Queen Victoria is considered today the Grandmother of Europe, and she was a woman who had family
links to many different royal families.
There is a belief that the First World War could have been sorted round a dinner table
due to the different family members of Victoria’s becoming more aggressive and hostile.
The war of course would greatly impact the lives of everyday people across Europe, but
there was a inherited genetic disorder which caused chaos within the decendents of Queen
Victoria and it’s believed that many members of the royalty in the 19th and 20th century
were affected by it.
It’s believed that the disorder came from Queen Victoria and her husband Prince Albert,
but what is the story of the Deadly Disorder That Haunted Queen Victoria’s Royal Family.
Haemophilia is a mostly inherited genetic disorder that affects and impairs the bodies
ability to make blood clots.
Because of this if a sufferer receives a cut or an injury, then the clothing of the blood
will not happen, and this is the process that is needed to stop bleeding.
Because of this, a slight injury can become fatal, and sometimes there is the risk of
bleeding inside the joints of brain.
But within many European royal families, there was a family member who suffered from the
condition.
It’s believed that through two of Queen Victoria’s five daughters, Princess Alice
and Princess Beatrice, that the genetic mutation for the condition was passed to various royal
houses around Europe.
There were members of the Russian, Spanish and German royal family that suffered from
Haemophilia, and Victoria’s youngest son Prince Leopold the Duke of Albany also suffered
from he disease.
But her 3 eldest sons did not.
The specific form of haemophilia which was passed down by Queen Victoria is believed
to have been the rather rate Haemophilia B, and it became known as ‘the royal disease.’
The disorder which is linked to the X chromosome manifests itself mostly in males, but it can
be inherited from the mother by male children, or from either mother or father by female
children.
IT is a trait that is recessive, and each child of a carrier of the gene would have
a 50% chance of inherited their mother’s mutation.
The daughter of a male haemophilia will always inherit the mutation of the father, whilst
a son cannot inherit it.
Mostly throughout ancestry, the origin of the disorder can be traced, but there are
elements of spontaneous mutation in an ancestor.
IT’s believed that Victoria’s link to the mutation was spontaneous, or was inherited
through one of her parents, but she is usually believed to be the source of the disease in
the modern cases of the illness within her descendants.
Queen Victoria’s father Prince Edward the Duke of Kent was not a haemophiliac, but the
mutation may have emerged within him.
When Victoria was born her father was 51, and it’s unlikely that her mother had a
lover with the condition as there was a rather low life expectancy from sufferers in the
early 1800s.
Her mother Victoria the Duchess of Kent was also not known to have had a family history
of the disease, but she could have been a carrier.
Queen Victoria’s eldest daughter Victoria the Princess Royal it’s believed escaped
the gene, and her fifth child Helena may or may not have been a carrier.
Victoria’s sixth child Princess Louise died without issue, but her sons expect Leopold
were not haeomphiliacs.
But Princess Alice and Beatrice were carriers.
Prince Leopold, the 8th child of Victoria and Albert and youngest son did suffer with
the condition.
He was described as a delicate child, and it was suggested that he also had epilepsy.
But because of the condition, Victoria did all she could to protect him, and she sheltered
him away from a military career as he would not be allowed in the army or navy.
Instead he went to Oxford University, and he would be stifled in his attempts to marry
because of his disorder.
He had difficulty finding a wife because of the haemophilia, but he would eventually marry,
but he was attended on for the disorder by the best doctors in Europe.
In February 1884, he went to Cannes on doctors orders for joint pain, which is a common symptom
of the disorder when it is winter.
His wife begged him not to go, but during his time in France he fell and injured his
knee and also hit his head.
He then within hours died from a cerebral haemorrhage, with his condition making him
most likely to get seriously ill from falls and scrapes.
Another sufferer was Victoria’s great grandson Prince Waldemar of Prussia.
He would suffer from the condition as would his younger brother and Waldemar died in a
clinic in Tutzing during the Second World War due to the fact there was no facility
to give a blood transfusion.
He and his wife had fled their homes due to the Russian advances, and because he could
not get the care he died.
The medical resources meant for him were diverted by the Americans to treat concentration camp
victims.
Waldermar’s younger brother Prince Henry of Prussia died at the age of 4.
He was described as a cheerful and lively boy, but he also suffered from Haemophilia.
When he was 4, he was left unsupervised for a few minutes and he climbed a chair and then
onto a table,.
And then when he climbed down he fell and hit his head.
He started to scream, but when his mother got to him he was almost unconscious.
The fall was not that bad, and if he had been not suffered with the disorder he would have
lived but within the next day he had died.
Prince Friedrich of Hesse and By Rhine was a grandson of Victoria’s and he also had
the condition.
His mother was Princess Alice, and he would die at just the age of 2.
He was left playing with his older brother, and Friedrich climbed on a chair next to an
open window in his mother’s bedroom to get a look at his brother and the chair ripped
and Friedrich fell 20 feet.
He survived the fall but died hours later of a brain haemorrhage linked to the condition.
One of the most famous cases of the condition was Alexei the Tsarevich of Russia.
He was the only son of Emperor Nicholas II and Empress Alexandra, and was a descendant
also of the British Queen.
He suffered from the haemophilia and he was noted for being a rather restless and adventurous
boy and he would not want to stay in any place for a length of time.
He was sheltered and wanted to play, but his energetic nature was a worry.
At first he seemed a healthy baby but at birth he lost a lot of blood.
Alexei was assigned two navy sailors to watch him at all times, and his condition was so
severe that trivial injuries such as a bruise or a nosebleed were often fatal.
He was treated by Grigori Rasputin, and it’s believed that Rasputin may have helped the
boy by stopping medication which was actually making the condition worse.
Alexei had suffered a number of injuries which had got worser in the days before, and Rasputin’s
calm and gentle nature may have helped calm Alexei and stop the bleeding.
Alexei would be executed later alongside his family when the Romanovs were shot by the
Bolsheviks.
Another boy with the condition who was a grandson of Queen Victoria was Ruper Cambridge, Viscount
Trematon.
He would also suffer from a intracerebral haemorrhage as he had a car crash in France.
He was driving with two friends to Lyon and when overtaking a car, his car hit a tree
and over-turned.
He had a slight fracture of the skull, and never recovered and died.
Another sufferer and grandson was Lord Leopold Mountbatten, and he did experience a military
career despite the condition.
During a hip operation he would never recover, and he was another member of the royal family
who would die at a young age, being 32.
Two more family members linked to Victoria was Alfonso the Prince of Asturias and Gonzalo
of Spain.
Gonzalo was an active sportsman, but he was also involved in a car crash but he did not
appear badly hurt.
However Gonzalo had severe abdominal bleeding, and he died two days after.
Alfonso’s life was also cut short due to a car crash.
He suffered internal bleeding after his car crashed into a telephone booth.
But Haemophilia was a condition that for decades after the death of Queen Victoria caused a
significant amount of problems for the European royal families.
The sufferers all died at rather young ages after getting into scrapes and problems that
would not have killed people who did not have the conditions.
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