Queen Victoria's Mysterious Daughter

by Lucinda Hawksley

  In the summer of 1875, the queen would again attempt to exert her control over both Leopold and Louise, this time attempting to gain Louise as an ally in a bid to curb Leopold’s attempts to gain independence. He was studying at Oxford and had, without telling his mother, gone to London for a few days to stay with Louise and Lorne. The queen was incensed that she had not been consulted and insisted that Leopold’s health made it impossible for him to live an adult life free from his mother’s strictures. Louise responded to this furious letter tactfully, but included the words: ‘at his age he cannot unfortunately be told [what] to do, and not to do … Leo is old enough to use his own discretion.’ In the letter, the queen had accused Lorne of being a bad influence on both Louise and Leopold because he subscribed to that ‘unfortunate idea which all British young men, especially in these days, have of being independent of their parents and doing just what they like’. Louise defended her husband (and herself) hotly against such an accusation and told her mother that she had burned the letter as it was so upsetting (the letter survives only because the queen kept a copy of most of her correspondence).

  It has often been claimed that Leopold’s first love was Alice Liddell, Charles Lutwidge Dodgson’s inspiration for his book Alice in Wonderland, whom he met in Oxford. Alice was the daughter of the Dean of Christ Church, Oxford, and Leopold had met her when he arrived in Oxford as an undergraduate in 1872 (when Alice Liddell was twenty). The two certainly became very good friends and in a few years’ time Alice would name her first son Leopold, and ask the prince to be his godfather. Leopold attempted to assert his independence on a number of occasions while at Oxford. Each time, this infuriated the queen and she inevitably blamed Louise for being the bad influence on Leopold and encouraging him to defy her.

  While Leopold was at Oxford, Bertie set off on a trip Leopold could only have dreamt about: a tour of India. (The queen complained throughout the trip how ‘boring’ Bertie’s letters to her were.) On 15 October 1875 Louise recorded the circumstances of her brother’s departure for her mother:

  The last day the 11th was a most painful one for Bertie, and I know he was thankful when it was over. He was dreadfully overcome when he parted with the children; and he said goodbye to all his servants and Alix’s people. They drove in an open carriage to the station, and there were crowds of people all along the streets, and in the station. Dear Alix kept up wonderfully, she was fighting with herself all the time. On her return from Calais she was looking calmer, and better than I could have expected, but she was very tired; she was looking forward to a quiet time with the children at Sandringham [this comment was perhaps written to stop the queen insisting her daughter-in-law and grandchildren stay with her in Bertie’s absence]. I never thought dear Bertie would have felt it so deeply as he did leaving, it was dreadful to see him but at the same time it brought out all his warm kind nature, which was very touching to see.

  In his absence, Bertie’s siblings took on some of the duties the Prince of Wales would have been expected to undertake. Louise was a great success when she launched HMS Inflexible at Portsmouth docks on 28 April 1876. The Inflexible was clad in thick iron and carried bigger guns than any British warship before her. Shortly after launching this ‘monster’ of a ship, the princess had a lifeboat named after her at Campbeltown in Scotland. She was not there for its launch, but Lorne was; once again, they were apart. Usually Louise and Lorne spent several months of the year at Inveraray; this year was an exception. Neither wanted to go to Lorne’s ancestral home, probably because they did not want to be forced to spend so much time together. Louise came up with an excuse that she knew her mother would agree with: ‘I mentioned in one of my former letters that one of the elder girls was I think unintentionally rather rude to me.’ This letter neatly let Louise out of a winter in Scotland, as far as her mother was concerned. Instead of going to Inveraray, Louise wanted to go to Dornden. As she explained to her mother, with more than a trace of irony about the queen’s insistence on visiting Balmoral every year: ‘I hope to be happy at Dornden. For two years we were 7 months in Scotland, life becomes monotonous if one does the same thing every year.’

  After Bertie returned from India in May 1876, the Prime Minister, Benjamin Disraeli, announced that the queen would also be known as Empress of India. Although the title was not made official until 1877, it was a controversial topic of discussion for a year beforehand. Louise wrote to her mother about the furore on 14 March 1876, attempting both to give advice and to soothe her mother’s anger: ‘There is a great deal of bother and talk about your title of Empress. The people will not understand it. They think you wish always to be called so in future, instead of Queen, it is too stupid; of course there is no title so fine as that of our British Queen: and calling us the Imperial Family instead of Royal gives a very unEnglish sound and which the people are so against but I always say that you never thought of such a thing.’ Louise was far more in touch with the people than her mother.

  CHAPTER 14

  Politics and Aestheticism

  You have been one of my few true friends that I have looked up to all my life & from whom I have always had encouragement & sympathy & from whom I have learnt much besides art tho [sic] art was the foundation of all things. When I am married as I have the great happiness of remaining in my beloved country & amongst my friends & acquaintances I shall hope often to see you & that our interest in each other[’]s works will not diminish but increase if possible.

  Princess Louise to Edward Corbould, 25 October 1870

  In the years since their wedding, Lorne had been pursuing his political career, as a Liberal MP. It was a career he would eventually excel at (though he would have to give it up when he inherited the dukedom from his father and entered the House of Lords). Louise was proud of her husband’s egalitarian principles and shared most of his political beliefs. While her mother firmly supported Disraeli, Louise’s husband joined Gladstone’s party.

  By the mid-1870s, Princess Louise was not only the daughter of the queen or the wife of an MP, she was at the forefront of the Aesthetic world and one of the most fashionable women in London. In 1877, Arthur Sullivan (of Gilbert and Sullivan fame) wrote enthusiastically to his mother about ‘My Princess Louise’ coming to his house the next day and all the preparations he needed his mother to help him make for Louise’s visit. ‘I had better do all I can to make her happy! Bring a lot of roses – never mind what it costs – I don’t get her every day. I want nothing but roses about the rooms – masses of them, and one in every single thing I have got. Hooray! Blow the expense.’ Louise embraced Aestheticism even more than she had the style of dressing in a Pre-Raphaelite-inspired manner. She met many of the top artists and craftspeople of the movement and was renowned on informal occasions for eschewing the conventional family jewels worn by her sisters in favour of modern jewellery designed by master artisans she had met through her artistic friends (including Carlo Giuliano and Robert Phillips).

  As her husband immersed himself in party politics, Louise continued to work with numerous charities and to undertake ‘good works’, not simply opening new schools and hospitals but taking an active role in helping to fund-raise and set them up. At this time, Princess Helena was a vice-president of the children’s hospital in Great Ormond Street, London and enlisted her sister’s help with the hospital. In addition to raising funds and awareness, Helena and Louise sewed and knitted items of clothing for the children and encouraged their friends to do the same – many of the children arrived at the hospital dressed in what were little more than rags.

  No longer cowed by her family, as she had been during the incident with Josephine Butler, Louise set about meeting the people she wanted to meet – regardless of whether society deemed them ‘acceptable’ or not. George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans) was considered a scandalous woman no ‘respectable’ lady of the time should have agreed to consort with, because Eliot had fallen in love with George Henry Lewes, a married man. Lewes’s wife was already in a relationship wi
th another man, so the situation was worked out amicably between the two couples; yet London was scandalised that Eliot and Lewes chose to live together ‘in sin’, and even more scandalised when it became apparent that they refused to be ashamed of it. Louise was a fan of George Eliot’s work, so she asked a mutual friend, George Goschen, to invite the author to a party. Then, breaking all expected protocol, Louise introduced herself to the author instead of waiting for a formal presentation. The two women talked for a long time and Louise was obviously entranced by Eliot’s intelligence and independent spirit. Her mother would have been incensed had she known.

  Louise did follow her parents’ example in becoming a patron of many of her favourite artists. That Louise was moving in circles which included Millais and his great friend and rival Frederic, Lord Leighton can be seen in a letter from Bertie at the start of her marriage. In 1872 he thanked her for sending him descriptions of her visits to the studios of Millais and Leighton. The princess supported Whistler through very public scandal and serious financial problems; she was one of the first people he invited to view his now-famous Peacock Room in 1876. She also remained friends with Dante Gabriel Rossetti, when he was already considered ‘mad’ by many of his former friends (he attempted suicide in 1872 and was known to take drugs). Rossetti was used to hearing unfounded rumours about his behaviour and most of the time he did nothing to correct them, partly because he could not be bothered to concern himself with them and partly because they added to his aura of artistic eccentricity. On one occasion, however, he went out of his way to extract an apology. An article had appeared in The World in which it was claimed that when Princess Louise had called on him, Rossetti had told his servant to tell her that he was not at home and nor was he at the command of royalty. Rossetti wrote to the paper and demanded that a correction be printed. He also sent a letter to The Times to set the record straight, in which he wrote: ‘It is true enough that I do not run after great people on account of their mere social position, but I am, I hope, never rude to them; and the man who could rebuff the Princess Louise must be a curmudgeon indeed.’

  In 1877, the Aesthetic world was thrilled by the opening of a new art gallery, one that would rival the stuffy formality of the Royal Academy. It was founded by Sir Coutts Lindsay and his wife Lady Blanche. Both were talented amateur artists; in addition, he had the business acumen and she had the money – Blanche was an heiress to the Rothschild fortune. The gallery was intended to look like a fashionable and wealthy home. As well as the works of art, there was a library and a billiard room in which visitors were invited to make themselves at home. The gallery was heralded as a much-needed saviour of modern artists. Oscar Wilde wrote an article in which he described the idea behind it:

  The origin of this Gallery is as follows: About a year ago the idea occurred to Sir Coutts Lindsay of building a public gallery, in which, untrammelled by the difficulties or meannesses of ‘Hanging Committees,’ he could exhibit to the lovers of art the works of certain great living artists side by side: a gallery in which the student would not have to struggle through an endless monotony of mediocre works in order to reach what was worth looking at; one in which the people of England could have the opportunity of judging of the merits of at least one great master of painting, whose pictures had been kept from public exhibition by the jealousy and ignorance of rival artists.

  Louise was amongst the stars of the artistic world who on 1 May 1877 attended the opening of the much-anticipated Grosvenor Gallery on fashionable Bond Street. It was a glamorous and avant-garde night at which the luminaries of the artistic and musical worlds were prominently in attendance. Most of the conventional newspapers and magazines wrote cool or scathing reviews of the inaugural exhibition, but for the artistic world the gallery was one of the most exciting things to have happened to London in years. Despite the hostile press, the gallery had its own pet writers: Oscar Wilde and Henry James both attended the opening (Wilde in a ‘cello-shaped’ coat made specially for the occasion) and wrote glowing reviews. The Grosvenor Gallery was intended to be a fashionable meeting place and, as such, it boasted of being the first commercial art gallery in London to have its own restaurant (or ‘dining room’, as it was called, to continue the theme of visiting a fashionable home).

  Rapidly, the Grosvenor Gallery became the place to be seen. Because it was a joint effort of husband and wife, and because Blanche had as forceful a personality as her husband, the Grosvenor Gallery became renowned as one of the few exhibition spaces in London to which both male and female artists were encouraged to bring their works. Artists whose works could be seen on the walls included Louise Jopling, G.F. Watts, Marie Spartali-Stillman, Edward Burne-Jones, Evelyn De Morgan, Lawrence and Laura Alma-Tadema, and Louise’s friends, Henrietta and Clara Montalba. One star in attendance was John Everett Millais, who had strongly encouraged the Lindsays to open the gallery in opposition to the Royal Academy. Both Louise and Boehm exhibited at the Grosvenor regularly and Louise became close friends with Sir Coutts and Lady Blanche Lindsay. This new and fashionable gallery proved an immediate success and was recognised at once as the spiritual home of the Aesthetic movement. The Lindsays knew they had made it when Gilbert and Sullivan parodied Aestheticism in their 1881 operetta Patience, in which a song includes the repeated line: ‘Greenery-yallery, Grosvenor Gallery’ (‘greenery yallery’ being the name the composers gave to the unique yellowish-green paint that the Lindsays had had made for the walls of the gallery).

  It was also in 1877 that Louise presented the bust of her mother to the Grosvenor Gallery’s rival, the Royal Academy – she was being careful not to identify herself with only one artistic movement. Shortly after the opening of the Grosvenor Gallery, Louise took Bertie to view Millais’s latest exhibit, Effie Deans, which was on display at the King Street Gallery. Louise wanted to see the painting because it was by her friend and an artist she admired; Bertie because the model for the painting (based on the tragic heroine of Sir Walter Scott’s novel The Heart of Midlothian) was Lillie Langtry. He wanted to meet the model: he did, and she became one of the most famous of his many lovers.

  Louise was also making regular visits to Scotland. In the autumn of 1877, the entire Campbell household, including Louise, narrowly escaped being burned to death when a fire swept through Inveraray Castle. The fire was spotted in the early hours of the morning when one of the duke’s tenants, a fisherman, woke up and suddenly had a desire to go out and check on his boats. He raised the alarm and, astonishingly, no one was killed. Every member of the household was alerted, and Lorne was hailed a hero when he returned into the burning castle without a thought for himself having heard that there were people still inside. Louise’s great contribution was to take control of the fire-fighting and suggest they form a human chain to pass water buckets; later she attributed her suggestion to a story she remembered Prince Albert telling her in childhood. In letters afterwards, members of the Campbell family and household praised her for her quick thinking (she had a clear head, when most of them were still in shock) and it was said that her idea had saved a great many of the family’s treasured possessions. Newspapers around the country reported that the duke owned a fire engine which was ‘brought up with all speed, and, after the hose had been adjusted and led up to the roof, a stream of water was soon directed upon the building. A column of flame was now rising from the central tower the roof of which had fallen with a tremendous crash … By great exertions all the most valuable paintings, and most of the furniture, books, &c., were saved from the fire, though much spoiled by the water and debris.’ Although the castle was devastated, it was not completely ruined, thanks to the fact that the walls were extremely thick and the staircases were made of stone.

  Louise wrote to her mother about the fire:

  All was perfectly quiet and peaceful till about 5 o’clock a.m. when I was woke by our big dog barking and making a great fuss. A few minutes after, Mrs Campbell of Isla’s Scotch maid came to the door, and one of the men shouted ‘th
e castle is on fire’ – then Lorne woke, and jumped up and said we must be off that moment (not knowing whereabouts the fire was) – and so with only our dressing gowns, not even slippers, we went downstairs and found all the inner part of the Hall was illuminated, and large sparks falling as we went; when we passed through the big hall, where the billiard-table is, large bits of the flaming roof fell on the furniture and set it in a blaze; most of the roof fell in about three minutes after Lorne and I had passed. All the others passed outside … It was a bitter cold night; as the morning broke, we found all the hills white with snow … It was a curious sight to see us all huddled together, walking away from the burning house … Not a being knew (I mean those in the Castle) that it was on fire, till alarmed by some people outside. A fisherman was the first to see it … Had he been a quarter of an hour later we should none of us been able to get away.

  Following the fire, the castle was completely rebuilt – but the castle today dates from much more recent times, as another devastating fire would decimate the building in the 1970s. Inveraray Castle remains the seat of the Dukes of Argyll, but it is now open to the public and remains proud of its association with Princess Louise. Amongst the items on display are an equestrian sculpture of the Black Prince by the princess, some of Louise’s baby shoes (red ballet-style pumps), a presentation slice of Louise and Lorne’s wedding cake (adorned not with the happy couple, as Vicky and Fritz’s cake had been, but with a medallion of Queen Victoria) and the gorgeous clothes worn by Louise at the coronation of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra in 1902. The dress shows how remarkably slim Louise was in late middle age; it is lavishly decorated in gold embroidery and gemstones, together with a velvet and ermine robe. The dress seems surprisingly sexy for such a solemn occasion.