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Welcome to Bite At A Time Books Behind the Story, where we answer the questions you have about your favorite classic authors.

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Today we are finishing Jane Ayer.

Today we will be talking about the final monarch reigning while Charlotte Bronte was alive.

Queen Victoria Victoria Alexandria Victoria May 24, 1819 January 22 One Nine One was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from June 21, 837 until her death in 1000.

Nineone known as the Victorian era.

Her reign of 63 years and seven months was longer than any previous British monarch.

It was a period of industrial, political, scientific and military change within the United Kingdom and was marked by a great expansion of the British Empire.

In 1876, the British Parliament voted to grant her the additional title of Empress of India.

Victoria was the daughter of Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Stratum, the fourth son of King George III and Princess Victoria of Sax Kuburg Salfield.

After the deaths of her father and grandfather in 1820, she was raised under close supervision by her mother and her Comptroller, John Conroy.

She inherited the throne at age 18 after her father's three elder brothers died without surviving legitimate issue.

Though a constitutional monarch, Victoria privately attempted to influence government policy and ministerial appointments.

Publicly, she became a national icon who was identified with strict standards of personal morality.

Victoria married her first cousin, Prince Albert of Sachs, Koberg and Gotha.

In 1840.

Their children married into Royal and Noble families across the continent, earning Victoria the sobriquette the grandmother of Europe and spreading hemophilia and European royalty.

After Albert?

S death in 61, Victoria plunged into deep mourning and avoided public appearances.

As a result of her seclusion, British republicanism temporarily gained strength, but in the latter half of her reign, her popularity recovered.

Her golden and Diamond Jubilees were times of public celebration.

She died on the Isle of White in 19, one the last British monarch of the House of Hanover.

She was succeeded by her son, Edward VII of the House of Sachs, Koburg and Gotha.

Victoria's father was Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Stratum, the fourth son of the reigning King of the United Kingdom, George III, until 1017.

Edward's niece, Princess Charlotte of Wales, was the only legitimate grandchild of George III.

Her death in 1817 precipitated a succession crisis that brought pressure on the Duke of Kent and his unmarried brothers to marry and have children.

In 1818 he married Princess Victoria of Sax Koberg Southfield, a widowed German Princess with two children, Carl by her first marriage to Image Carl, second Prince of Leningen.

Her brother, Leah Polled, was Princess Charlotte's widower, the Duke and Duchess of Kent's only child.

Victoria was born at 04:15 A.m.

On May 24, 1819, at Kensington Palace in London.

Victoria was christened privately by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Charles Mantersutton, on June 24, 1819, in the Capella Room at Kensington Palace.

She was baptized Alexandrina after one of her godparents, SAR, Alexander I of Russia, and Victoria after her mother.

Additional names proposed by her parents, Georgina or Georgiana, Charlotte and Augusta, were dropped on the instructions of Kent's eldest brother, George, Prince Regent at birth.

Victoria was fifth in the line of succession after the four eldest sons of George, the Prince Regent, later George the fourth, Frederick, Duke of York, William, Duke of Clarence, later William IV, and Victoria's father, Edward, Duke of Kent.

The Prince Regent had no surviving children and the Duke of York had no children.

Further, both were estranged from their wives, who were both past childbearing age, so the two eldest brothers were unlikely to have any further legitimate children.

William and Edward married on the same day in 1818, but both of William's legitimate daughters died as infants.

The first of these was Princess Charlotte, who was born and died on March 27, 1819, two months before Victoria was born.

Victoria's father died in January 1820, when Victoria was less than a year old.

A week later, her grandfather died and was succeeded by his eldest son as George IV.

Victoria was then third in line to the throne after Frederick and William.

William's second daughter, Princess Elizabeth of Clarence, lived for twelve weeks from December 10, 1820, to March 4, 1821, and for that period Victoria was fourth in line.

The Duke of York died in 1827, followed by George V.

In 1830 the throne passed to their next surviving brother, William, and Victoria became air presumptive.

The Regency Act 1830 made special provision for Victoria's mother to act as Regent in case William died while Victoria was still a minor.

King William distrusted the Duchess's capacity to be Regent, and in 1836 he declared in her presence that he wanted to live until Victoria's 18th birthday so that a Regency could be avoided.

Victoria later described her childhood as rather melancholy, her mother was extremely protective, and Victoria was raised largely isolated from other children under the socalled Kensington system, an elaborate set of rules and protocols devised by the Duchess and her ambitious and domineering Comptroller, Sir John Conroy, who was rumored to be the Duchess's lover.

The system prevented the Princess from meeting people whom her mother and Conroy deemed undesirable, including most of her father's family, and was designed to render her weak and dependent upon them.

The Duchess avoided the court because she was scandalized by the presence of King William's illegitimate children.

Victoria shared a bedroom with her mother every night, studied with private tutors to a regular timetable, and spent her play hours with her dolls and her King Charles spaniel dash.

Her lessons included French, German, Italian and Latin, but she spoke only English at home.

In 1830, the Duchess of Kent and Conroy took Victoria across the center of England to visit the Malvern Hills, stopping at towns and great country houses along the way.

Similar journeys to other parts of England and Wales were taken in 1832 85.

To the King's annoyance, Victoria was enthusiastically welcomed.

In each of the stops, William compared the journeys to Royal progresses and was concerned that they portrayed Victoria as his rival rather than his heir.

Presumptive.

Victoria disliked the trips.

The constant round of public appearances made her tired and ill, and there was little time for her to rest.

She objected on the grounds of the King's disapproval, but her mother dismissed his complaints as motivated by jealousy and forced Victoria to continue the tours.

At Ramsgate.

In October 1835, Victoria contracted a severe fever, which Conroy initially dismissed as a childish pretense.

While Victoria was ill, Conroy and the Duchess unsuccessfully badgered her to make Conroy her private Secretary.

As a teenager, Victoria resisted persistent attempts by her mother and Conroy to appoint him to her staff.

Once clean, she banned him from her presence, but he remained in her mother's household.

By 1836, Victoria's maternal uncle Leopold, who had been King of the Belgian since 1831, hoped to marry her to Prince Albert, the son of his brother Ernest I, Duke of Sax, Coburg and Gotha.

Leopold arranged for Victoria's mother to invite her Coberg relatives to visit her in May 1009.

Three six, with the purpose of introducing Victoria to Albert.

William IV, however disapproved of any match with the Coburgs and instead favored the suit of Prince Alexander of the Netherlands, second son of the Prince of Orange.

Victoria was aware of the various matrimonial plans and critically appraised a parade of eligible Princes.

According to her diary, she enjoyed Albert's company from the beginning.

After the visit, she wrote, Albert is extremely handsome.

His hair is about the same color as mine.

His eyes are large and blue, and he has a beautiful nose and a very sweet mouth with fine teeth.

But the charm of his countenance is his expression, which is most delightful.

Alexander, on the other hand, she described as very plain.

Victoria wrote to King Leopold, whom she considered her best and kindest adviser to thank him for the prospect of great happiness you have contributed to give me in the person of dear Albert.

He possesses every quality that could be desired to render me perfectly happy.

He is so sensible, so kind, and so good, and so amiable too.

He has, Besides the most pleasing and delightful exterior and appearance you can possibly see.

However, at 17, Victoria, though interested in Albert, was not yet ready to marry.

The parties did not undertake a formal engagement, but assumed that the match would take place in due time.

Victoria turned 18 on May 24, 1837, and a Regency was avoided less than a month later.

On June 21, 1837, William IV died at the age of 71 and Victoria became Queen of the United Kingdom.

In her diary she wrote, I was awoke at 06:00 by Mama, who told me the Archbishop of Canterbury and Lord Cunningham were here and wished to see me.

I got out of bed and went into my sitting room only in my dressing gown and alone, and saw them.

Lord Cunningham then acquainted me that my poor uncle the King was no more and had expired at twelve minutes past two this morning and Consequently that I am Queen.

Official documents prepared on the first day of her reign described her as Alexandrina Victoria, but the first name was withdrawn at her own wish and not used again.

Since 1714, Britain has shared a monarch with Hanover in Germany, but under Solic law women were excluded from the Hanivarian succession.

While Victoria inherited the British throne, her father's unpopular younger brother, Ernest Augustus, Duke of Cumberland, became King of Hanover.

He was Victoria's heir presumptive until she had a child.

At the time of Victoria's accession, the government was led by the Whig Prime Minister, Lord Melbourne.

He at once became a powerful influence on the politically inexperienced monarch who relied on him for advice.

Charles Greenville suppose that the widowed and childless Melbourne was passionately fond of her, as he might be of his daughter if he had one, and Victoria probably saw him as a father figure.

Her Coronation took place on June 28, 1838 at Westminster Abbey.

Over 4000 visitors came to London for the celebrations.

She became the first sovereign to take up residence at Buckingham Palace and inherited the revenues of the Duchies of Lancaster and Cornwall, as well as being granted a civil list allowance of 385 £0 per year.

Financially prudent, she paid off her father's debts.

At the start of her reign, Victoria was popular, but her reputation suffered in an 1839 court intrigue when one of her mother's ladies in waiting, Lady Flora Hastings, developed an abdominal growth that was widely rumored to be an out of wedlock pregnancy by Sir John Conroy.

Victoria believed the rumors.

She hated Conroy and despised that odious Lady Flora because she had conspired with Conroy and the Duchess of Kent in the Kensington system.

At first, Lady Flora refused to submit to an intimate medical examination until in midFebruary.

She eventually acquiesced and was found to be a Virgin.

Conroy the Hastings family and the opposition Tories organized a Press campaign implicating the Queen in the spreading of false rumors about Lady Flora.

When Lady Flora died in July, the postmortem revealed a large tumor on her liver that had distended her abdomen.

At public appearances, Victoria was hissed and jeered as Mrs.

Melbourne.

In 1839, Melbourne resigned after radicals and Tories, both of whom Victoria detested, voted against a bill to suspend the Constitution of Jamaica.

The bill removed political power from plantation owners who were resisting measures associated with the abolition of slavery.

The Queen commissioned a Tory, Robert Peele, to form a new Ministry.

At the time, it was customary for the Prime Minister to appoint members of the Royal household, who were usually his political allies and their spouses.

Many of the Queen's ladies of the Bed Chamber were wives of Wigs and Peel expected to replace them with wives of Tories in what became known as the Bedchamber Crisis.

Victoria, advised by Melbourne, objected to their removal.

Peele refused to govern under the restrictions imposed by the Queen and Consequently resigned his Commission, allowing Melbourne to return to office.

Though Victoria was now Queen as an unmarried young woman, she was required by social convention to live with her mother.

Despite their differences over the Kensington system and her mother's continued reliance on Conroy, her mother was consigned to a remote apartment in Buckingham Palace, and Victoria often refused to see her.

When Victoria complained to Melbourne that her mother's proximity promised torment for many years, Melbourne sympathized but said it could be avoided by marriage, which Victoria called a shocking alternative.

Victoria showed interest in Albert's education for the future role he would have to play as her husband, but she resisted attempts to rush her into wedlock.

Victoria continued to praise Albert.

Following his second visit in October 1839, Albert and Victoria felt mutual affection, and the Queen proposed to him on October 1539, just five days after he had arrived at Windsor.

They were married on February 10, 1840, in the Chapel Royale of St.

James Place, London.

Victoria was lovestruck.

She spent the evening after their wedding lying down with a headache, but wrote ecstatically in her diary, I never, never spent such an evening, my dearest, dearest, dear Albert.

His excessive love and affection gave me feelings of heavenly love and happiness I never could have hoped to have felt before.

He clasped me in his arms and we kissed each other again and again.

His beauty, his sweetness and gentleness.

Really, how can I ever be thankful enough to have such a husband to be called by names of tenderness I have never yet heard used to me before?

What bliss beyond belief.

Oh, this was the happiest day of my life.

Albert became an important political adviser as well as the Queen's companion, replacing Melbourne as the dominant influential figure in the first half of her life, Victoria's mother was evicted from the palace to ingest her house in Belgrave Square.

After the death of Victoria's aunt, Princess Augusta in 1840, Victoria's mother was given both clearance and Frogmore houses through Albert's mediation.

Relations between mother and daughter slowly improved during Victoria's first pregnancy in 1840.

In the first few months of the marriage, 18 year old Edward Oxford attempted to assassinate her while she was riding in a carriage with Prince Albert on her way to visit her mother.

Oxford fired twice, but either both bullets missed, as he later claimed the guns had no shot.

He was tried for high treason, found not guilty by reason of insanity, committed to an insane asylum indefinitely, and later sent to live in Australia.

In the immediate aftermath of the attack, Victoria's popularity soared, mitigating residual discontent over the Hastings affair and the bed Chamber crisis.

Her daughter, also named Victoria, was born on November 21, 840.

The Queen hated being pregnant, viewed breastfeeding with disgust and thought newborn babies were ugly.

Nevertheless, over the following 17 years she and Albert had further eight children Albert Edward, born 1841, Alice born 1843, Alfred Helena Louise born Arthur, born Leopold, born 1853, and Beatrice born 1857.

The household was largely run by Victoria's childhood governess, Baroness Louise Letson, from Hanover.

Letson had been a formative influence on Victoria and had supported her against the Kensington system.

Albert, however, thought that Leslin was incompetent and that her mismanagement threatened his daughter's health.

After a furious row between Victoria and Albert over the issue lesson was pensioned off in 1842 and Victoria's close relationship with her ended.

On May 29, 1842, Victoria was riding in a carriage along the Mall, London, when John Francis aimed a pistol at her, but the gun did not fire.

The assailant escaped.

The following day, Victoria drove the same route, though faster and with a greater escort, in a deliberate attempt to bait Francis into taking second aim and catching him in the act.

As expected, Francis shot at her, but he was seized by plainclothes policemen and convicted of high treason.

On July 3, two days after Francis death sentence was commuted to transportation for life.

John William Bean also tried to fire a pistol at the Queen, but it was loaded only with paper and tobacco and had too little charge.

Edward Oxford felt that the attempts were encouraged by his acquittal.

In 1840, being was sentenced to 18 months in jail.

In a similar attack in 1849, unemployed Irishman William Hamilton fired a powder filled pistol at Victoria's carriage as it passed along Constitution Hill, London, in 1850.

The Queen did sustain injury when she was assaulted by a possibly insane ex army officer, Robert Pate.

As Victoria was riding in a carriage, Pete struck her with his cane, crushing her bonnet and bruising her forehead.

Both Hamilton and Paige were sentenced to seven years transportation.

Melbourne support in the House of Commons weakened through the early years of Victoria's reign and in the 1814 one general election, the Whigs were defeated.

Peele became Prime Minister and the ladies of the bedchamber most associated with the Whigs were replaced.

In 1845, Ireland was hit by a potato blight.

In the next four years, over a million Irish people died and another million emigrated.

In what became known as the Great Famine in Ireland, Victoria was labeled the Famine Queen in January 7.

She personally donated 2000 lbs equivalent to between 178 £0 and six £5 million in 2016 to the British Relief Association, more than any other individual famine relief donor, and also supported the Main News grant to a Roman Catholic seminary in Ireland, despite Protestant opposition.

The story that she donated only £5 in aid to the Irish and on the same day gave the same amount to Battersea Dogs Home was a myth generated towards the end of the 19th century.

By 1846, Peel's Ministry faced a crisis involving the repeal of the Corn Laws.

Many Tories, by then known as Conservatives, were opposed to the repeal, but Peel some Tories, the free trade oriented Liberal Conservative Peelites, most Whigs and Victoria supported it.

Peele resigned in 1814 six after the repeal narrowly passed and was replaced by Lord John Russell.

Internationally, Victoria took a keen interest in the improvement of relations between France and Britain.

She made and hosted several visits between the British Royal family and the House of Orleans, who was related by marriage through the Coburns.

In 1843 and 1845, she and Albert stayed with King Louis Philippe I at Chateau Deo in Normandy.

She was the first British or English monarch to visit a French monarch since the meeting of Henry VIII of England and France is the first of France on the field of the cloth of gold.

In 1520, when Louis Philippe made a reciprocal trip in 144, he became the first French King to visit a British sovereign.

Louis Philippe was deposed in the revolutions of 1848 and fled to exile in England at the height of a revolutionary scare in the United Kingdom.

In April 1848, Victoria and her family left London for the greater safety of Osborne House, a private estate on the Isle of White that they had purchased in 1845 and redeveloped.

Demonstrations by Chartists and Irish nationalists failed to attract widespread support and the scare died down without any major disturbances.

Victoria's first visit to Ireland in 1849 was a public relations success, but it had no lasting impact or effect on the growth of the Irish nationalism.

Russell's Ministry, though Wig, was not favored by the Queen, she found particularly offensive the Foreign Secretary, Lord Palmerston, who often acted without consulting the Cabinet, the Prime Minister or the Queen.

Victoria complained to Russell that Palmerston sent official dispatches to foreign leaders without her knowledge, but Palmerston was retained in office and continued to act on his own initiative despite her repeated remonstrances.

It was only in 1851 that Palmerston was removed after he announced the British government's approval of President Louis Napoleon Bonaparte's coup in France without consulting the Prime Minister.

The following year, President Bonaparte was declared Emperor Napoleon III, by which time Russell's administration had been replaced by a shortly lived minority government led by Lord Derby.

In 1853, Victoria gave birth to her 8th child, Leopold, with the aid of the new Anesthetic Chloroform.

She was so impressed by the relief it gave from the pain of childbirth that she used it again in 1857 at the birth of her 9th and final child, Beatrice.

Despite opposition from members of the clergy who considered it against biblical teaching and members of the medical profession who thought it dangerous, Victoria may have suffered from postnatal depression after many of her pregnancies letters from Albert to Victoria intermittently complain of her loss of selfcontrol.

For example, about a month after Leap Holt's birth, Albert complained in a letter to Victoria about her continuance of hysterics over a miserable trifold.

In early 1855, the government of Lord Aberdeen, who had replaced Derby, fell amidst recriminations over the poor management of British troops in the Crimean War.

Victoria approached both Derby and Russell to form a Ministry, but neither had sufficient support, and Victoria was forced to appoint Palmerston as Prime Minister.

Napoleon III, Britain's closest ally as a result of the Crimean War, visited London in April 1 955, and from August 17 to 28 the same year, Victoria and Albert returned the visit.

Napoleon III met the couple at Bologna and accompanied them to Paris.

They visited the Exposition Universal, a successor to Albert's 1851 brainchild, the Great Exhibition, and Napoleon I tomb at Ley in the Valids, to which his remains had only been returned in 1840 and were guests of honor at a 1200 guest ball at the palace of Versailles.

On January 14, 1858, an Italian refugee from Britain called Felice orsani attempted to assassinate Napoleon III with a bomb made in England.

The ensuing diplomatic crisis destabilized the government, and Palmerston resigned.

Derby was reinstated as Prime Minister.

Victoria and Albert attended the opening of a new Basin at the French military Port of Sherberg on August 5, one eight in an attempt by Napoleon III to reassure Britain that his military preparations were directed elsewhere.

On her return, Victoria wrote to Derby, reprimanding him for the poor state of the Royal Navy in comparison to the French Navy, Derby's Ministry did not last long, and in June 1859 Victoria recalled Palmerston to office.

Eleven days after Ursini's assassination attempt in France, Victoria's eldest daughter married Prince Frederick William of Prussia in London.

They had been betrothed since September 1855, when Princess Victoria was 14 years old.

The marriage was delayed by the Queen and her husband, Albert, until the bride was 17.

The Queen and Albert hoped that their daughter and soninlaw would be a liberalizing influence in the enlarging Prussian state.

The Queen felt sick at heart to see her daughter leave England for Germany it really makes me shudder, she wrote to Princess Victoria in one of her frequent letters.

When I look round to all your sweet, happy, unconscious sisters and think I must give them up to one by one.

Almost exactly a year later, the Princess gave birth to the Queen's first grandchild, Wilhelm, who would become the last German Emperor.

In March 1861, Victoria's mother died, with Victoria at her side.

Through reading her mother's papers, Victoria discovered that her mother had loved her deeply.

She was heartbroken and blamed Conroy and Leslie for wickedly estranging her from her mother to relieve his life.

During her intense and deep grief, Albert took on most of her duties despite being ill himself with chronic stomach trouble.

In August, Victoria and Albert visited their son, Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, who was attending army maneuvers near Dublin, and spent a few days holidaying in Kalarni.

In November, Albert was made aware of gossip that his son had slept with an actress in Ireland.

Appalled, he traveled to Cambridge, where his son was studying to confront him.

By the beginning of December, Albert was very unwell.

He was diagnosed with typhoid fever by William Jenner and died on December 14, 1861.

Victoria was devastated.

She blamed her husband's death on worry over the Prince of Wales flandering.

He had been killed by that dreadful business, she said.

She entered a state of mourning and wore black for the remainder of her life.

She avoided public appearances and rarely set foot in London.

In the following years, her seclusion earned her the nickname Widow of Windsor.

Her weight increased through comfort eating, which reinforced her aversion to public appearances.

Victoria's selfimposed isolation from the public diminished the popularity of the monarchy and encouraged the growth of the Republican movement.

She did undertake her official government duties, yet chose to remain secluded in her Royal residences, Windsor Castle, Osborne House and the private estate in Scotland that she and Albert had acquired in 1847, Balmoral Castle.

In March 1864, a protester stuck a notice on the railings of Buckingham Palace that announced these commanding premises to be led or sold.

In consequence of the late occupants declining business.

Her uncle Leopold wrote to her, advising her to appear in public.

She agreed to visit the gardens of the Royal Horticulture Society at Kensington and take a drive through London in an open carriage.

Through the 1860s, Victoria relied increasingly on a manned servant from Scotland, John Brown.

Rumors of a romantic connection and even a secret marriage appeared in print, and some referred to the Queen as Mrs.

Brown.

The story of their relationship was the subject of the 1997 movie Mrs.

Brown.

A painting by Sir Edwin Henry Lancer depicting the Queen with Brown was exhibited at the Royal Academy, and Victoria published a book, Leaves from the Journal of Our Life in the Highlands, which featured Brown prominently and in which the Queen praised him highly.

Palmerston died in 1865, and after a brief Ministry, led by Russell Derby, returned to power in 1866.

Victoria attended the state opening of Parliament for the first time since Albert's death.

The following year she supported the passing of the Reform Act, which doubled the electorate by extending the franchise to many urban working men.

Though she was not in favor of votes for women, Derby resigned in 1868 to be replaced by Benjamin Disraeli, who charmed Victoria.

Everyone likes flattery, he said, and when you come to royalty you should lay it on with a trowel with the phrase we authors ma'am, he complimented her.

The Israeli's Ministry only lasted a matter of months, and at the end of the year his Liberal rival, William Albert Gladstone, was appointed Prime Minister.

Victoria found Gladstone's demeanor far less appealing.

He spoke to her she is thought to have complained as though she were a public meeting rather than a woman.

In 1870, Republican sentiment in Britain, fed by the Queen's seclusion, was boosted after the establishment of the Third French Republic.

A Republican rally in Trophagal Square demanded Victoria's removal, and radical MPs spoke against her.

In August and September 1871, she was seriously ill, with an abscess in her arm, which Joseph Lister successfully lanced and treated with his new antiseptic carbolic acid spray.

In late November 1871, at the height of the Republican movement, the Prince of Wales contracted typhoid fever, the disease that was believed to have killed his father, and Victoria was fearful her son would die.

As the 10th anniversary of her husband's death approached, her son's condition grew no better, and Victoria's distress continued to general rejoicing.

He recovered.

Mother and son attended a public parade through London and a grand service of Thanksgiving in St.

Paul's Cathedral on February 27, 1872, and Republican feeling subsided.

On the last day of February 1872, two days after the Thanksgiving service, 17 year old Arthur O'Connor, a great nephew of Irish MP Fergus O'Connor, waved an unloaded pistol at Victoria's open carriage just after she had arrived at Buckingham Palace.

Brown, who was attending the Queen, grabbed him, and O'Connor was later sentenced to twelve months imprisonment and a birching as a result of the incident, Victoria's popularity recovered further.

After the Indian Rebellion of 1857, the British East India Company, which had ruled much of India, was dissolved, and Britain's possessions and protectorates on the Indian subcontinent were formerly incorporated into the British Empire.

The Queen had a relatively balanced view of the conflict and condemned atrocities on both sides.

She wrote of her feelings of horror and regret are the result of this bloody civil war and insisted, urged on by Albert, that an official proclamation announcing the transfer of power from the Company to the state should breathe feelings of generosity, benevolence, and religious toleration at Herbie Hest, a reference threatening the undermining of native religions and customs, was replaced by a passage guaranteeing religious freedom.

In the 1874 general election, Disraeli was returned to power.

He passed the public worship Regulation Act, which removed Catholic rituals from the Anglican liturgy and which Victoria strongly supported.

She preferred short, simple services and personally considered herself more aligned with the Presbyterian Church of Scotland than the Episcopal Church of England.

Disraeli also pushed the Royal Titles Act 176 through Parliament so that Victoria took the title Empress of India from May 1, 1876.

The new title is proclaimed at the Delhi Durbar on January 1, 1877.

On December 14, 1878, the anniversary of Albert's death, Victoria's second daughter, Alice, who had married Louis of Hess, died of diphtheria in Darminstad.

Victoria noted the coincidence of the dates as almost incredible and most mysterious.

In May 1879 she became a great grandmother on the birth of Princess Theodora of Sax Meningen, and past her poor old 60th birthday, she felt aged by the loss of my beloved child.

Between April 1877 and February 1878, she threatened five times to abdicate while pressuring Disraeli to act against Russia during the Russo Turkish War, but her threats had no impact on the events or their conclusion.

With the Congress of Berlin, Disraeli's expansionist foreign policy, which Victoria endorsed, led to conflicts such as the Anglo Zulu War and the Second Anglo Afafghan War.

If we are to maintain our position as a firstrate power, she wrote, we must be prepared for attacks and wars somewhere or other.

Continually.

Victoria saw the expansion of the British Empire as civilizing and benign, protecting native Peoples from more aggressive powers or cruel rulers.

It is not in our custom to annex country, she said, unless they are obliged and forced to do so.

To Victoria's dismay, Disraeli lost the 1880 general election and Gladstone returned as Prime Minister.

When Disraeli died the following year, she was blinded by fast falling tears and erected a Memorial tablet placed by his grateful sovereign and friend Victoria R.

I.

On March 2, 182, Roderick McLean, a Disgruntled poet, apparently offended by Victoria's refusal to accept one of his poems Shot at the Queen as her carriage left Windsor railway station, two schoolboys from Etton College struck him with their umbrellas until he was hustled away by a policeman.

Victoria was outraged when he was found not guilty by reason of insanity, but was so pleased by the many expressions of loyalty after the attack that she said it was worth being shot at to see how much one is loved.

On March 17, 1883, Victoria fell down some stairs at Windsor, which left her lame until July.

She never fully recovered and was plagued with rheumatism thereafter.

John Brown died ten days after her accident, and to the consternation of her private Secretary, Sir Henry Ponsonby, Victoria began work on a eulogistic biography of Brown.

Ponsonby and Randall Davidson, Dean of Windsor, who had both seen early drafts, advised Victoria against publication on the grounds that it would stroke the rumors of a love affair.

The manuscript was destroyed in early 1884.

Victoria did publish more leaves from a Journal of the Life in the Highlands, a sequel to her earlier book, which she dedicated to her devoted personal attendant and faithful friend, John Brown.

On the day after the first anniversary of Brown's death, Victoria was informed by Telegram that her youngest son, Leafold, had died in Cannes.

He was the dearest of my dear sons, she lamented.

The following month, Victoria's youngest child, Beatrice, met and fell in love with Prince Henry of Battenberg at the wedding of Victoria's granddaughter, Princess Victoria of Hess, and by Ryan to Henry's brother, Prince Louis of Battenberg.

Beatrice and Henry planned to marry, but Victoria opposed the match, at first wishing to keep Beatrice at home to act as her companion.

After a year she was won around to the marriage by their promise to remain living with and attending her.

Victoria was pleased when Gladstone resigned in 1885 after his budget was defeated.

She thought his government was the worst I have ever had and blamed him for the death of General Gordon at Cordom.

Gladstone was replaced by Lord Salisbury.

Salisbury's government only lasted a few months, however, and Victoria was forced to recall Gladstone, whom she referred to as a half crazy and really in many ways ridiculous old man.

Gladstone attempted to pass a bill granting Ireland home rule, but to Victoria's glee it was defeated.

In the ensuing election, Gladstone's party lost to Salisbury's and the government switched hands again.

In 1887 the British Empire celebrated the Golden Jubilee of Queen Victoria.

She marked the 50th anniversary of her session on June 20 with a banquet to which 50 Kings and Princes were invited.

The following day she participated in a procession and attended a Thanksgiving service in Westminster Abbey.

By this time Victoria was once again extremely popular.

Two days later, on June 23, she engaged two Indian Muslims as waiters, one of whom was Abdul Karim.

He was soon promoted to Munchi, teaching her Urdu and acting as a clerk.

Her family and retainers were appalled and accused Abdul Karim of spying for the Muslim Patriotic League and biasing the Queen against the Hindus, echoes Frederick Ponzanbi.

The son of Sir Henry discovered that the Munchi had lied about his parentage and reported to Lord Elgin visaroi of India the moon she occupies very much the same position as John Brown used to do.

Victoria dismissed their complaints as racial prejudice.

Abdul Karim remained in her service until he returned to India with a pension on her death.

Victoria's eldest daughter became Empress consort of Germany in 1888, but she was widowed a little over three months later, and Victoria's eldest grandchild became German Emperor.

As Wilhelm II, Victoria and Albert's hopes of a Liberal Germany would go unfulfilled.

As Wilhelm was a firm believer in autocracy, Victoria thought he had little heart in Zapulgu and his conscience and intelligence had been completely warped.

Gladstone returned to power after the 1892 general election.

He was 82 years old.

Victoria objected when Gladstone proposed appointing the radical MP Henry Lampershire to the cabinet, so Gladstone agreed not to appoint him.

In 1894, Gladstone retired, and without consulting the outgoing Prime Minister, Victoria appointed Lord Roseberry as Prime Minister.

His government was weak, and the following year Lord Salisbury replaced him.

Salisbury remained Prime Minister for the remainder of Victoria's reign.

On September 23, 1996, Victoria surpassed her grandfather George III, as the longest reigning monarch in British history.

The Queen requested that any special celebrations be delayed until 1897 to coincide with her Diamond Jubilee, which was made festival of the British Empire.

At the suggestion of the Colonel Secretary, Joseph Chamberlain, the prime ministers of all the selfgoverning dominions were invited to London for the festivities.

One reason for including the prime ministers of the dominions and excluding foreign heads of state was to avoid having to invite Victoria's grandson, Wilhelm II of Germany, who, it was feared might cause trouble at the event.

The Queen's Diamonds Jubilee procession on June 22, 1897, followed a route 6 miles long through London and included troops from all over the Empire.

The procession paused for an open air service of Thanksgiving held outside St.

Paul's Cathedral, throughout which Victoria sat in her open carriage to avoid having to climb the steps to enter the building.

The celebration was marked by vast crowds of spectators and great.

Outpourings of affection for the 78 year old Queen, Victoria visited mainland Europe regularly for holidays.

In 1889, during a stay in Bjeretz, she became the first reigning monarch from Britain to set foot in Spain when she crossed the border for a brief visit.

By April 1900, the Boer War was so unpopular in mainland Europe that her annual trip to France seemed inadvisable.

Instead, the Queen went to Ireland for the first time since 1961, in part to acknowledge the contribution of Irish regiments to the South African War.

In July 1900, Victoria's second son, Alfred Alfie, died.

Oh, God, my poor Darling.

Affy gone too, she wrote in her Journal.

It is a horrible year.

Nothing but sadness and horrors of one kind in another.

Following a custom she maintained throughout her widowhood, Victoria spent the Christmas of 1900 at Osborne House on the Isle of Wight, rheumatism in her legs had rendered her lame, and her eyesight was clouded by cataracts.

Through early January she felt weak and unwell, and by midJanuary she was drowsy, dazed and confused.

She died on January 2219, one at 06:30 in the evening, at the age of 81.

Her son and successor, King Edward II, and her eldest grandson, Emperor Wilhelm II, were at her deathbed.

Her favorite pet Pomeranian Turi, was laid upon her deathbed as a last request.

In 1897, Victoria had written instructions for her funeral, which was to be military as befitting a soldier's daughter and the head of the army and white instead of black.

On January 25, Edward, Wilhelm and her third son, Arthur, helped lift her body into the coffin.

She was dressed in a white dress and her wedding veil.

An array of mementos commemorating her extended family, friends and servants were laid in the coffin with her at her request by her doctor and dressers.

One of Albert's dressing gowns was placed by her side with a plaster cast of his hand, while a lock of John Brown's hair, along with a picture of him was placed in her left hand, concealed from the view of the family by a carefully positioned bunch of flowers.

Items of jewelry placed on Victoria included the wedding ring of John Brown's mother, given to her by Brown in 1883.

Her funeral was held on Saturday, February 2 in St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle, and after two days of lying in state, she was interred beside Prince Albert in the Royal Mausoleum Frogmore at Windsor Great Park.

With a reign of 63 years, seven months and two days, Victoria was the longest reigning British monarch and the longest reigning Queen Regnant in world history until her great great granddaughter Elizabeth II surpassed her on September 9, 2015.

She was the last monarch of Britain from the House of Hanover.

Her son and successor, Edward the 7th, belonged to her husband's House of Sax, Coburn and Gotha.

According to one of her biographers, Guile Saint Aubin, Victoria wrote an average of 2500 words a day during her adult life.

From July 1832 until just before her death, she kept a detailed Journal, which eventually encompassed 122 volumes.

After Victoria's death, her youngest daughter, Princess Beatrice, was appointed her literary executor.

Beatrice transcribed and edited the diaries covering Victoria's session onwards and burned the originals in the process.

Despite this destruction, much of the diaries still exist.

In addition to Beatrice's edited copy, Lord Escher transcribed the volumes from 1832 to 1861 before Beatrice destroyed them.

Part of Victoria's extensive correspondence has been published in volumes edited by AC Benson, Hector Bellisso, George Earl Buckle, Lord Escher, Roger Fulford and Richard Hugh, among others.

Victoria was physically unproposing.

She was stout, Doughty and only about 5ft?

Tall, but she succeeded in projecting a grand image.

She experienced unpopularity during the first years of her widowhood, but was well liked during the when she embodied the Empire as a benevolent matriarchal figure.

Only after the release of her diary and letters did the extent of her political influence become known to the wider public.

Biographies of Victoria written before much of the primary material became available, such as Litton Straci's, Queen Victoria of 1921, are now considered out of date.

The biographies written by Elizabeth Longford and Cecil Woodham Smith in respectively are still widely admired.

They and others conclude that as a person Victoria was emotional, obstinate, honest and straight talking.

Contrary to popular belief, her staff and family reported that Victoria was immensely amused and roared with laughter on many occasions.

Through Victoria's reign, the gradual establishment of a modern constitutional monarchy in Britain.

Continued reforms of the voting system increased the power of the House of Commons at the expense of the House of Lords and the monarch.

In 1867, Walter Beige Hat wrote that the monarch only retained the right to be consulted, the right to encourage, and the right to warn.

As Victoria's monarchy became more symbolic than political, it placed a strong emphasis on morality and family values, in contrast to the sexual, financial, and personal scandals that had been associated with previous members of the House of Hanover and which had discredited the monarchy.

The concept of the family monarchy with which the burgeoning middle classes could identify was solidified.

Victoria's links with Europe's Royal families earned her the nickname the Grandmother of Europe.

Of the 42 grandchildren of Victoria and Albert, 34 survived to adulthood.

Their living descendants include Elizabeth the second, Harold V of Norway, Carl the 16th Gustav of Sweden, Margarita the second of Denmark, and Philippe VI of Spain.

Victoria's youngest son, Leopold, was affected by the blood clotting disease hemophilia B, and at least two of her five daughters, Alice and Beatrice, were carriers.

Royal hemaphiliacs, descended from Victoria included her greatgrandsons Alex Nikolavish Shah of Russia, Alfonso Prince Vesturius, and Infant Gonzalo of Spain.

The presence of the disease in Victoria's descendants, but not in her ancestors, led to modern speculation that her true father was not the Duke of Kent but a hemophiliac.

There is no documentary evidence of a hemophiliac in connection with Victoria's mother, and as male carriers always suffered the disease, even if such a man had existed, he would have been seriously ill.

It is more likely that the mutation arose spontaneously because Victoria's father was over 50 at the time of her conception, and haemophilia arises more frequently in the children of older fathers.

Spontaneous mutations account for about a third of cases around the world.

Places and memorials are dedicated to her, especially in the Commonwealth Nations.

Places named after her include Africa's largest Lake Victoria Falls, the capitals of British Columbia Victoria and Saskatchewan, Regina, two Australian States, Victoria and Queensland, and the capital of the island named Chajalis.

The Victoria Cross was introduced in 1856 to reward acts of Valor during the Crimean War, and it remains the highest British, Canadian, Australian and New Zealand award for bravery.

Victoria Day is a Canadian statutory holiday and a local public holiday in parts of Scotland, celebrated on the last Monday before or on May 24, Queen Victoria's birthday.

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