Victoria (Penguin Monarchs) by Jane Ridley

Author:Jane Ridley [Ridley, Jane]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
ISBN: 9780141977195
Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd
Published: 2015-04-29T16:00:00+00:00

The source for this touching scene is an undated letter written by the queen after John Brown’s death to his brother Hugh, into which she copied an extract from ‘an old Diary or Journal of mine’. The journal as rewritten by Princess Beatrice contains no reference to any of this – and without Victoria’s full account we will never really know how close the relationship was.*

John Brown, who had been the queen’s favourite gillie at Balmoral, was summoned to Osborne to lead her pony in 1864. The idea originated with Princess Alice, who thought Brown would help to relieve the queen’s grief. Promoted to the post of the queen’s Highland Servant in 1865, he took orders from the queen, came to her room after breakfast and after luncheon, and was constantly in attendance, both indoors and out. She drew strength from the simple, direct words of this ‘faithful friend’. Worried that her grief for Albert had become less acute, compromising her loyalty to her beloved, she sought guidance from the Dean of Windsor. He assured her that Brown was sent by God to comfort her.2

Already there was gossip. The household joked that she was ‘Mrs Brown’, and her daughters referred to Brown as ‘Mama’s lover’.3 The Lausanne Gazette printed a story in September 1866 that Victoria had secretly married Brown and was pregnant with his child. Observers noted that Victoria was putting on weight and had become red in the face, but the claim that she gave birth at the age of forty-seven was a libel. The story has reappeared in various versions ever since – the most recent account was published in 2012.4 Tales of illegitimate births are an occupational hazard of royal biography, and the fact that John Brown was Victoria’s only alleged lover means that scurrilous gossip clusters thickly around him.

The relationship between Queen Victoria and John Brown was improper nonetheless. The queen seemed determined to flaunt her affection for her Highland Servant. As the Conservative politician Lord Stanley (later Derby) wrote in his diary in 1866:

She is really doing all in her power to create suspicions which I am persuaded have no foundation. Long solitary rides, in secluded parts of the park: constant attendance upon her in her room: private messages sent to him by persons of rank: avoidance of observation while he is leading her pony or driving her little carriage: everything shows that she has selected this man for a kind of friendship which is absurd and unbecoming her position.5

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