It's Victoria Day weekend, and I am proud to be able to help renew public knowledge of the great woman this holiday commemorates by providing the following list of little known facts about her.
- If the Prince Regent hadn't detested Victoria's father, the Duke of Kent, she would have ruled under a different name. The Prince Regent livened up her christening by refusing to allow her to receive any of the traditional names of the British royal family. So her intended name of Victoire (sic) Georgina Alexandrina Charlotte Augusta became Alexandrina Victoria.
- She had an older half-brother and half-sister, Prince Charles and Princess Feodora of Leiningen. Feodora and Victoria were each other's closest friends throughout their lives, as a result of the curious circumstances of their childhood.
- These curious circumstances were called the Kensington System by their instigator, Capt. John Conroy. He had been the Duke of Kent's equerry, and after the Duke's death the Duchess fell under his influence. He wanted Victoria to be dependent on her mother so that when Victoria acceded to the throne he could control her through her mother. To make Victoria dependent, Conroy kept her and Feodora isolated from any outside influence. After Feodora was married off at the earliest opportunity, Victoria was on her own.
- Victoria nevertheless refused to fall under Conroy's influence. Before acceding to the throne she refused his request that she make him her personal secretary, on the day of her accession she ignored him and her mother, and after her accession she refused to receive him at court.
- She loved beer.
- Contrary to popular belief, Victoria's first language was English, not German.
- When she became queen one of the first things she did was pay
her father's considerable debts. - Like the rest of the royal family she was a staunch Whig. In 1839 she precipitated a political crisis which resulted in the Whigs preventing the Tories from taking over the government. The idea that the Crown should be above politics was introduced later by Prince Albert.
- Because she outranked Prince Albert, she proposed to him.
- In 1840 one Edward Oxford tried to shoot Victoria from close range while she was going to her mother's house in her carriage. She proceeded to her mother's house, then shortly after went out for another drive to assure the public that she had not beenhurt. The public was much impressed.
- In 1858 she wrote to her pregnant daughter: "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 very nature becomes so very animal and unecstatic."
- Victoria's noble wish to promote the cause of civilization by demolishing the Royal Pavilion, Brighton, was thwarted by Brighton Town Council, which purchased and refurnished the building. The monstrosity survives to this day.
Happy Victoria Day.
(This article was cribbed from Cecil Woodham-Smith's
Queen Victoria: Her Life and Times, 1819-1861.)
The Truth about Queen Victoria © John FitzGerald, 2001
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