen Victoria Timeline for Queen Victoria Queen Victoria: Biography Queen Victoria: bio from the Encyclopedia Britannica Victoria and the Victorian Age Introduction Victoria served as the queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 1837 until 1901. In 1876 she also became empress of India. During her reign the English monarchy took on its modern ceremonial character. Victoria first learned of her future role as a young princess during a history lesson when she was 10 years old.

Almost four decades later Victoria's governess recalled that the future queen reacted to the discovery by declaring, "I will be good." This combination of earnestness and egotism marked Victoria as a child of the age that bears her name. The queen, however, rejected important Victorian values and developments. A mother of nine who hated pregnancy and childbirth, detested babies, and was uncomfortable in the presence of children, Victoria reigned in a society that idealized both motherhood and the family. She had no interest in social issues, yet the 19th century in Britain was an age of reform. She resisted technological change even while mechanical and technological innovations reshaped the face of European civilization. Most significantly, Victoria was a queen determined to retain political power; yet unwillingly and unwittingly she presided over the transformation of the sovereign's political role into a ceremonial one and thus preserved the English monarchy. When Victoria became queen, the political role of the crown was by no means clear; nor was the permanence of the throne itself. When she died and her son Edward VII moved from Marlborough House to Buckingham Palace, the change was one of social rather than of political focus; there was no doubt about the monarchy's continuance.

That was the measure of her reign. Lineage and early life. On the death in 1817 of Princess Charlotte, daughter of the prince regent (later George IV), there was no surviving legitimate offspring of George III's 15 children. In 1818, therefore, three of his sons, the dukes of Clarence, Kent, and Cambridge, married to provide for the succession. The winner in the race to father the next ruler of Britain was Edward, duke of Kent, fourth son of King George III. His only child, christened Alexandrina Victoria, was born at Kensington Palace, London, on May 24, 1819. After his death and George IV's accession in 1820, Victoria became third in the line of succession to the throne after the Duke of York (died 1827) and the Duke of Clarence (subsequently William IV), whose own children died in infancy.

Victoria, by her own account, "was brought up very simply," principally at Kensington Palace, where her closest companions, other than her German-born mother, the Duchess of Kent, were her half sister, F�odore, and her governess, Louise (afterward the Baroness) Lehzen, a native of Coburg. An important father figure to the orphaned princess was her uncle Leopold, her mother's brother, who lived at Claremont, near Esher, Surrey, until he became king of the Belgians in 1831. Victoria's childhood was made increasingly unhappy by the machinations of the Duchess of Kent's advisor, Sir John Conroy. In control of the pliable duchess, Conroy hoped to dominate the future queen of Britain as well. Persuaded by Conroy that the royal dukes, "the wicked uncles," posed a threat to her daughter, the duchess reared Victoria according to "the Kensington system," by which she and Conroy systematically isolated Victoria from her contemporaries and her father's family. Conroy thus aimed to make the princess dependent on and easily led by himself.

Strong-willed, and supported by Lehzen, Victoria survived the Kensington system; when she ascended the throne in 1837, she did so alone. Her mother's actions had estranged her from Victoria and taught the future queen caution in her friendships. Moreover, her retentive memory did not allow her to forgive readily. Accession to the throne. In the early hours of June 20, 1837, Victoria received a call from the archbishop of Canterbury and the lord chamberlain and learned of the death of William IV, third son of George III. Later that morning the Privy Council was impressed by the graceful assurance of the new queen's demeanour. She was small, carried herself well, and had a delightful silvery voice, which she retained all her life. The accession of a young woman was romantically popular. But because of the existence in Hanover of the Salic law, which prevented succession by a woman, the crowns of Great Britain and Hanover became separated, the latter passing to William IV's eldest surviving brother, Ernest, the unpopular duke of Cumberland.

The queen, who had never before had a room to herself, exiled her mother to a distant set of apartments when they moved into Buckingham Palace. Conroy was pensioned off. Only Lehzen, of whom Victoria was still in awe, remained close to the queen. Even her beloved uncle Leopold was politely warned off discussions of English politics. "Alone" at last, she enjoyed her new-found freedom. "Victoria," wrote her cousin, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, who later married her, is said to be incredibly stubborn and her extreme obstinacy to be constantly at war with her good nature; she delights in Court ceremonies, etiquette and trivial formalities. . . . She is said not to take the slightest pleasure in nature and to enjoy sitting up at night and sleeping late into the day. It was, in retrospect, "the least sensible and satisfactory time in her whole life"; but at the time it was exciting and enjoyable, the more so because of her romantic friendship with Lord Melbourne, the prime minister. Melbourne was a crucial influence on Victoria, in many ways an unfortunate one.

The urbane and sophisticated prime minister fostered the new queen's self-confidence and enthusiasm for her role; he also encouraged her to ignore or minimize social problems and to attribute all discontent and unrest to the activities of a small group of agitators. Moreover, because of Melbourne, Victoria became an ardent Whig. Victoria's constitutionally dangerous political partisanship contributed to the first two crises of her reign, both of which broke in 1839. The Hastings affair began when Lady Flora Hastings, a maid of honour who was allied and connected to the Tories, was forced by Victoria to undergo a medical examination for suspected pregnancy. The gossip, when it was discovered that the queen had been mistaken, became the more damaging when later in the year Lady Flora died of a disease that had not been diagnosed by the examining physician. The enthusiasm of the populace over the coronation (June 28, 1838) swiftly dissipated. Between the two phases of the Hastings case "the bedchamber crisis" intervened. When Melbourne resigned in May 1839, Sir Robert Peel, the Conservative leader, stipulated that the Whig ladies of the bedchamber should be removed.

The queen imperiously refused, not without Melbourne's encouragement. "The Queen of England will not submit to such trickery," she said. Peel therefore declined to take office, which Melbourne rather weakly resumed. "I was very young then," wrote the queen long afterward, "and perhaps I should act differently if it was all to be done again." The Albertine monarchy. Victoria's wedding to Prince Albert served as a stage for displays of political partisanship: very few Tories received invitations, and the Tories themselves rejected Victoria's request that Albert be granted rank and precedence second only to her own. Victoria responded violently, "Monsters! You Tories shall be punished. Revenge! Revenge!" Marriage to Albert, however, lessened the queen's enthusiasm for Melbourne and the Whigs. She admitted many years later regarding Melbourne that "Albert thinks I worked myself up to what really became rather foolish." Albert thus shifted Victoria's political sympathies; he also became the dominant figure and influence in her life. She quickly grew to depend on him for everything; soon she "didn't put on a gown or a bonnet if he didn't approve it." No more did Victoria rule alone. Marriage to Albert.

Attracted by Albert's good looks and encouraged by her uncle Leopold, Victoria proposed to her cousin on Oct. 15, 1839, just five days after he had arrived at Windsor on a visit to the English court. She described her impressions of him in the journal she kept throughout her life: "Albert really is quite charming, and so extremely handsome . . . a beautiful figure, broad in the shoulders and a fine waist; my heart is quite going." They were married on Feb. 10, 1840, the queen dressed entirely in articles of British manufacture. Children quickly followed. Victoria, the princess royal (the "Vicky" of the Letters), was born in 1840; in 1858 she married the crown prince of Prussia and later became the mother of the emperor William II. The Prince of Wales (later Edward VII) was born in 1841.

Then followed Princess Alice, afterward grand duchess of Hesse, 1843; Prince Alfred, afterward duke of Edinburgh and duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, 1844; Princess Helena (Princess Christian of Schleswig-Holstein), 1846; Princess Louise (duchess of Argyll), 1848; Prince Arthur (duke of Connaught), 1850; Prince Leopold (duke of Albany), 1853; and Princess Beatrice (Princess Henry of Battenberg), 1857. The queen's first grandchild was born in 1859, and her first great-grandchild in 1879. There were 37 great-grandchildren alive at her death. Victoria never lost her early passion for Albert: "Without him everything loses its interest." Despite conflicts produced by the queen's uncontrollable temper and recurrent fits of depression, which usually occurred during and after pregnancy, the couple had a happy marriage. Victoria, however, was never reconciled to the childbearing that accompanied her marital bliss  the "shadow-side of marriage," as she called it.

Victoria explained to her eldest daughter in 1858: What you say of the pride of giving life to an immortal soul is very fine, dear, but I own I cannot enter into that; I think much more of our being like a cow or a dog at such moments; when our poor nature becomes so very animal and unecstatic. At the beginning of their marriage the queen was insistent that her husband should have no share in the government of the country. Within six months, on Melbourne's repeated suggestion, the prince was allowed to start seeing the dispatches, then to be present when the queen saw her ministers. The concession became a routine, and during her first pregnancy the prince received a "key to the secret boxes." As one unwanted pregnancy followed another and as Victoria became increasingly dependent on her husband, Albert assumed an ever-larger political role. By 1845 Charles Greville, the observer of royal affairs, could write, "it is obvious that while she has the title, he is really discharging the functions of the Sovereign. He is the King to all intents and purposes." Victoria, once so enthusiastic about her role, came to conclude that "we women are not made for governing." Relations with Peel.

The prince came into his own to negotiate with Peel a compromise on the bedchamber question after the Melbourne government had been defeated in the general election of 1841. The queen's first interview with Peel went well, eased by Melbourne's advice to his successor: The Queen is not conceited  she is aware there are many things she cannot understand and she likes to have them explained to her elementarily  not at length and in detail but shortly and clearly. If, as Lady Lyon once noted, "there was 'a vein of iron' which ran through the Queen's extraordinary character," the iron could bend; Victoria was able to revise her opinions and reevaluate her judgments. Peel's very real distress when in the summer of 1842 an attempt was made to assassinate the queen  together with the affinity between the prince and the new prime minister  soon converted the "cold odd man" of the queen's earlier comment into "a great statesman, a man who thinks but little of party and never of himself." Lord Aberdeen, the foreign secretary, also became a great favourite. "We felt so safe with them both," she told King Leopold.

The departure of the possessive Lehzen for Germany in 1842 signaled Albert's victory in the battle between the two for Victoria's loyalty and for power in the royal household. He became effectively the queen's private secretary  according to himself, "her permanent minister." As a result of Albert's diligence and refusal to accept the obstacles that ministers threw in his path, the management of the queen's properties was rationalized and her income thus increased. A visible sign of the prince's power and influence was the building of the royal residences of Osborne, on the Isle of Wight, and Balmoral Castle in Scotland. Albert, who taught the once party-loving Victoria to despise London, played a central role in the acquisition of both properties as well as in designing the homes he and Victoria erected on them between 1845 and 1855. Victoria described Osborne as "our island home" and retreated there frequently; it was, however, at Balmoral that she was happiest. The royal pair and their family were able to live there "with the greatest simplicity and ease," wrote Greville. The queen soon came to hold the Highlanders in more esteem than she held any other of her subjects.

She liked the simpler life of the Highlands, as her published journal was to reveal: she came to make the most of the thin stream of Scottish blood in her veins; also, so long as the sermons were short enough, she came to prefer the Scottish form of religious service. "You know," she was to tell her prime minister, William Ewart Gladstone, "I am not much of an Episcopalian"; and she developed a comfort in the consolations of the Reverend Norman Macleod and also a delight in the plain speech of John Brown, the Highland servant who stalked with Albert and became her personal attendant. The royal couple's withdrawal to Scotland and the Isle of Wight bore witness to a new sort of British monarchy. In their quest for privacy and intimacy Albert and Victoria adopted a way of life that mirrored that of their middle-class subjects, admittedly on a grander scale. Although Albert was interested in intellectual and scientific matters, Victoria's tastes were closer to those of most of her people. She enjoyed the novels of Charles Dickens and patronized the circus and waxwork exhibitions. Both Victoria and Albert, however, differed from many in the middle class in their shared preference for nudes in painting and sculpture.

Victoria was not the prude that many claimed her to be. She was also no Sabbatarian: "I am not at all an admirer or approver of our very dull Sunday." Victoria's delight in mingling with the Scottish poor at Balmoral did little to raise the level of her social awareness. Although in 1846 she and Albert supported the repeal of the Corn Laws (protectionist legislation that kept the price of British grain artificially high) in order to relieve distress in famine-devastated Ireland, they remained much more interested in and involved with the building of Osborne and foreign policy than in the tragedy of Ireland. Victoria, moreover, gave her full support to the government's policy of repression of the Chartists (advocates of far-reaching political and social reform) and believed the workers in her realm to be contented and loyal. In 1848, rejoicing in the failure of the last great Chartist demonstration in London, the queen wrote: The loyalty of the people at large has been very striking and their indignation at their peace being interfered with by such worthless and wanton men  immense.

The consequences of continental revolutions led her to conclude: Revolutions are always bad for the country, and the cause of untold misery to the people. Obedience to the laws and to the Sovereign, is obedience to a higher Power, divinely instituted for the good of the people, not the Sovereign, who has equally duties and obligations. Yet, revolution or no revolution, many of her people lived in "untold misery," a fact Victoria rarely confronted. For both the queen and the prince consort the highlight of their reign came in 1851, with the opening of the Great Exhibition. Albert poured himself into the task of organizing the international trade show that became a symbol of the Victorian Age. Housed in the architectural marvel of the Crystal Palace, a splendid, greenhouse-inspired glass building erected in Hyde Park, the Great Exhibition displayed Britain's wealth and technological achievements to a wondering world. To Victoria the success of the Great Exhibition provided further evidence of her husband's genius: "I do feel proud at the thought of what my beloved Albert's great mind has conceived." Profits from the Great Exhibition funded what became the South Kensington complex of colleges and museums. Albert has been credited with teaching Victoria the importance of remaining above party.

Certainly he saw the danger in the Whig partisanship she openly displayed before their marriage; more clearly than Victoria he realized the fine sense of balance required of a constitutional monarch. Albert's own actions, however, such as his much-criticized appearance in the gallery of the House of Commons during Peel's speech on the first day of the Corn Laws debates (and thus his open and partisan show of support for Peel), revealed his political sympathies. Gladstone noted in 1846 that the Prince is very strongly Conservative in his politics and his influence with the Q. is over-ruling; through him she has become so attached to Conservative ideas that she could hardly endure the idea of the opposite Party as her ministers. Like the queen, Albert believed that the sovereign had an important and active role to play in British politics. The fluid political situation operating during the prince's lifetime made such an active role seem possible.

After the repeal of the Corn Laws (1846) there was a period, not ending until the election of 1868, when politics tended to consist of a series of temporary alliances between splinter groups and no single group could guarantee its extended control over the House of Commons: the golden age of the private member, a condition rendering active political intervention by the crown not only possible but sometimes even necessary. There was a role for the cabinet maker, especially in helping to compose coalitions. Its significance must not, however, be overemphasized; although Victoria probably would not have admitted it, the queen's role, albeit "substantial," was always "secondary." Foreign affairs. The tradition also persisted that the sovereign had a special part to play in foreign affairs and could conduct them alone with a secretary of state. Victoria and Albert had relatives throughout Europe and were to have more. Moreover, they visited and were visited by other monarchs.

Albert was determined that this personal intelligence should not be disregarded and that the queen should never become (as his own mentor the Baron Stockmar had indicated) "a mandarin figure which has to nod its head in assent or shake it in denial as its Minister pleases." The result was a clash with Lord Palmerston, the foreign secretary, who could look back on a career of high office beginning before the royal couple was born. The prince distrusted Palmerston's character, disapproved of his methods, thought his policy shallow, and disagreed with his concept of the constitution. Even after Victoria insisted to Palmerston in 1850, "having once given her sanction to a measure, that it be not arbitrarily altered or modified by the minister," the foreign secretary continued to follow policies disapproved of by both Albert and Victoria, such as his encouragement of nationalist movements that threatened to dismember the Austrian Empire. Finally, after Palmerston expressed his approval of the coup d'�tat of Louis Napoleon (later Napoleon III) in 1851 without consulting the queen, the prime minister, Lord John Russell, dismissed him. Within a few months the immensely popular Palmerston was back in office, however, as home secretary.

He would serve twice as prime minister. After Albert's death Victoria's disapproval of Palmerston diminished; his conservative domestic policy and his insistence that Britain receive its due in world affairs accorded with her own later views. On the eve of the Crimean War (1854-56) the royal pair encountered a wave of unpopularity, and Albert was suspected, without any foundation, of trying to influence the government in favour of the Russian cause. There was, however, a marked revival of royalist sentiment as the war wore on. The queen personally superintended the committees of ladies who organized relief for the wounded and eagerly seconded the efforts of Florence Nightingale: she visited crippled soldiers in the hospitals and instituted the Victoria Cross for gallantry. With the death of Prince Albert on Dec. 14, 1861, the Albertine monarchy came to an end. Albert's influence on the queen was lasting. He had changed her personal habits and her political sympathies. From him she had received training in orderly ways of business, in hard work, in the expectation of royal intervention in ministry making at home, and in the establishment of a private (because royal) intelligence service abroad. The English monarchy had changed.

As the historian G.M. Young said, "In place of a definite but brittle prerogative it had acquired an undefinable but potent influence." Queen Victoria Queen Victoria ▼ Primary Sources ▼ Queen Victoria Alexandrina Victoria, the only child of Edward, Duke of Kent and Victoria Maria Louisa of Saxe-Coburg, was born in 24th May 1819. The Duke of Kent was the fourth son of George III and Victoria Maria Louisa was the sister of King Leopold of Belgium. The Duke and Duchess of Kent selected the name Victoria but her uncle, George IV , insisted that she be named Alexandrina after her godfather, Tsar Alexander II of Russia . Victoria's father died when she was eight months old. The Duchess of Kent developed a close relationship with Sir John Conroy, an ambitious Irish officer. Conroy acted as if Victoria was his daughter and had a major influence over her as a child. On the death of George IV in 1830, his brother William IV became king. William had no surviving legitimate children and soVictoria, became his heir.

William's health was not good and he feared that Conroy would become the power behind the throne if Victoria became queen before she was eighteen. William IV died 27 days after Victoria's eighteenth birthday. Although William was unaware of this, Victoria disliked Conroy and she had objected to his attempt to exert power over her. As soon as she became queen in 1837, Victoria banished Conroy from the Royal Court. Lord Melbourne was Prime Minister when Victoria became queen. Melbourne was fifty-eight and a widower. Melbourne's only child had died and he treated Victoria like his daughter. Queen Victoria grew very fond of Melbourne and became very dependent on him for political advice. Melbourne was leader of the Whig party and although radical in his youth, his views were now extremely conservative. Melbourne had been a member of Earl Grey's government that had passed the 1832 Reform Act , but he had privately been against the measure. Melbourne attempted to protect Victoria from the harsh realities of British life and even advised her not to read Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens because it dealt with "paupers, criminals and other unpleasant subjects". Queen Victoria and Melbourne became very close.

An apartment was made available for Lord Melbourne at Windsor Castle and it was estimated that he spent six hours a day with the queen. Victoria's feelings for Melbourne were clearly expressed in her journal. On one occasion she wrote: "he is such an honest, good kind-hearted man and is my friend, I know it." Some people objected to this close relationship. When on royal visits, some members of the crowd would shout out "Mrs. Melbourne". Lord Melbourne's old friend, Thomas Barnes , the editor of The Times wrote "Is it for the Queen's service - is it for the Queen's dignity - is it becoming - is it commonly decent?" In the autumn of 1837 a rumour circulated that Victoria was considering marrying Lord Melbourne . Queen Victoria wrote in her diary that she was growing very fond of Melbourne and loved listening to him talk: "Such stories of knowledge; such a wonderful memory; he knows about everybody and everything; who they were and what they did. He has such a kind and agreeable manner; he does me the world of good." In 1839 Lord Melbourne resigned after a defeat in the House of Commons . Sir Robert Peel , the Tory leader, now became Prime Minister.

It was the custom for the Queen's ladies of the bedchamber to be of the same political party as the government. Peel asked Victoria to replace the Whig ladies with Tory ladies. When Victoria refused, Peel resigned and Melbourne and the Whigs returned to office. Soon after the return of Lord Melbourne as Prime Minister, Victoria saw Lady Flora Hastings, one of her ladies-in-waiting, getting into a carriage with Sir John Conroy. A few months later Victoria noticed that Lady Hastings appeared to be pregnant. When Victoria approached Lady Hastings about this she claimed that she was still a virgin and had not had a sexual relationship with Conroy. Victoria refused to believe her and insisted that she submitted to a medical examination. The queen's doctor discovered that Lady Hastings was indeed a virgin and that the swelling was caused by a cancerous growth on the liver. The story was leaked to the newspapers and when Lady Hastings died of cancer a few months later, Victoria became very unpopular with the British public. Soon afterwards an attempt was made to kill Victoria while she was driving in her carriage in London.

Further assassination attempts took place in 1842 (twice), 1849, 1850, 1872 and 1882. Queen Victoria's cousin, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg , visited London in 1839. Victoria immediately fell in love with Albert and although he initially had doubts about the relationship, the couple were eventually married in February 1840. During the next eighteen years Queen Victoria gave birth to nine children. Lord Melbourne resigned as Prime Minister in 1841. However, by this time, it was Prince Albert , rather than Melbourne, who had become the main influence over Victoria's political views. Whereas Melbourne had advised Victoria not to think about social problems, Prince Albert invited Lord Ashley to Buckingham Palace to talk about what he had discovered about child labour in Britain. Queen Victoria had a good relationship with the next two prime ministers, Sir Robert Peel and Lord John Russell . However, she disapproved of Lord Palmerston , the Foreign Secretary. Palmerston believed the main objective of the government's foreign policy should be to increase Britain's power in the world. This sometimes involved adopting policies that embarrassed and weakened foreign governments.

Queen Victoria and Prince Albert , on the other hand, believed that the British government should do what it could to help preserve European royal families against revolutionary groups advocating republicanism. This was very important to Victoria and Albert as they were closely related to several of the European royal families that faced the danger of being overthrown. Victoria and Albert also objected to Palmerston's sexual behaviour. On one occasion he had attempted to seduce one of Victoria's ladies in waiting. Palmerston entered Lady Dacre's bedroom while staying as Queen Victoria's guest at Windsor Castle. Only Lord Melbourne's intervention saved Palmerston from being removed from office. In the summer of 1850 Queen Victoria asked Lord John Russell to dismiss Palmerston. Russell told the queen he was unable to do this because Palmerston was very popular in the House of Commons. However, in December 1851, Lord Palmerston congratulated Louis Napoleon Bonaparte on his coup in France. This action upset Russell and other radical members of the Whig party and this time he accepted Victoria's advice and sacked Palmerston. Six weeks later Palmerston took revenge by helping to bring down Lord John Russell's government. In 1855 Lord Palmerston became Prime Minister.

Queen Victoria found it difficult to work with him but their relationship gradually improved. When Palmerston died she wrote in her journal: "We had, God knows! terrible trouble with him about Foreign Affairs. Still, as Prime Minister he managed affairs at home well, and behaved to me well. But I never liked him." Prince Albert died of typhoid fever in December 1861. Victoria continued to carry out her constitutional duties such as reading all diplomatic despatches. However, she completely withdrew from public view and now spent most of her time in the Scottish Highlands at her home at Balmoral Castle. Victoria even refused requests from her government to open Parliament in person. Politicians began to question whether Victoria was earning the money that the State paid her. While at Balmoral Queen Victoria became very close to John Brown, a Scottish servant. Victoria's friendship with Brown caused some concern and rumours began to circulate that the two had secretly married. Hostility towards Victoria increased and some Radical MPs even spoke in favour of abolishing the British monarchy and replacing it with a republic. In 1868 William Gladstone , leader of the Liberals in the House of Commons , became Prime Minister.

Gladstone's government had plans for a series of reforms including the extension of the franchise, elections by secret ballot and a reduction in the power of the House of Lords. Victoria totally disagreed with these policies but did not have the power to stop Gladstone's government from passing the 1872 Secret Ballot Act . In 1874 the Tory, Benjamin Disraeli , became Prime Minister. Victoria much preferred Disraeli's conservatism to Gladstone's liberalism. Victoria also approved of Disraeli's charm. Disraeli later remarked that: "Everyone likes flattery, and when you come to royalty, you should lay it on with a trowel." Queen Victoria was very upset when Gladstone replaced Disraeli as premier in 1880. When Disraeli died the following year, Victoria wrote to his private secretary that she was devastated by the news and could not stop crying. Gladstone's relationship with Victoria failed to improve. As well as her objection to the 1884 Reform Act , Victoria disagreed with Gladstone's foreign policy. William Gladstone believed that Britain should never support a cause that was morally wrong.

Victoria took the view that not to pursue Britain's best interest was not only misguided, but close to treachery. In 1885 Victoria sent a telegram to Gladstone criticizing his failure to take action to save General Gordon at Khartoum. Gladstone was furious because the telegram was uncoded and delivered by a local station-master. As a result of this telegram it became public knowledge that Victoria disapproved of Gladstone's foreign policy. The relationship became even more strained when Gladstone discovered that Victoria was passing on confidential documents to the Marquess of Salisbury , the leader of the Conservatives . In 1885 the Marquess of Salisbury became Prime Minister. He was to remain in power for twelve of the last fifteen years of her reign. Victoria shared Salisbury's imperialist views and was thrilled when General Kitchener was successful in avenging General Gordon in the Sudan in 1898. Victoria also enthusiastically supported British action against the Boers in South Africa. Queen Victoria died at her house on the Isle of Wight on 22nd January 1901.

Queen Mary - Biography - IMDb Queen Mary Jump to: Overview (5) | Mini Bio (1) | Spouse (1) | Trivia (9) Overview (5) Victoria Mary Augusta Louise Olga Pauline Claudine Agnes May Nicknames 5' 6" (1.68 m) Mini Bio (1) Queen Mary was born Victoria Mary Augusta Louise Olga Pauline Claudine Agnes Mary in Kensington Palace on May 26, 1867 to Duke Francis and Duchess Mary of Teck. Young Mary was the great-granddaughter of George III and a second cousin to Queen Victoria . She and her family lived a quiet life in England, forced to exist on the money that Duchess Mary's mother the Duchess of Cambridge was able to give them. Unfortunately the money was not enough to keep the creditors away and in 1883 the family moved around Europe, settling in Italy for awhile. They went around Europe for two years before settling again in London. After this Mary, as she was called, became her mother's unofficial secretary. Mary spent much of her time corresponding with her family including her Aunt who lived in Germany.

She also corresponded with her cousin (and future sister-in-law) Maude (the daughter of future King Edward VII). In 1891, at the behest of Queen Victoria, Mary was engaged to Queen Victoria's grandson Prince Albert Victor , Duke of Clarence. Unfortunately Albert died shortly afterwards. Queen Victoria, however, suggested that Mary marry Albert's brother George. Although it was an arranged marriage George and Mary fell deeply in love and on July 6, 1893 they were married. Over the course of their marriage the Yorks (they were Duke and Duchess of York until his father became King) had six children: Prince Edward in 1894, Prince Albert in 1895, Mary in 1897, George, Duke of Kent in 1902, and Prince John in 1905. In January 1901 Queen Victoria died and Mary's father-in-law became King Edward VII. This led Mary and George to be Prince and Princess of Wales about a year later. In 1910 her father-in-law died and Mary became Queen Mary. As Queen she helped her husband with his new role as King.

She was the Queen Consort for about 25 years before her husband died in January of 1936. Her oldest son Edward became Edward VIII after the death of George V. Shortly afterwards she was shocked and saddened to hear that her son would renounce his throne to marry Wallis Warfield Simpson. Her second son, Albert, then became King choosing to name himself King George VI. She supported her son and his wife in their new role being the first dowager Queen to go to a successor's coronation. While the new King and Queen traveled around the British Commonwealth, Queen Mary helped look after their two young daughters, Elizabeth and Margaret. During World War Two, the King was worried about his mother's safety and he suggested that she move somewhere in the country where it would be safer. She did what he asked and went to live with her niece, only leaving the house shortly after the war in Europe was over. She spent the remaining years of her life devoting herself to charities. She also liked obtaining jewels including the jewels of Empress Marie of Russia (Nicholas II's mother).

During this time she also spent time with her great-grandchildren, Charles and Anne, helping look after them when their parents (Elizabeth and Prince Phillip) were away helping the ailing king. In 1952 her son King George VI died of lung cancer. She was sick at the time with lung cancer as well, and shortly before the coronation of her granddaughter Elizabeth, she died. - IMDb Mini Biography By: crr Spouse (1) ( 6 July 1893 - 20 January 1936) (his death) (6 children) Trivia (9) Mother of King Edward VIII ( Duke of Windsor ), King George VI , Mary the Princess Royal (aka Victoria, 1897-1965), Prince Henry ( Duke of Gloucester ), Prince George ( Duke of Kent ), and Prince John (1905-1919) The ocean liner Queen Mary was named in her honour. Her 28-word speech christening the liner was the only broadcast address ever made to her people by the intensely shy queen, who preferred devoting herself to her children.

She had three younger brothers: Adolphus II (Cambridge) of Teck (Duke of Teck and 1st Marquess of Cambridge) (1868-1927); Francis Joseph Leopold Frederick of Teck (Prince Francis) (1870-1910), and Alexander George (Cambridge) of Teck (Prince Alexander, 1st Earl of Athlone) (1874-1957). Alexander served as Governor General of South Africa (1923-1931) and Canada (during WWII). Daughter of Franz Paul Karl Louis von Teck (1st Duke/Prince of Teck) and Princess Mary Adelaide of Cambridge (a grand-daughter of King George III, known as "Fat Mary"). As a great-grand-daughter of George III, she was the 3rd cousin once removed of her husband George V. Queen of England (1910-1936) and Queen Mother (1936-1953).

She had previously held the titles of Princess Mary ("May") of Teck (1867-1893), Duchess of York (1893-1901) and Princess of Wales (1901-1910). She was engaged to marry Prince Albert Victor , oldest son of King Edward VII . However, Eddy died of influenza shortly before the marriage was due to take place; she instead married his younger brother George - whose birthday parties she attended as a child. Died from the same cause (lung cancer) as her son King George VI , although at the time it was announced that she had died from "gastric problems.".

Question: Which title was held by Queen Victoria’s father?
Answer: Duke of Kent