by Jane Ridley
The young Prince and Princess of Wales with baby Eddy.
Queen Victoria in mourning. Staring—glaring—straight into the camera.
Bertie’s entry in the measure book of tailor Henry Poole. When he was first measured at Oxford in 1860, his chest was 33¾ inches; his waist 29¼. In 1905 his chest was 47 inches; his waist 46½. Alix’s minuscule measurements (waist 21 inches, bust 31½ inches) are on the bottom line. Scrawled across the entry in pencil is: “Dead 6/5/10.”
Bertie’s brother Affie, Duke of Edinburgh, wearing the dress uniform of a naval officer.
Louise, Bertie’s artistic sister.
Alice, Bertie’s favorite sister, with her husband, Louis, Grand Duke of Hesse.
House party, 1860s. Lady-in-waiting Lady Macclesfield, the “precise little stick” who delivered Eddy, looks up at Alix. Oliver Montagu, equerry and “wicked boy,” lies on the grass at Alix’s feet. Bertie stands behind holding his hat.
Goodwood party, 1860s. Bertie poses in a white suit (left). Alix, fourth left, appears to ignore him.
Alix, with her hair down, convalescing from her illness with a seedy-looking Bertie at her side, 1867. Georgie and Eddy in frocks.
Hunting party at Kimbolton, 1868. Bertie stands on the balcony (middle). Beside him is Lord Hartington, and next to Hartington is his mistress Louise, Duchess of Manchester. Below, hatless, is Louise’s husband, the Duke of Manchester.
The Prince of Wales, c. 1867: Known for his womanizing and gambling, Bertie was an unpopular figure at this time.
Susan Vane-Tempest, Bertie’s discarded mistress. “I cannot describe to you how wretched I am,” she wrote him.
John Brown. Adored by Victoria but hated by the household, who called him “The Queen’s stallion.”
Danish sisters: Alix (right) and Minnie “double dressing.”
Minnie’s Russian family. The czar, Alexander II (seated) in front of his daughter, the Grand Duchess Marie, who married Affie in 1874. Alix’s sister Minnie sits with her baby, the future Nicholas II, on her knee. Her bearlike husband, the czarevitch Sasha, later Alexander III, stands behind her.
Alix (left) and (right) Oliver Montagu, her close friend and admirer. His support helped her survive Bertie’s unfaithfulness and Eddy’s death.
Bertie in Ceylon, 1875.
Lillie Langtry, the Professional Beauty (PB) whose Grecian profile took London—and Bertie—by storm.
Alix, photographed by Alexander Bassano in 1881. Note the collar of pearls concealing the scar on her neck.
Jennie Churchill, Bertie’s chère amie. “Had Lady Randolph Churchill been like her face she would’ve governed the world.”
Bertie and his family, 1884. From left: Georgie; Maud; Alix, looking thinner and prettier than her daughters; Eddy, breaking sartorial convention by wearing a wing collar, flamboyant tie, and spats with a kilt; Louise, Victoria.
Bertie’s daughters. From left: Maud, Victoria, and Louise, 1887. Unkindly known as “the Hags,” they still wore identical dresses though Louise was already twenty.
Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria, shortly before the Mayerling tragedy.
Daisy Brooke entertains the Prince of Wales at Easton Lodge, November 1891. From right: “Fat Mary,” Duchess of Teck; Princess May; the Marquis de Soveral, “the Blue Monkey” (seated); Daisy. Lord Brooke sits in front of Bertie.
Daisy with her son Maynard shortly after her “abdication” as Bertie’s mistress.
Queen Victoria, photographed by Alexander Bassano in 1882 wearing her crown made of one thousand diamonds. She refused to share power with Bertie.
May of Teck: engagement photo, 1891. Just over six weeks later her fiancé, Eddy, was dead; in 1893 she married his brother George.
Britain’s German family: Queen Victoria and Bertie at Coburg, 1894. From left: Arthur, Duke of Connaught; Affie, now Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha; Kaiser William II; his mother, Vicky, the Empress Frederick. The kaiser’s quarrel with his mother, his uncle Bertie, and his grandmother transformed dynastic diplomacy.
House party at Rufford with the Saviles, 1899. Consuelo Marlborough is on Bertie’s left. Mrs. Keppel sits, far right; as in all photographs, her gaze is firmly fixed on Bertie.
Invitation to the Coronation that was postponed because of Bertie’s operation.
The King in his study in 1901. Overwork made him ill in the first year of his reign.
Bertie recuperating after the Coronation with Alix on a cruise aboard the Victoria and Albert.
Charlotte Knollys (left), woman of the bedchamber to Alix for more than fifty years, and Francis Knollys (right), her brother, Bertie’s private secretary. After forty years with Bertie, he went on to serve George V.
Alix in the midst of her family in Denmark: her father (King Christian IX), her sister Minnie (Dowager Empress of Russia), and (with her back to the camera) her sister Thyra (Crown Princess of Hanover).
The kaiser (back row, fourth left) stays at Windsor, November 1907. There are five queens and four kings in this photograph.
The King photographed by Baron de Meyer in 1904.
Dighton Probyn, court comptroller and honorary Sikh, with his “Blessed Lady,” Queen Alexandra, in 1920.
FOR TOBY AND HUMPHREY
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
My first and greatest debt is to Her Majesty the Queen for granting me unrestricted access to the papers of Edward VII in the Royal Archives at Windsor Castle. This book is not an official biography. I was not commissioned to write it; the proposal was mine, and it has been an incredible privilege to work in Windsor’s treasure house of papers. Pam Clark and Jill Kelsey guided my research, which must at times have seemed never ending. They painstakingly checked my transcriptions and rigorously examined the accuracy of my text. For this I am grateful, though any remaining errors are, of course, my own. I should like to thank the Royal Librarian Lady Roberts, Lord Luce, and Lady de Bellaigue.
The Hon. Georgina Stonor gave invaluable advice, especially on Queen Alexandra. Victoria Fishburn, an indefatigable researcher, accompanied me on trips to archives and dug away at Daisy Warwick’s papers. I should like to thank Caroline Spurrier for permission to quote from her Daisy Warwick archive. Other descendants of Bertie’s women friends who have been especially helpful are Anne Somerset, Sarah Lutyens, and Sir Philip Naylor-Leyland. Cara Lancaster generously lent the papers of Mabel Batten. For Emma Bourke, I thank James Collett-White. Miranda Villiers entertained me and helped me to understand the Keppels, and John Phillips provided encouragement and information. Anthony Camp’s prompt and scholarly genealogical research has kept me right on mistresses and bastards.
The late Lord Aylesford was generous with his records and his time at Packington Hall. I am grateful to John Sandwich for permission to use the Mapperton Papers (Oliver Montagu), and for kindly allowing me to reproduce illustrations from his superb albums. Penny Crowe approached me with the forgotten story of her forebear James Mackenzie and made available his papers. Charles Sebag-Montefiore kindly allowed me to use the papers of Philip Magnus. Michaela Reid showed me the diaries of Sir James Reid. Henry Poole and Co. of Savile Row provided an insight into Tum Tum’s waistline. Ian Shapiro generously allowed me to reproduce photographs from his collection at Argyll Etkin.
For advice on medical issues I am grateful to Carole Reeves of the Wellcome Library and to James Lefanu and Anthony Wright. My thanks to Philip Mansel and the Society for Court Studies, to whom I have given four papers on various aspects of this book. Working on a documentary for BBC2 about Bertie with Denys Blakeway and Rob Coldstream greatly helped to focus my thoughts. Edwina Ehrman enlightened me about Alexandra’s clothes. Marina Vorobieva kindly helped with Russian sources. Yvonne Ward lent me her excellent PhD thesis.
I was awarded a Research Fellowship by the Leverhulme Trust in 2007–8. This was immensely valuable in enabling me to dedicate time to writing the book. The Leverhulme Trust also awarded me a research expenses grant to fund the translation from Danish of Alexandra’s letters
to her sister Minnie. Birgit Christensen, my translator in Copenhagen, opened up Alexandra’s world for me.
The following people have lent me books and unpublished materials, provided information, and helped in all sorts of ways with the book: R. J. Q. Adams; Mark Amory; Nicolas Barker; Stephen Bartley; Richard Belfield; Mark Blackett-Ord; Vernon Bogdanor; Mark Bostridge; Fiona Campbell; Moyra Campbell; David Cannadine; Juliet Carey; Professor John Clarke; Miss Denise Critchley-Salmonson; Joe Mordaunt Crook; Sarah Cubitt; Angus Cundey; Mark Curthoys of the ODNB; Richard Davenport-Hines; Susannah Davis; Patric Dickinson; Frances Dimond; Martyn Downer; John Drew; Laura Dugdale; Sir William Dugdale; the late Charles Elwell; Jessica Fletcher; Nicholas Gibbs; Sir Martin Gilbert; Richard Grantley; the Dowager Lady Grimthorpe; Jennifer Holmes; Michael Holroyd; Simon Houfe; Kathryn Hughes; the late Mrs. Maud Hutton-Attenborough; Cindy Jansz; Mary Kenny; Judith Keppel; Anna Kirk; Jeremy Lewis; Lady Amabel Lindsay; Lucy and Andrew Lloyd Davies; Sarah Mahaffy; Clarissa Mitchell; Eoghain Murphy; Maggie Oliphant; Anthea Palmer; Clarissa Palmer; Hannah Palmer; Edward Pearce; Helen Rappaport; Josie Reed; Susanna Rickett; Adam Ridley; my namesake, Jane Ridley; Judy Ridley; Andrew Riley; John Rohl; Ian Scott; Mary Clare Scrope; Anne Sebbah; Thomas Seymour; Rupert Shortt; Nancy Sladek; William St. Clair; Gerard Stamp; Kate Strasdin; Bridget Taverner; Humphrey Thomas; Anna Thomasson; Hugo Vickers; Sheila Walton; Michael Wheeler-Booth; Andrew Wilson; Sue Woolmans; Mary Yule; Philip Ziegler.
Material from the Royal Archives is quoted by permission of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. The Hon. Rupert Carington kindly gave permission to quote from the diaries and writings of Lord Carrington (Lincolnshire Papers) held by the Carington Estates at Bledlow and available on microfilm at the Bodleian Library. Passages from the Margot Asquith diaries in the Bodleian Library are reproduced by permission of Christopher Osborne. Edward Sandars and the Bodleian Library gave leave to quote from the Sandars Papers. For permission to quote from the Wilfrid Blunt diaries, I am grateful to the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge. For permission to quote from the papers of Nathaniel Meyer, 1st Lord Rothschild, I am grateful to the Rothschild Archive, London. The Churchill Archives Centre allowed me to quote from Jennie Churchill’s papers. The Esher Papers are reproduced by kind permission of the Churchill Archives Centre on behalf of the 5th Lord Esher. My thanks to the Marquess of Salisbury for permission to quote from the papers of the 3rd Marquess of Salisbury at Hatfield House. The Royal College of Physicians gave permission to quote from the diaries of Edward Sieveking.
My colleagues at the University of Buckingham have supported my research, especially Judith Bray, Angela Brown, Roy Davis, and Terence Kealey. Special thanks to my students on the Biography MA program, who have no doubt had more than their fill about royal biography.
My son, Toby Thomas, read the book in manuscript and in proof and provided valuable and incisive criticism. My mother, Clayre Percy, was, as always, my first and most encouraging reader.
The Heir Apparent began life as a gleam in the eye of my agent, Caroline Dawnay, and she has cheerfully supported me and the book through a long and sometimes bumpy gestation. Thank you also to Olivia Hunt and Maria Dawson at United Agents, and to my American agent, Emma Parry. Christopher Phipps did a brilliant job on the index.
I am so thankful to my publishers for standing by the book. Susanna Porter of Random House has been patient and trusting. At Chatto, I have benefited greatly from Becky Hardie’s clearheaded support. My thanks also to Alison Samuel and Parisa Ebrahimi. Silvia Crompton’s quiet efficiency has made working on the last stages of the book a delight. Most of all, I want to thank my editor, Penelope Hoare. She is wise, funny, and always right, and I am the luckiest of writers to have Penny as my editor.
NOTES
ABBREVIATIONS USED IN THE NOTES
B
Bertie, Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, King Edward VII
POW
Prince of Wales
QV
Queen Victoria
Alix
Princess of Wales, Queen Alexandra
Vicky
Victoria, Princess Royal, Crown Princess of Prussia, Empress of Germany
Alice
Princess Alice, Grand Duchess of Hesse
Affie
Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh
Fritz
Frederick William, Crown Prince of Prussia
Minnie
Dagmar, Princess of Denmark, later Marie Feodorovna, Czarina of Russia
George
Prince George, later King George V
Eddy
Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence
RA
Royal Archives
RA VIC
Papers of Queen Victoria (these include the papers of Edward VII)
RA GV
Papers of George V
QVJ
Queen Victoria’s journal
RA QVJ
Queen Victoria’s journal in the Royal Archives (unpublished)
RA VIC/EVIID
Bertie’s diary
RA VIC/Add C07
Knollys papers
RA VIC/Add36
Henry Ponsonby’s letters to Mary Ponsonby
RA VIC/U143
Queen Victoria’s letters to Alice (microfilm)
GV/AA
Bertie’s correspondence with Prince George
GV/GG9
Papers concerning Sidney Lee’s biography
RPC
Royal Photograph Collection, Windsor
Copenhagen Letters
Letters from Alexandra to her sister Minnie. Håndskriftsamlingen XVI Danica, 1862–85, 4555. Centralarkiv for Oktoberrevolutionen, Moskva, Boxes 102–4, in the Danish National Archives. Photocopies.
ODNB
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004–13
BL
British Library
Fitzwilliam
The Fitzwilliam Museum
CHAPTER 1: VICTORIA AND ALBERT 1841
1. RA QVJ, 17 October 1841.
2. RA QVJ, 18, 19, 25, 28, 29 October, 3 November 1841.
3. RA VIC/M11/20, Albert to Robert Peel, 26 October 1841.
4. Cecil Woodham-Smith, Queen Victoria: Her Life and Times, 1819–1861 (Sphere, 1975), p. 287.
5. Lady Lyttelton, the children’s governess, used the phrase “vein of iron”: Monica Charlot, Victoria: The Young Queen (Blackwell, 1991), pp. 189, 217.
6. RA VIC/Y54/88, Memo by Anson (Albert’s secretary), 21 October 1841.
7. John Tosh, A Man’s Place: Masculinity and the Middle-Class Home in Victorian England (Yale, 1999), pp. 82–83.
8. RA VIC/M11/25, Henry Wheatley to Albert, 11 November 1841.
9. RA QVJ, 2 December 1841.
10. RA Y54/92, Anson’s memo, 9 November 1841.
11. See Anthony Camp, Royal Mistresses and Bastards (privately printed, 2007), pp. 132–329.
12. See D. M. Potts and W. T. W. Potts, Queen Victoria’s Gene (Alan Sutton, 1995), pp. 55–73.
13. See Camp, Royal Mistresses, pp. 273–87.
14. Ibid., pp. 287–88. Steve Jones, In the Blood (HarperCollins, 1996), pp. 249–57, 267–70. Lord of the Dance: Diverse Writing of Sir Iain Moncreiffe of That Ilk, ed. Hugh Montgomery-Massingberd (Debrett’s Peerage, 1986), p. 65.
15. Ida Macalpine and Richard Hunter, George III and the Mad Business (Allen Lane, 1969).
16. Timothy M. Cox, Nicola Jack, Simon Lofthouse, John Watling, Janice Haines, and Martin J. Warren, “King George III and Porphyria: An Elemental Hypothesis and Investigation,” Lancet, vol. 266 (2005), pp. 332–35.
17. John Rohl, Martin Warren, and David Hunt, Purple Secret: Genes, “Madness” and the Royal Houses of Europe (Bantam Press, 1998), pp. 79–83.
18. Woodham-Smith, Queen Victoria, p. 107.
19. Timothy Peters, “George III: A New Diagnosis,” History Today, September 2009, pp. 4–5.
20. King Leopold of Belgium to QV, 22 January 1841, in The Letters of Queen
Victoria, ed. A. C. Benson and Viscount Esher (John Murray, 1908), vol. 1, pp. 257–58.
21. Lynne Vallone, Becoming Victoria (Yale, 2001), pp. 29, 63–65, 165–67. Woodham-Smith, Queen Victoria, pp. 103–5. Charlot, Victoria, pp. 47–50.
22. Anson’s memo, 15 January 1841, in Benson and Esher, Letters of Queen Victoria, vol. 1, p. 256.
23. QV to King Leopold, 15 July 1839, in ibid., vol. 1, p. 177.
24. QVJ, 10 October 1839, in Queen Victoria in Her Letters and Journals, ed. Christopher Hibbert (Sutton, 2000), p. 55.
25. QVJ, 15 October 1839, in ibid., p. 57.
26. Lytton Strachey, Queen Victoria (Chatto and Windus, 1921), pp. 98–99.
27. QV to Vicky, 21 April 1866, in Your Dear Letter: Private Correspondence Between Queen Victoria and the Crown Princess of Prussia, 1865–1871, ed. Roger Fulford (Evans, 1971), p. 69.
28. See Camp, Royal Mistresses, pp. 342–43. Another rumor alleges that Albert’s father was, in fact, his uncle Leopold, who visited Coburg at Christmas 1818. Albert was born on 26 August 1819. Even if true, which seems unlikely, this would not bring an infusion of “fresh blood.” See Yvonne Ward, “Editing Queen Victoria: How Men of Letters Constructed the Young Queen,” (PhD dissertation, La Trobe University, 2004), p. 239.
