Victoria ‒ Queen of the United Kingdom and Empress of India ‒ passed away at her home on the Isle of Wight at 18:30 on 22nd January 1901.
Her favourite pet Pomeranian, Turi, was laid upon her deathbed as a last request.
Her reign of 63 years and 216 days was longer than that of any previous monarch and bettered only by that of Queen Elizabeth II, who passed away last year. She was the last monarch of Britain from the House of Hanover; her son Edward VII belonged to her husband’s House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha.
On hearing that Victoria was unwell, her grandson Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany abandoned his duties to be at her side and other members of her family soon followed.
When the news of Her Majesty’s death reached London, a German artist, Hubert von Herkomer ‒ who was employed as an illustrator for the Graphic ‒ was commissioned to paint her portrait on her deathbed. A second artist ‒ Emil Fuchs ‒was given the same task.
Throughout the night of the 23rd, both men worked in the Queen’s bedroom. Victoria was laid out on the bed in her bridal gown and surrounded by lilies. On the bedhead was a portrait of her late husband Albert, also painted in death.
Herkomer only had time to make an outline sketch; however, the Queen’s physician ‒ Sir James Read ‒ declared his work to be an ethereal and flattering portrait of the late monarch.
Herkomer’s watercolour of the late Queen, entitled ‘Queen Victoria on her Deathbed, Osborne during the night of January 23 1901’ was framed in ivory and now hangs outside Victoria’s bedroom at Osborne House.
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 25th January, her sons Edward and Arthur and her grandson Wilhelm helped lift her body into the coffin. She was dressed in a white dress and her wedding veil.
An array of mementoes commemorating her extended family, friends and servants were laid in the coffin with her, at her request, by her doctor and dressers. 1 of Albert’s dressing gowns was placed by her side, with a plaster cast of his hand, while a lock of her Highland servant’s 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 jewellery placed on Victoria included the wedding ring of John Brown’s mother, given to her by Brown in 1883.
On 1st February 1901, thousands of people lined the route for her funeral procession from Osborne House through East Cowes to Trinity pier. Queen Victoria’s coffin was placed on the Royal Yacht Alberta, which carried the Queen’s coffin across the Solent to Portsmouth. On 2nd February, the coffin was transported by train to Victoria Station in London.
Victoria’s funeral was held on 2nd February, in St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, and after 2 days of lying in state, she was interred beside Prince Albert in the Royal Mausoleum, Frogmore, at Windsor Great Park.
But was the dog dead or alive?
Alive one presumes.
What about the smell and the fleas?
I suppose the dog had to just tolerate that!
Joke, bad taste as Queen Victoria ruled such a great nation and would no doubt certainly NOT be amused at how it now has become.
The Empire may have collapsed, and the inhabitants of such along with others are now in the process of destroying the Motherland from within as it is bred into the overcrowding, poverty, crime and violence which arrives with such.
Let’s hope she doesn’t crush her grave goods whilst turning daily.
RiP Your Majesty.
I suggest you learn a little bit about Victoria before writing such garbage. She would be turning in her grave, alright, she would be distraught at how it has become a nasty little insular country run by, and for, petty racists and xenophobes like you.
You might find this informative:
https://time.com/5946375/people-of-color-royal-family-victorian-era/
I hope the current one is the last one. Not a good look taking bags of cash from people who run a country that thinks it’s alright to murder journalists.
Who cares about the Journo f#*k3rs who spread lies and rumours with a big stick!
Queen Elizabeth 11 passed away last year….. Who knew?
Just waiting for the comments saying they remember that day..
As always another great article from the Echo.
How lovely a time when most still respected their Queen and country, and when most here were themselves truly British.
How Politicians, time and those who perhaps would be better suited to be elsewhere have ruined this once great nation, not for a while, but forever, as time make it ever worse with each incoming tide
I guess we are lucky to at least have had Grandparents who lived in a time when people here were far more decent and respectful
God help the next generation for the diversity has improved nothing imo.
Victoria’s mother was German, her father was half German and she married, you guessed it, A German.
That makes Victoria 3/4 German and her children 7/8ths German.
Her successor, Edward VII, married a Dane, so their children are half Danish and most of the other half is German.
His successor (George V) married another German (Mary of Teck), so George V was around 3/4 German and 1/4 Danish.
He married Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon who was English, so Elizabeth II was back to being half foreign.
She went and spoiled it for you by marrying a Greek, so our current King, Charles II, is still mostly foreign and only Elizabeth Bowes Lyon was “truly British” in the lot of them.
Made a bit of a tit of yourself, haven’t you?
Our current King is Charles lll. Charles ll died over 300 years ago.
Oh dear, I missed an “I”. Obviously invalidates my whole point about the royal family being anything but Charlesworth’s “true British”, doesn’t it?
If that’s your best counter-argument I suggest you go back to bed.
Lol ya only 300 plus years out of date but night night
All wealthy, aristocratic Europeans dear Chap, unlike the more recent arrivals both in, and outside of the Royal family.