Childhood at Court, 1819-1914 (4 page)

The new King and Queen were well disposed enough towards the Duchess of Kent and fond of her daughter, though they were suspicious of Conroy’s influence at Kensington Palace. Princess Victoria had not been allowed the close acquaintance with her kindly uncle and aunt that she would have liked, though she knew enough about the Queen’s tragic attempts at motherhood to hope that she would have the child she craved. The Duchess of Kent kept her daughter away from the ‘Acquatics’ as she contemptuously dubbed them, because – it was said – she looked askance at King William IV’s illegitimate brood, the adult children of his long liaison with the late actress Dorothy Jordan. The distance she put between herself and her brother- and sister-in-law, however, was part and parcel of Conroy’s plan of keeping the Kents in splendid isolation, under his influence.

In July 1830 Princess Victoria attended a Garter ceremony at St James’s Palace, and her small, withdrawn figure in black veil and weepers reaching to the ground, walking behind Queen Adelaide, was commented on by the German Ambassador. The next month, she was invited to court for the celebrations of Queen Adelaide’s thirty-eighth birthday. Though happy to be at the festivities, she was ill at ease and too frightened of her mother’s anger to smile and appear too friendly. King William complained later that she had stared at him stonily.

If the King had had his way, Princess Victoria would not have been called thus for much longer. Soon after Christmas, he instructed his Prime Minister, Lord Grey, to tell the Duchess of Kent that he wanted the Princess’s name to be changed to an English one. As the girl bore an Anglicized version of her mother’s name, Victoire, the request was hardly a tactful one, but the King stood by ‘his sole aim being that the name of the future Sovereign of this country should be English’. Elizabeth and Charlotte were mentioned as possible alternatives. With reluctance, the Archbishop of Canterbury informed that it might be legally possible to change a name by Act of Parliament, but the Duchess put up such a show of resistance that the idea was soon dropped.

It was a portent of clashes to come. The Duchess and her daughter were commanded to attend the Coronation in September 1831, and Princess Victoria was to be assigned a place in the procession behind the surviving Royal Dukes. As heiress presumptive, the Duchess of Kent maintained that her daughter should be allowed to walk directly behind the sovereign. Neither side would give way, and the Duchess refused to attend the ceremony or allow the Princess to participate, making excuses that they could not afford the expense, and that she feared the strain on her daughter’s health. The Princess was bitterly disappointed. Nothing, she recalled later, could console her – not even her dolls.

In 1832, shortly after her thirteenth birthday, two important changes took place in the life of the young Princess. She was instructed to keep a diary, which she maintained almost without ceasing until within a few days of her death sixty-eight years later; and she began to undertake extensive travels throughout the country.

The semi-royal tours, or ‘progresses’, to acquaint her with the country and with her future subjects, were instituted by Conroy. They were arranged without the consent of King William IV, whose entourage at court was predominantly Tory, while that of the Duchess of Kent was mainly Whig. Only too happy to exploit the emotions aroused by the year of the Great Reform Bill, Conroy encouraged citizens to present loyal addresses containing references to the Duchess’s support for the ‘free people’ of England.

Immediately before the first of these journeys, the Princess was presented with a small leather-backed notebook with mottled covers. The first inscription reads: ‘This Book Mama gave me that I might write the journal of my journey to Wales in it. Victoria, Kensington Palace, July 31st.’
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The Princess’s pencil writing is inked over by an adult hand.

The initial entries were no more than a dry record of events. Meant for the approval of her governess and her mother, they could hardly contain anything that was not strictly factual. The first entry, for Wednesday 1 August 1832, records rather mechanically that

We left K[ensington] P[alace] at 6 minutes past 7 and went through the Lower-field gate to the right. We went on, & turned to the left by the new road to Regent’s Park. The road & scenery is beautiful. 20 minutes to 9. We have just changed horses at Barnet, a very pretty little town.
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Passing through the Midlands, near Birmingham she had her first sight of industrial England:

We just passed through a town where all coal mines are and you see the fire glimmer at a distance in the engines in many places. The men, women, children, country and houses are all black. . . . The country is very desolate every where; there are coals about, and the grass is quite blasted and black. I just now see an extraordinary building flaming with fire. The country continues black, engines flaming, coals, in abundance, every where, smoking and burning coal heaps, intermingled with wretched huts and carts and little ragged children.
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In Wales they visited Anglesey, ‘
dear
Plas Newydd’, Caernarvon and Powis Castle. The tour also included three days with the Duke of Devonshire at Chatsworth, and luncheon ‘on splendid gold plate’ with Lord Shrewsbury at Alton Towers. At Oxford they saw the Sheldonian Theatre and the Bodleian Library, where Princess Victoria was shown Queen Elizabeth’s Latin exercise book – ‘when she was of my age (13)’. The journey ended with their return to Kensington Palace on 9 November.

King William IV was furious, suspecting that the Duchess and Conroy were endeavouring to set up a rival court: the late Duke of Kent had made no secret of his radical sympathies. Distracted by the worries of the Great Reform Bill going through Parliament that year, the publicly impartial but privately Tory King suspected that much harm could be done to the crown. He became ‘so indecent in his wrath’ that those around him feared for his sanity. When the Duchess of Kent and Princess Victoria visited the Isle of Wight in the summer of 1833, he was so angered by the ‘continual popping in the shape of salutes’ to his sister-in-law and niece that he ordered that in future the Royal Standard should be saluted only when the King or Queen was on board.

Now into her teens, the Princess’s education expanded accordingly. Her tutor filled the whole morning with lessons, including more history and natural philosophy. Science lessons included lectures on alchemy and anatomy, the latter of which she found ‘very disagreeable’.

Her adolescence coincided with a gradual liberalization in outlook towards children’s literature. With the influence of the Romantic movement in the fine arts, classical influences were being replaced by those of German and Nordic culture. Modern fairy tales, particularly those of the Brothers Grimm, first published in English translation in 1823, were becoming more respectable. While the old-fashioned might deride them as unsuitable, largely on the grounds that their sense of fantasy might prove frightening, the old arguments about their being immoral or contrary to reason had lapsed. The historical novel and adventure story both came into their own, particularly with the books of Walter Scott. Popularly regarded as the ‘American Scott’ was James Fenimore Cooper, whose
Last of the Mohicans
was reportedly the first novel the Princess read. She found it ‘very interesting’ and ‘very horrible’. Cooper’s tales of the conflict of wild and civilized races, Indians and whites, still had enough underlying moral tone, but as robust adventure stories they were at the same time more appealing to the young mind, and the occasional ‘very horrible’ element surely served some purpose in preparing children for adult life.

Scott’s novels were written mainly for an adult readership. The first British adventure stories written specially for children were Captain Marryat’s
Peter Simple
(published in 1834) and
Mr Midshipman Easy
(1836). In a sense they still fulfilled a didactic purpose, with their patriotic appeal in praise of the Navy and the seafaring life, but as adventure stories they appealed greatly to boys.

The Princess also studied the great poets, especially Pope, Gray, Cowper, Goldsmith, ‘parts of’ Virgil in Latin, and Sir Walter Scott, the latter being the only one she really enjoyed. The magical simplicity of Maria Edgeworth’s
Popular Tales
pleased her more than ‘many a novel’.

Opera and ballet interested her increasingly. Her idol was Giulia Grisi, one of the foremost young opera singers of her day, and she was thrilled when Grisi came to Kensington Palace to sing on her sixteenth birthday. By this time, she had put her dolls away. Her circle of acquaintances was slowly increasing. At a ball given by King William on her fourteenth birthday, at St James’s Palace, she had opened the dancing with her cousin, Prince George of Cambridge. He was only two months older than her, and his parents hoped that they might soon be betrothed.

When they returned home, she found consolation in the company of pets. The one thing Conroy did for which she was grateful was to give the Duchess of Kent a King Charles spaniel, Dash, whom the Princess adored, adopted and enjoyed dressing up in scarlet jacket and blue trousers. Dash evidently had a peaceful disposition and put up no resistance to being treated like a four-legged doll. That Christmas she gave him his own presents, three india-rubber balls, and two bits of gingerbread decorated with holly and candles. Whenever she was ill he spent ‘his little life’ in her room with her. In addition she had a horse called Rosa, who like Dash accompanied her on the progresses. Caged birds also lived in the royal quarters at Kensington, in particular a tame old canary which came out of its cage to peck gently at Dash’s fur, and a parakeet which laughed and coughed in faithful imitation of the grown-ups.

The year of 1835 was to prove a decisive one in the Princess’s childhood. On 30 July she was confirmed at the Chapel Royal, St James’s. The day before, the Duchess of Kent had given her three books to prepare her for the step, two of which she had read by the following day. ‘I felt that my confirmation was one of the most solemn and important events and acts in my life;’ she wrote, ‘and that I trusted it might have a salutary effect on my mind.’
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It was overshadowed when the King counted the Duchess of Kent’s retinue, declared it was too large and ordered Conroy out of the chapel. The comptroller bitterly resented this public indignity and never forgave the King. A power struggle was going on at Kensington, and the Princess was aware of efforts to dismiss the faithful Lehzen. ‘I was very much affected indeed when she came home,’ she wrote in her journal, evidently not just through religious awe, but also overcome by misery at the thought of her security being taken from her.

A month later the royal progresses began again with a grand tour of the north. The Princess looked forward to them with scant enthusiasm. The ‘Kensington system’ was preying on her emotions; she knew the effort of travelling would make her ill, and that the King would be upset. The Duchess and Conroy brushed her objections aside impatiently, and on 3 September 1835, in heat and dust, suffering from headache and backache, Princess Victoria set out for Yorkshire, taking in the York Musical Festival, Doncaster races, and the Belvoir mausoleum. Her health had not improved, and by the time they reached Holkham, she was so exhausted she nearly fell asleep over dinner.

At the end of September they moved to Ramsgate for an autumn holiday. The Princess’s spirits rose, for King Leopold of the Belgians was coming to stay for a few days. She had not seen him for several years, and had never met his wife, Queen Louise, daughter of Louis-Philippe, King of the French. Only seven years separated the Queen Consort and the future Queen regnant, and Louise immediately put her niece at ease, telling her to treat her as an elder sister. Victoria had a delightful time trying on her aunt’s Parisian clothes while King Leopold, as yet unaware of the darker aspects of the ‘Kensington system’, went for a long walk with Conroy, assuring him that with tact, he might still win himself ‘a very good position’.

Two days before the King and Queen were due to depart, Princess Victoria awoke feeling sick. By the time they left, she was too ill and wretched to eat. Her physician Dr James Clark, appointed to the Duchess of Kent’s household the previous year, examined her and thought it was ‘a slight indisposition’ which would pass in two or three days. Lehzen was concerned that it was more than that, but the Duchess told her that she and the Princess were exaggerating. In fact, the illness worsened, and the Princess was confined in her room for five weeks. Whether it was typhoid, tonsilitis, or collapse from strain, has never been ascertained.

Although ill, the Princess was a fighter – as she needed to be. Backed up by the Duchess, Conroy strode into her room one day carrying a pencil and paper which he asked the sixteen-year-old invalid to sign. It was a pledge by which she would agree to appoint him as her private secretary on her succession to the throne. Fortunately Lehzen was in the room as well, and despite his fiery temper, Conroy was forced to leave the room, muttering angrily, without the signature.

The Princess had recovered by January 1836 and they returned to Kensington Palace. Four months later, a few days before her seventeenth birthday, her Coburg cousins, Ernest and Albert, were invited to come and stay. She was very taken with them, ‘particularly Albert, who is the most reflective of the two’, and she felt wretched when they returned home.

In August King William IV celebrated his seventy-first birthday. The Duchess of Kent had declined to attend Queen Adelaide’s birthday on 13 August, but she could not refuse the royal command to attend that of the King the following week. Enraged by the Duchess’s appropriation of a suite of rooms at Kensington Palace, he made a rambling speech at the end of the dinner in which he trusted that his life would be spared for nine months longer, in order that no regency would take place; ‘I should then have the satisfaction of leaving the royal authority to the personal exercise of that young lady (pointing to the Princess), the heiress presumptive of the Crown, and not in the hands of a person now near me, who is surrounded by evil advisers and who is herself incompetent to act with propriety in the station in which she would be placed.’
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