queen of England

Wanted: A Husband for the Queen–Queen Victoria and Prince Albert

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As Queen of England, Victoria was expected to produce an heir. Soon after her coronation in 1837 a search for a husband started. Since the Queen of England ruled in her own right, finding a husband presented some unique issues since there was really no precedent. Queen Elizabeth I ruled alone but never married. In the end Victoria chose her German cousin on her mother’s side. He became known in England as Prince Albert.

The extraordinary circumstances of their marriage were no doubt helped by the fact that Victoria and Albert were very much in love with each other. Prince Albert soon carved out his own role beside Victoria. He served as her private secretary and closest advisor. He often stood in for her when she was feeling particularly unwell during one of her nine pregnancies. Albert also influenced Victoria with his interest in science and technology. As a result the queen remained a patron of both throughout her reign.

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The Marriage of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, Feb. 1840

Husband and wife and their nine children made for quite a happy family. Though it has been said that Victoria did not like children, this was mostly true of children six months of age and younger. Like most women, she did not enjoy the experience of childbirth. In contrast to Victoria, Albert liked the company of very small children. The Queen admitted that Albert made a better nurse than she did after the birth of their first child and later reminded her daughter “dear Papa always directed our nursery and I believe that none was ever better.”

Victoria had many photographs and portraits made of her and her family, although she was often away on official business. Neither mother nor father could spend as much time with the children as they would’ve liked, but this was common among wealthy British families. Both parents took a keen interest and concern in their children’s education. They tended to stay away from the traditional clerics and selected more liberal tutors.

Albert and Victoria’s personalities also balanced one another out. Albert had tendency to be serious, while Victoria appeared more serious in portraits than in real life. Many people who met her in person were surprised to see Victoria smile and laugh so often.

When Albert died in 1861, the Queen was devastated. After his death, she wrote “What a dreadful going to bed! What a contrast to that tender lover’s love! All alone!” Victoria mourned in private for almost three years until she was finally seen in public riding in her carriage.

The Education of Queen Victoria of England

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As a little girl, the future Queen of England already had a stubborn streak. She refused to behave and her mother described her as “unmanageable.” Fortunately, four-year-old Victoria’s first tutor, George Davys, came up with ways to make lessons interesting. Though Victoria resisted learning to read, her tutor decided to create a word game for his student. He wrote words on cards and hid them in the nursery. Victoria adored searching for the cards as Davys called out the name of each one. The princess learned quickly, but Davys noted that she still had “a will of her own.”

By age five, Victoria’s mother appointed Louise Lehzen as Victoria’s governess. The relationship did not always go smoothly, since Lehzen insisted that Victoria behave and practice her lessons. Victoria rebelled with tantrums. Once the princess threw scissors at the governess. The older woman proved as stubborn as Victoria though and she devoted hours to the child’s lessons, piano practice, and playtime with Victoria’s collection of dolls. Eventually Victoria began to like her governess. Victoria later said of Lehzen that, “I adored her, though I was greatly in awe of her.”

Lehzen remained an important part of Victoria’s life, but she as she grew she had tutors who specialized in certain subjects. The princess’ school day started at 9:30 and went to 11:30. Then she and ate until 3pm when lessons began again and lasted until 6pm. Victoria loved drawing, dancing, and history. She wrote to her uncle that, “I am very fond of making tables of the Kings and Queens.” In contrast, she hated practicing the piano. When she was told that she must practice, Victoria slammed the lid of the piano shut and declared, “There! There is no must about it.”

Despite her occasional outbursts, Victoria managed to concentrate on her studies, which included an increasingly wide range of subjects. She made progress in learning languages, including French, German, and English, though grammar was not her strong point.

Her education was very focused on the knowledge she would need as a future monarch and had little in common with other girls’ education in the nineteenth century. For example, instead of learning to sew, Victoria studied arithmetic. For many young ladies, beauty and the opinions of men mattered a lot, but Victoria spent little time worrying about her appearance or what others thought of her. In a letter to her half-sister, Victoria poked fun at her own portrait.

The emphasis that her mother and tutors placed on her education made the future queen inquisitive. As queen, Victoria refused to sit back and let her ministers advise her. Instead, she studied and asked questions about issues in England and foreign affairs, frequently surpassing her advisors with her knowledge. To date Queen Victoria is England’s longest reigning monarch, though she may be surpassed by Queen Elizabeth II.

The Childhood of Queen Elizabeth II of England

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Even though she has been the Queen of England for decades, Queen Elizabeth II wasn’t supposed to inherit the throne. Her father George VI wasn’t born to be king either but his elder brother decided to marry a divorced woman. In those days, an English monarch couldn’t marry someone who was divorced without creating a scandal, so he decided to quit his duties as king and left the job to his brother. In 1952, the eldest daughter of George VI inherited the throne.

As a young girl, Elizabeth, nicknamed Lilibet, didn’t receive the formal education of most previous monarchs since she wasn’t expected to rule. Her parents wanted Elizabeth and her younger sister Margaret to enjoy childhood and they hired a governess that agreed to carry out their wishes. The governess later wrote that the girls’ parents “were not over concerned with the higher education of their daughters. They wanted most for them a really happy childhood, with lots of pleasant memories…and, later, happy marriages.” Elizabeth’s lessons started when she turned six years old. Her governess taught arithmetic, literature, writing, composition, and geography. In all, the lessons only lasted an hour and a half each day. Even when she became heir to the throne Elizabeth’s parents didn’t want her education to be too rigid, though courses on constitutional history and the monarchy were added.

Elizabeth preferred the outdoors to the schoolroom, especially once she learned to ride horses. She received her first pony at age three and was devoted to riding and caring for the animals. When someone asked her what she would like to do when she grew up, she said, “Live the life of a country lady, with lots of horses and dogs.” As queen she couldn’t always be in the country, but she did get her wish for plenty of horses and dogs.

Since she was a member of the royal family, taking her out to meet “normal” girls and boys was almost impossible without being recognized by the public. Eventually her mother invited some neighborhood girls over so that Elizabeth could have her own group of Girl Guides (known in the U.S. as the Girl Scouts).Though her parents had duties that would sometimes take them away from the children, they made family time a priority. The girls spent as much time as possible with their parents, who read them stories, ate dinner with them, and engaged in pillow fights. Although the relationship between the princesses and their parents does not seem unusual today, most royal children, including Elizabeth’s father, were not close to their parents. George VI’s father, George V, thought that his own children needed to fear him; however, Elizabeth brought out another side of her grandfather. She never learned to fear adults, so she simply announced when she wanted to play and her grandfather got down on the floor and let her lead him around by his beard.

Still, her role models and primary companions were adults. She especially admired her father’s courage and sense of duty when he became king. She knew he didn’t want the job and he struggled with public speaking, but he put his duty to his country first. His example taught her more about what it meant to be a good leader than any of her history books.