One of England’s longest running monarchs was Queen Victoria.
She passed away on the 22nd January 1901, and the 81 year old Victoria had ruled for
roughly 64 years.
This was a colossal amount of time, and her reign was one which saw the British Empire
at its prosperous height, and the people in her country began to become known as Victorians.
She had a significant impact on the history, however her death caused a great shock and
when the monarch died, and in particular such time had passed in her long reign that people
did not know how to prepare for a state funeral.
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Queen Victoria’s final years of her reign were rather turbulent and strained.
In 1900 in particular Victoria had a rather distressing year which was filled with a significant
amount of upset.
Britain had been fighting in the Boer War, and the loss in the war and conflict caused
her a significant amount of stress, and her eldest son Edward who was the heir apparent
to the throne was shot.
He had been shot in an assassination attempt in protest over the Second Boer War, and at
the time was going through Belgium, when an assassin just a young boy fired bullets at
him.
Victoria’s eldest daughter also was very sick that year, Vicky the Dowager Empress
of Germany had been diagnosed with agonising breast cancer which had already spread around
her body and in particular her spine.
The Queen’s daughter’s health was a great shock and was very sad for Victoria, but then
another son Alfred the Duke of Edinburgh also passed away.
Victoria regarded him as her favourite son, and Alfred who was not living he healthiest
lifestyle before, for example smoking heavily and drinking heavily died from throat cancer.
His passing in particular shocked the English Queen and upset her greatly.
The English royal family during this time began to become surrounded by important deaths,
as Victoria’s much loved and treasured grandson Prince Christian Victory passed away from
fever whilst he was away in South Africa within the British Army.
One of the Queen’s best friends Lady Churchill, whom the Queen had known for a very long time
also passed away in her sleep and bed whilst she was visiting the monarch at Osborne House.
These moments all had a huge effect on the Queen, who in her years had experienced very
serious bouts of depression during her life.
In particular when he husband died, she suffered greatly from this.
But towards the end of the 1800s, Victoria was not her normal self.
She would not eat as much as she previously did, and lost lots of weight causing doctors
and family to worry a great deal about her.
She eventually became wheelchair bound, and also suffered with her eyesight and often
became very confused.
Victoria who was once the head of the British Empire, and who had been the Queen for over
64 years was coming to terms with her end, and was beginning to slip away.
She noted how, ‘another year has begun, I am feeling so weak and unwell that I enter
upon it sadly,’ showing that infact she was down, depressed and also coming to terms
with her death.
Within 3 weeks of the start of 1901, Queen Victoria passed away on the 22nd January and
the Queen’s residence on the Isle of Wight, Osborne House was placed on a very strict
lockdown.
Not one person was allowed to leave for a brief period inside the household, and the
phone lines were taken down and a crowd had gathered outside the entrance gates to the
residence.
On the small bulletin board outside, a note was placed.
It read, ‘Osborne House, January 22nd 6:45pm.
Her majesty the Queen breathed her last at 6:30pm surrounded by her children and grand
children.’
The news of the Queen’s death travelled very quickly and it took many by surprise.
For large amounts of the population, Victoria’s reign was all that they knew and as she had
reigned for so long, no one knew how to really prepare the Queen for her state funeral, and
how to arrange this.
The Queen had been ill for a long while, and the public had been constantly told that she
was not in fact ill, and doctors had stated for a long time that she was not ill.
But one of her doctors, James Reid a man who had looked after Victoria’s health for 20
years realised that Victoria was about to pass away.
He tried to tell the royals that Victoria was dying, but no one would listen, and he
could not convince them that this was happening.
It’s been debated for a long time what actually killed Queen Victoria, and despite suffering
with confusion and delirium, she had also been suffering with other conditions.
Victoria had been suffering with Rheumatism which affected her legs and this forced the
Queen into a wheelchair in her final days, affecting her mobility meaning that she could
not get around as she had previously.
Also her eyesight was poor, and she had suffered from cataracts.
No doubt this was distressing for the Queen with her sight deteriorating, but this would
not have killed her, just affected her mood struggling to see things which she previously
would have been able to.
She also complained throughout the month that she was weak and generally felt sick and unwell,
but as the month continued she began to become more sick, and dazed and confused.
She did state to her doctors at one point that, ‘I should like to live a little longer,
as I have a few things to settle,’ showing that she had fighting spirit and that she
did not want to succumb to her deteriorating condition.
But as the month continued this waned.
After the 17th January, it seemed that things went downhill for the long reigning monarch,
as she suffered from what could be attributed to being a stroke.
Strokes can kill instantly, but with Victoria they occured in a short amount of time, and
caused her to become delirious and suffer with a great deal of pain.
Following these strokes, the royal family were immediately ordered to come to the Isle
of Wight.
It was very clear to anyone and the doctors that Victoria was on deaths door, and preparations
were made for her successor, and for the government to stop as the Queen could not effectively
carry out her duties.
The royal family gathered around in Victoria’s small bedroom, and along with the Bishop of
Winchester they prayed and said their final words to the Queen.
Priests sung prayers and hymns by her side, and the Kaiser of Germany was summoned, Victoria’s
grandson who was also there at her bedside.
The Queen was conscious but could not see, and the deathbed was surrounded by her closest
family.
Each of them kissed the Queens hand and said farewell in their own way.
Clerics continued to chant and sing, in an attempt to rally the Queen but this did not
happen.
It’s believed that the strokes the Queen suffered caused Victoria’s death, but it’s
also considered that she had a short and painless illness that took her life.
Other’s believe that Victoria simply died from old age as she was very frail, and other
people even consider that she had a cerebral hemorrage.
Victoria had been ill for some time, and that her health was only going one way.
The Queen looked very thin as she did not eat, and she grew tired and confused more
often.
It’s most probably that a short illness is responsible coupled with her old age.
But Victoria did not die alone, she was surrounded by her family including her successor her
eldest son, and also the Kaiser of Germany her eldest grandson.
Following her death, there was a significant degree of confusion as to how to plan for
the Queen’s funeral.
Victoria had ruled for simply so long that no one had experience in doing this.
After her death, Kaiser Wilhelm ordered a deathmask to be cast, and this was against
the wishes of the Queen, who would not have liked this.
Also during the preparations for the funeral, the Duke of York was taken very ill by a dangerous
illness and the royal undertakers then arrived on the Isle of Wight to take Victoria’s
body back to London.
But he forgot to bring a coffin which caused further delay, and a new coffin was was built
by a local carpenter and then brought to Osborne House.
Victoria’s doctor and her dresser prepared the body for her coffin, and they refused
to embalm the Queen and threw charcoal on the floor of the coffin to stop the smell
and to absorb any moisture.
They also cut her hair, and dressed Victoria in a white silk dressing gown, with a garter
ribbon and a star, putting her wedding veil over her face.
Then the new King, the Kaiser and other royal dukes came into the room to lift the body
into the coffin.
A number of objects were placed inside her coffin.
These included one of her husband’s dressing gowns, a plaster cast of his hand, a lock
of her confident and close friend John Brown’s hair and a picture of him, along with pieces
of jewellery.
The wedding ring of John Brown’s mother was also strangely placed on Victoria’s
hand.
The coffin then made its way to London under a guard of battleships and cruisers crossing
the Solent, and it then had a huge military procession.
The official funeral service took place first, and then a smaller one in the mausoleum that
Victoria had built for Albert at Frogmore.
As Victoria’s body was lowered into the vault, Kaiser Wilhelm II and Edward VIII knelt
by her coffin.
Queen Victoria was one of the longest reigning royals to reign over England, but her final
moments were met with pain and sorrow for the woman who once was a symbol of immense
power.
It was Victoria who was referred to as the empress, but she grew weak and ill very quickly.
However she passed away surrounded very closely by her family and by love.
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