She might have been raised in a palace, but for Alexandrina Victoria, life was anything but a fairy tale
When Edward and Victoria, the Duke and Duchess of Kent, left their home in Bavaria and headed to England in the spring of 1819, they had very good reasons for doing so. The duchess was heavily pregnant with what would be the couple’s only child and they were determined that the baby would be born in England, making her unquestionably English in the eyes of the law. The couple arrived in late April and just a month later, on 24 May 1819, Princess Alexandrina Victoria was born in Kensington Palace.
The Kents were heavily in debt and their return to London was masterminded and arranged by British army officer John Conroy, an equerry to the duke who was known for his ruthless efficiency. He would play a significant role in the life of the young Victoria. At first the little family didn’t remain in London but instead moved to Sidmouth in Devon, where the cost of living was much lower. Yet when the popular and well-loved duke died of pneumonia in January 1820, the duchess returned to Kensington Palace with her infant daughter and prepared to take up a quiet life away from the public eye.
Although at the time of her birth Victoria was fifth in line for the throne after three uncles and her own father, that line dwindled at a rapid rate. By the time her uncle William came to the throne in 1830, Victoria was no longer an outside contender, she was in pole position.
Regardless of what excitement the future may hold, the young Victoria’s childhood was dull. She might be a princess who lived in a palace but there was certainly nothing glamorous about her life. She wasn’t raised in opulence, but in a manner that would be familiar to many upper-class English girls during the mid-19th century, though she was certainly one of the most isolated. Victoria’s time was taken up with a strictly timetabled educational programme that was intended to improve her, and there was no room for slacking off. Known as the Kensington System, Victoria was in lessons every day from 9.30 until 11.30 each morning and then again from 3.00 until 5.00 each afternoon. After a block of lessons her mother would hold an audience with Victoria and grill her on what she had learned, in order to ensure that her education was sinking in. She was never alone, watched by her mother, Conroy or her tutors at all hours of the day, and she even shared a bedroom with the duchess.
Victoria took lessons in the arts, humanities, religion, and languages such as Greek, Latin, German, French and Italian. Despite her royal status she didn’t enjoy a glittering lifestyle but instead was subjected to an exceptionally unremarkable diet, with regular bedtimes and plenty of time to enjoy the fresh air both walking and on horseback, which was a passion for the princess. The household’s predominant language was German, though Victoria was fluent in English, but to all intents and purposes, she grew up speaking the language of her mother’s homeland. She was a good-natured little girl, romantic and thoughtful and highly intelligent.
Victoria’s education was overseen by her governess, Louise Lehzen, who was to become one of her closest confidantes. Baroness Lehzen monitored the activities of her charge through her so-called ‘Behaviour Books’, in which the young princess was required to reflect on her own conduct and attitude. Each day she recorded her self-assessment in the book and though her conduct was often exemplary, that certainly wasn’t always the case. The self-reflection of the Behaviour Books, in which it was recorded that the adolescent Victoria occasionally behaved very badly indeed, was complemented by her own journals. She kept these from the age of 13 and recorded not only her comings and goings but also the private thoughts that might not be appropriate for the ominous-sounding Behaviour Books.
Victoria loved to write, not only her journal but works of fiction too. She also expressed herself through art and was a talented watercolourist and illustrator. Through her journals one can find her sketches and paintings of people she met and sights she saw, a habit she continued into adulthood. As an enthusiastic theatregoer, Victoria also chronicled the shows she had seen in her journals, in illustrations as well as written entries. As part of the Kensington System of education, which the duchess and Conroy had put into action, Victoria lived a very secluded life, prevented from socialising or making friends of her own age. The system was designed to ensure that Victoria was kept from anyone whom her mother and Conroy deemed unsuitable – which was virtually everybody – and kept the young princess in isolation. By doing this, they were able to keep her entirely under their influence and ensure that no scandal could possibly attach itself to her name.
Though Victoria delighted in the company of her little dog, Dash, she had precious few other friends. Her only playmates were her older half-sister by the Duchess of Kent’s first marriage, Princess Feodora of Leiningen, and Conroy’s daughter, Victoire. By now the comptroller to the Duchess of Kent, Conroy’s influence over her and Victoria was virtually unchallenged and as the young princess moved up the line of succession, it continued to become ever more dominant.
By 1830 George IV’s health was in terminal decline. Neither he nor Clarence had any living heirs and Victoria finally learned just how close she was to the throne of Great Britain. While studying her genealogy with Baroness Lehzen, she asked who would succeed to the throne should all her aging uncles die without issue. After several attempts to dodge the question it was left for the Duchess of Kent to answer and tell Victoria that, in such circumstances, the crown would be hers. In her journal Victoria wrote of her despair when she realised what her future held and just what would be expected of her, recognising that her entire life would soon change forever. As George IV’s health grew more frail, Victoria’s stringent educational timetable was overhauled in preparation for her eventual succession. In order to demonstrate that she and Conroy had raised a child fit to be queen, the duchess put her daughter forward for a series of examinations. She excelled in all of them.
Yet though she had been kept in seclusion, Victoria’s natural curiosity couldn’t be assuaged. She wrote often to her Uncle Leopold, King of the Belgians, and he proved to be an invaluable figure in advising her of the life of a monarch. He also took an interest in her health and wellbeing, spurred on by his concerns at her very small stature. At home, however, Victoria had little in the way of advice and much in the way of instruction. Her mother smothered and micromanaged every aspect of her life in tandem with Conroy, and with precious little contact with friends of her own age, Victoria was growing more isolated than ever. She slept in her mother’s room, was accompanied by her mother when changing, bathing or doing anything else, and was never left alone.
When George IV died and his brother, William, succeeded him in 1830, it was the catalyst for a family feud that would become synonymous with Victoria and her mother. Conroy took offence at the position Victoria was to be offered in the coronation procession of the incoming William IV and advised the Duchess of Kent that she should be forbidden from attending. Victoria’s mother did as he bade and the princess was barred from her uncle’s coronation. Of course, the king knew that his adolescent niece had no say in this decision but he reserved a particular loathing for the Duchess of Kent and John Conroy.
Victoria now became a pawn in the empirebuilding schemes of her mother and her comptroller, Conroy. The couple arranged a series of tours and visits for the princess in order to raise her public profile in preparation for her eventual succession, but the king was apoplectic when he heard of the plans.
Meanwhile, Conroy did all he could to whip up in-fighting at Kensington Palace, using his Whig connections to enrage and challenge the Tory monarch and his supporters. After her sheltered childhood, Victoria found her endless routine of tours and visits utterly exhausting and when she tried to appeal to her mother for time to rest, the duchess wouldn’t hear of it. Victoria’s health began to fail, but still she was forced out on the road.
As tensions at home grew, so too did they increase in Parliament where supporters of the Duchess of Kent were lobbying for her to be named as regent should King William die before Victoria came of age.
This was a thorny issue at the time, as Parliament was discussing a Regency Bill for just such an eventuality. With another uncle, Ernest, Duke of Cumberland, favourite for the role, the ambitious Conroy discredited him by spreading rumours that he was planning to harm Princess Victoria. The scheming twosome achieved their aim and the Duchess of Kent was named as prospective regent, but she wouldn’t rule alone. Instead, she would be assisted by a council made up of other members of the royal family and senior government officials.
Furious, King William IV was determined to remain alive until Victoria came of age. Above all, he hoped to keep the duchess and Conroy from achieving any power. Yet as Victoria’s teenage years passed, the princess who had been raised in seclusion and would now one day rule as queen was subject to their whims in other ways, never more so than when she was thrust into the royal marriage mart. Both Conroy and the Duchess of Kent intended to find an ideal match for the heir to the throne, and the only way to do that was to have her many attributes widely seen.
To this end, Victoria left isolation behind and joined the London social scene, under the watchful eye of her mother. She loved the excitement after so long alone but as Victoria’s confidence grew, her relationship with the Duchess of Kent declined. Domineering and disinterested in private, the duchess liked to give the impression that she was an attentive and caring mother in public.
In 1835, that strained relationship reached breaking point. After a visit from her beloved uncle Leopold, Victoria fell seriously ill with a fever. As she laid on her sickbed, the duchess and Conroy pressured her to sign a document that would have given the comptroller the position of her private secretary, a role in which his influence and power would be virtually unchallenged. Victoria resisted, but she never forgot their behaviour.
Their ambitions frustrated, the duchess and Conroy never seized the power they hungered for and just two years later, Victoria became queen.