324: Gladstone was interrupted often by Palmerston’s enthusiastic supporters, as were all of Palmerston’s opponents: Ridley 524.
325: Crowds crammed the avenues outside the entrances to the House: Times 29 June 1850, 2.
325: … “the House and country only wish to hear Peel, Lord John, and Dizzy; all others are only bores”: Roebuck 242.
325: Cockburn deftly and with legal precision deflected Gladstone’s attack, defending item by item Palmerston’s actions in Greece and throughout Europe: Times 29 June 1850, 2–3.
325: Robert Peel… managed to chide Palmerston’s policy and yet conciliate the Whig government: Times 29 June 1850, 4–5.
325: John Russell, speaking next, had an easy job of it: Times 29 June 1850,5.
325: In a speech containing little of his trademark wit, he explained why he would vote as Peel did: Times 29 June 1850, 5–6.
326: … 250 supporters would enthusiastically sing the national anthem and cheer vociferously the lines “Confound their politics,/Frustrate their knavish tricks”: Ridley 525.
326: … he “would have consummated his fiendish scheme by violence had not the miraculous efforts of his victim and such assistance attracted by her screams, saved her”: Ridley 532.
326: Albert and Victoria, with the help of Stockmar, tried again a month later, setting out in a memo for Palmerston the behavior they expected in a foreign minister: St. Aubyn, Queen Victoria 250–1.
326: Russell thought the memo so humiliating that Palmerston would have to resign rather than accept it: Ridley 532.
327: “I consider that man to be the happiest in England at this moment”: Roebuck 242.
327: His wife Julia was feeling unwell and so she remained in bed, reading a newspaper account of his speech: Gash 697.
327: Playfair … had been appointed upon Peel’s recommendation Special Commissioner for the Exhibition: Davis 71; Auerbach 70–1.
328: They discussed the mounting opposition to the Hyde Park site, and resolved that they would hold the Exhibition there or nowhere: RC/8/A, minutes for 29 June 1850, np.
328: “Depend upon it,” he said, “the House of Commons is a timid body”: Cole Henry 167.
328: Joseph Paxton … approached Henry Cole with a revolutionary idea for the Exhibition building: Davis 81.
328: Three days later, bored in the middle of a railway director’s meeting in Derby, Paxton created the most famous doodle in history: Christopher Hobhouse 28; Auerbach 48; ffrench 91.
328: On the train from Derby he had run into the engineer Robert Stevenson—of the Building Committee—and quickly gained his support: Auerbach 49; Christopher Hobhouse 32.
328: He met with the vice-chairman of the Commission, Earl Granville, who promised to submit the plan to the Commissioners: Christopher Hobhouse 34.
328: “I believe nothing can stand against my plans, everybody likes them”: Auerbach 49.
328: He also forwarded a set of plans to Peel: ffrench 97.
329: … they referred Paxton’s plans to them: Christopher Hobhouse 35.
329: The Commission adjourned at 1:15: according to the “Court Circular”: Times 1 July 1850, 4; it adjourned at 3:00, according to Norman Gash: Gash 697.
329: … he kissed his wife good-bye and set off with his groom for his customary ride around the Parks: Gash 697; Times 1 July 1850, 5.
329: The horse he mounted was new to him—an eight-year-old which a friend had purchased for him two months before, from Tattersall’s: Gash 697; Illustrated London News 17 (1850): 10.
329: Peel’s coachman was suspicious about the horse, and had recommended Peel not ride it: Gash 697.
329: Peel and his groom passed through St. James’s Park and stopped at Buckingham Palace: For Peel’s ride, see Gash 697–701; Times 1 July 1850, 5; Daily News 1 July 1850, 5; Illustrated London News 17 (1850): 10.
330: The two men who had sat him up, as well as the two doctors, now supported Peel: Times 1 July 1850, 5. According to the Illustrated London News, a doctor from St. George’s Hospital accompanied Peel home: 17 (1850): 10.
330: … a patent hydraulic bed was set up in the same room: Illustrated London News 17 (1850): 10.
330: “Sir Robert Peel has met with a severe accident by falling from his horse”: Gash 698–99.
330: Albert and the Prince of Prussia rushed to Whitehall Gardens as soon as they heard of his fall: Times 1 July 1850, 5.
330: “We have, alas! now another cause of much greater anxiety in the person of our excellent Sir Robert Peel”: Victoria Letters (first series) 2:253.
330: Peel told them on the day of the accident that his injury was worse than they realized, and that he would not survive it: Gash 699.
331: “That silent, solemn crowd betokened the unknown depth to which love and reverence for the great practical statesman had sunk in the minds of humble English men and women”: Illustrated London News 17 (1850): 3.
331: He ate a little and even walked around the room with assistance: Gash 701.
331: … he held each of his children’s hands in turn, and whispered his good-byes to them, the words “God bless you!” scarcely audible: Illustrated London News 17 (1850): 10.
331: His wife Julia, overwhelmed, was led from the room: Gash 701.
331: Peel’s death …“absorbed every other subject of interest”: Greville 2:458.
332: “All persons agree that there has never been an instance of such general gloom and regret”: Bunsen 2:142.
332: “He has felt, and feels, Sir Robert’s loss dreadfully”: Victoria Letters (first series) 2:256.
332: “Now our Exhibition is to be driven from London”: Albert to Ernst, 4 July 1850, qtd. in Auerbach 46.
332: Sibthorp laid into the greatest trash, fraud, and imposition “palmed upon” the people of Britain: Times 5 July 1850, 3.
333: … Peel, “that eminent man, who never neglected any duty … which he considered conducive to the public good”: Times 5 July 1850, 4.
333: “The feeling of the house was completely altered”: Lord John Russell to Albert, qtd. in Davis 78.
333: His iron-and-glass design had received a cold reception from the Exhibition’s Building Committee, especially from Isambard Kingdom Brunel: Auerbach 49.
333: … Paxton’s “peculiar” design would cost 10% more than a variation of their own: Davis 83.
334: “Perhaps I might take the liberty of saying that I consider the success of the Exhibition would be considerably increased by the adoption of Mr. Paxton’s plan”: Cole 1:124–25.
334: On the sixteenth, the Building Committee met with the Royal Commission: Times 16 July 1850, 8.
334: “In all the matters which I had in hand,” Albert was able to write Stockmar four days later from Osborne, “I had triumphant success”: Martin 2:247.
334: … when he returned to complete his Home Office examination on Friday morning, the fifth of July, there was no large crowd outside to hoot or hiss him: Examiner 6 July 1850, 428. (Other newspapers, however, such as Lloyd’s Weekly—on 7 July 1850, 7—note a larger crowd.)
334: … his health suffered from lack of walking: Times 6 July 1850, 8; Examiner 6 July 1850, 428.
334: … he had instead spent most of the last week absorbed in his books: Manchester Examiner 6 July 1850, 4.
334: … his own counsel, with whom he hadn’t spoken since his arrest: Times 6 July 1850, 8.
334: Only the Queen’s physician, James Clark, had anything new to add: Times 6 July 1850, 8; Examiner 6 July 1850, 428.
335: Huddleston, Pate’s attorney, said little: Times 6 July 1850, 8.
335: Monro visited Pate twice at Clerkenwell and three times in Newgate: “Robert Pate.”
336: Attorney General Jervis, then, was compelled to hurry the trial along, requesting the presiding judge, Baron Alderson, to schedule Pate’s trial for the next morning, 11 July: Times 11 July 1850, 7.
336: … the courtroom on that morning was full but not crowded: Times 12 July 1850, 7.
336: With perfect composure he bowed slightly to the justices: Times 12 July 1850, 7.
336: … Pate loudly pleaded not guilty: Times 12 July 1850, 7.
336: … the effect of such an acquittal “would be that he would be imprisoned for the rest of his life”: Times 12 July 1850, 7.
337: … Cockburn in his opening admitted to the jury that he simply could not prove “that there were certain and safe grounds for believing that the prisoner at the bar was not enabled to discriminate between right and wrong”: Morning Chronicle 12 July 1850, 5.
338: … the testimony, Cockburn argued, “might fall short of that degree of proof of insanity which would be necessary to give [Pate] immunity from the penalties of law”: Morning Chronicle 12 July 1850, 5.
338: Pate was not vicious, but “unfortunate,” and did not deserve to be visited with the full severity of the law: Morning Chronicle 12 July 1850, 5.
338: The defense presented a host of witnesses to Pate’s traumas and idiosyncrasies while in the army: For varied accounts of the testimony in Pate’s trial, see Times 12 July 1850, 7; “Robert Pate”; Morning Chronicle 12 July 1850, 5; Reynolds’s Weekly 14 July 1850, 5.
338: Pate’s valet, Charles Dodman, enumerated Pate’s many personal eccentricities at home: Times 12 July 1850, 7; “Robert Pate.”
339: … Charles Mahon, better known as the “O’Gorman Mahon,” testified that in his opinion Pate was a “maniac … the frequent subject of remark amongst myself and [my] companions”: Reynolds’s Weekly 14 July 1850, 5.
339: … “he presents an example of what is not at all uncommon to me, of persons who are very devoid of mental power … who consequently persevere in no pursuit, have no object, and are unfit for all the ordinary duties of life”: “Robert Pate.”
339: … “Is he, in your judgment, capable of distinguishing between right and wrong?”: “Robert Pate.”
339: He was “subject to sudden impulses of passion”: Times 12 July 1850, 7.
340: “Be so good, Dr. Monro,” Alderson snapped at him, “as not to take upon yourself the functions of the judges and the jury”: Times 12 July 1850, 7.
340: … if he were soon free, probably “unwatched and unrestrained,” he would “renew his dangerous and violent proceedings”: Times 12 July 1850, 7.
341: “Did this unfortunate gentleman know it was wrong to strike the Queen on the forehead?”: Morning Chronicle 12 July 1850, 6.
341: “A man might say that he picked a pocket from some uncontrollable impulse”: Times 12 July 1850, 7.
341: … Alderson noted Pate’s eccentric habits, his “differing from other men,” his mental affliction”: Times 12 July 1850, 7.
341: … “you are as insane as it is possible for a person to be who is capable of distinguishing between right and wrong”: Morning Chronicle 12 July 1850, 6.
341: For all that, he told Pate, “you are to be pitied”: Times 12 July 1850, 7.
342: Pate would not be subject to the “disgraceful punishment of whipping”: Times 12 July 1850, 7.
342: … leading several who read the trial in the newspapers the next day … to conclude that the court had given Pate special treatment because of his social status: Times 13 July 1850, 3.
342: … “one of the most successful realizations, on a large scale, of the ugly in architecture,” Henry Mayhew said of it: Mayhew and Binny 234.
343: According to this letter, Pate was given an officer’s room and an officer to attend upon him, had access to the governor, and had a separate exercise yard: Daily News 9 August 1850, 4.
343: “Pate, we are informed, is in a very delicate state of health, and he employs his time by writing letters in different languages”: Moreton Bay Courier 18 November 1850, 1.
Chapter 18: Great Exhibition
344: “I wish you could have witnessed the 1st May 1851”: Victoria Letters (first series) 2:317.
344: “Albert’s dearest name is immortalised with this great conception … his own”: Victoria Letters (first series) 2:318.
345: From early in the morning, the crowds began to assemble in numbers simply too great to count: Times 2 May 1851, 4; one estimate of the numbers was 700,000 (Martin 2:369).
345: … a party of Royal Sappers soon restored order: Times 2 May 1851, 5.
345: The irrepressible Colonel Sibthorp had been carping at the project ever since: Times 5 February 1851, 4; ffrench 141; James 199.
345: “We have invited the pestilence into our dwellings, and we shall have to submit to its ravages”: qtd. Leapman 65.
346: “I am more dead than alive from overwork”: Martin 2:359.
346: The Tsar refused to issue passports to the Russian nobility: Longford 223.
346: “I am not easily given to panicking … but I confess to you that I would not like anyone belonging to me exposed to the imminent perils of these times”: qtd. in ffrench 147.
346: “I can give no guarantee against these perils”: qtd. in James 199–200.
347: … the Commissioners could not have come to “a more impolitic, a more absurd, or a more ludicrous resolution”: Daily News 17 April 1851, qtd. in Davis 117.
347: … “Queen Victoria is not Tiberius or Louis XI”: Times 17 April 1851, 5.
347: … a “densely crowded mass of human beings, in the highest good humor and most enthusiastic”: qtd. in Martin 2:365.
348: “The glimpse of the transept through the iron gates … gave us a sensation which I can never forget”: qtd. in Martin 2:365.
348: When the Queen ascended with her family to the throne, two organs burst into the national anthem: For details of the opening ceremony see the Times 2 May 1851, 4–6; Davis 126–8.
348: … sung by six hundred voices: Weintraub, Victoria 219.
348: The Lord Chamberlain, perplexed as to what to do with the man, consulted with Victoria and Albert: Playfair 120.
348: They recommended that he join the diplomats who were then forming up for the great procession through the Exhibition: Martin 367n.
349: The plan had been to keep the public well clear of their route: Martin 2:367.
349: … and so they walked, hemmed in by thousands, many with tears in their eyes, all cheering deafeningly and waving handkerchiefs: 2:367.
349: “HER MAJESTY, as She Appeared on the FIRST of MAY, Surrounded by ‘Horrible Conspirators and Assassins’”: Punch 20 (1851): 194.
349: Besides the multitudes who cheered her, the Queen could see little else: Martin 2:367–8.
349: It was a unique event, Victoria knew, “a thousand times superior” to her coronation: Martin 2:366.
350: Albert was visibly emotional, and the Queen noticed her Home Secretary was crying: Times 2 May 1851, 5; Martin 2:368.
350: “It was and is a day to live for ever”: Martin 2:366.
PART 4: TRIUMPH
Chapter 19: What Does She Do with It?
353: His controversial words about Victoria and her family both established him for a time as the people’s champion: The same report of Dilke’s 6 November 1871 speech, “Representation and Royalty,” appears in the Times 9 November 1871, 6, and the Daily News 10 November 1871, 6. A shorter account appears in the Newcastle Courant 10 November 1871, 5.
355: … she wrote to her Prime Minister, William Gladstone, deploring the recent spate of “Gross misstatements & fabrications injurious to the credit of the Queen & to the Monarchy”: Gued-alla 1:309.
355: … asking “whether he or at least some of his Colleagues shld not take an opportunity of reprobating in very strong terms such language”: Guedalla 1:308.
356: In 1871, republicanism had become “a distemper,” as Gladstone put it, and the “Royalty question” was one of the most vexing problems with which his ministry had to deal: Hibbert, Queen Victoria 336; Gladstone and Granville 283.
356: The economy had slumped since 1866, and unemployment was high, particularly in London where it was exacerbated by an influx of migrants from the countryside: Nicholls 48.
356: The fall of Emperor Louis Napoleon … and the establishment of a French Republic led to the spontaneous generation of dozens of republican clubs across the nation: Rumsey 4–8, 100–106.
356: … ready-made and enthusiastic audiences for republican speakers such as Charles Bradlaugh and trade union leader George Odger. Leventhal; Royle.
357: Victoria was plunged immediately into a chasm of grief, and then into a long-lasting depression, from which Albert devoted most of that year weaning her: Hibbert, Queen Victoria 266–67; St. Aubyn, Queen Victoria 318–19.
357: Albert was determined to train the Hanoverian vices out of his son with a rigorous course of academic study; any attempts by Bertie to rebel were met… with boxed ears or a rap across the knuckles with a stick: Hibbert, Royal Victorians 16; Magnus 9, 12.
357: … he enjoyed an element of freedom while training with the Grenadier Guards at Curragh Camp in Ireland: Hibbert, Royal Victorians 45–46; St. Aubyn, Edward VII 50–51.
358: The affair, thanks to Nellie’s boasting, had been the talk of all London: Magnus 47.
358: … “upon a subject which has caused me the greatest pain I have yet felt in this life”: James 268.
358: … “she could be able to give before a greedy multitude disgusting details of your profligacy for the sake of convincing the Jury:” James 268.
358: Albert’s heartsickness conspired with overwork, many sleepless nights, nervous strain, and almost certainly the effects of a long-lasting illness to undermine his health and sap his will to live: In his biography of Victoria, Giles St. Aubyn disputes the diagnosis that Albert came down with typhoid fever and speculates that he suffered from cancer of the bowels. St. Aubyn, Queen Victoria 328; James 268.
358: … three days later, with a cold and feverish and confessing to his diary “bin recht elend” (“I am very wretched”) he traveled to Cambridge to confront his son: James 269–70.
359: Palmerston and Foreign Minister John Russell drew up a bellicose communication demanding reparation and an apology: James 271.
Shooting Victoria Page 63
