Recollections of Victoria Mountbatten, Marchioness of Milford Haven
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My 400th post on this blog!
The excerpts:
I might here mention certain fixed rules for our life, which my mother had adopted from those used in her youth. We rose early. ... We breakfasted with our parents at 9 o'clock, and had an hour's exercise out of doors, after which we had what we called "little lunch" consisting of milk, fruit and biscuits at 11, and at 2 o'clock we lunched with our parents. I would mention here that my mother adhered to the diet Queen Victoria and the Prince Consort had instituted for their children. We were never given spiced or rich food, simple dishes being served up for us. We never objected to anything given us at home, but the awful bread and butter puddings without a raisin in them or the stodgy tapioca pudding full of lumps we got in Queen Victoria's houses I still remember with a shudder of disgust. On the rarest of occasions were we given a sweet or a bonbon, but we were always allowed a lump of sugar if we wanted something sweet. ...
After lunch we again went out for 1½ hours in all weathers and had schoolroom tea at 5. This over, we went down to my mother's room where we played about with the younger children. We went to bed at 6.30, later on at 7. when preparations took more time. Morning walks were taken together with the smaller ones, in charge of their nurses, when the pony-carriage always took out two or three little ones, for after my brother Fritz, two sisters were born, Alix and May. The favourite place for our walk was the Akaziengarten which has long since disappeared. It had been made on the outskirts of the town by Louis II, to give occupation to unemployed and was, strictly speaking, no garden at all, but consisted of plots of unkempt grass intersected by sandy paths, and of a sandy mound, planted with acacias. There the little ones ran about in safety and the elders got into the pony-carriage and drove about at a galop round and round. ...
... I was decidedly a tomboy up to the age of 14 and my ideal was the hero of Tom Brown's Schooldays. I ruled the younger with a rod of iron, though my sister Ella being nearest my age, would rebel sometimes against too much ruling. So we ended by dividing the authority over the younger ones between us. ...
On Saturday afternoons we always had a half holiday and our playfellows, the daughters of my mother's secretary, Dr. Becker, and those of our successive physicians, Drs Weber and Eigenbrodt, came to play with us. Our greatest amusement on Saturday afternoon was to go to the Prince Emil Garten, if the weather was fine. It had a sham ruin in a little shrubbery near the house. We used to divide into parties, one led by me, the other by the strongest guest, one party defending the ruin, the other attacking it. ...
... In the summer of 1878, three months before my mother's death, Miss Margaret Hardcastle Jackson came to us, who had been finisheing governess to Lady Mary and Lady Maud Herbert (afterwards Lady Maud Parry). On Lady Herbert's conversion to Roman Catholicism, Miss Jackson left the family. She was a strong British conservative. Though she had been such a short time with us before my mother died, she religiously carried on every rule and suggestion my mother had made. ... She left us after my sister Irene married, as Alix, being so much younger, had not been entirely under her. On her retirement Grandmama gave her apartments at St. Catherine's in Regents Park. She only died during the Great War, luckily not surviving the downfall of the Russian and German Empires. She was so devoted to us all, that she had our photographs placed in her coffin. It was from Miss Jackson's dislike of gossip that we never took any interest in local tittle tattle.
I would like to say that our nurse Miss Orchard, called "Orchie" who came to us in 1865 always remained with my sister Alix and accompanied her to Russia, only leaving her in 1905, when the weakness of age overtook her. Orchie's birthday was always a great fete. Several days before it she stirred her own birthday cake after an English recipe, at which performance we always managed to be present, and on the day Orchie gave a big tea, to which we were all invited.
Our chief instructors were not the governesses, but various teachers from the Volksshule or Gymnasium. We were given by them arithmetic, geography and history lessons. Our religious instructor was Pfarrer Sell, D. D. who became a Professor of Theology at Bonn and always remained in touch with Irene. ... My sister Alix's principal teacher was Fraulein Textor, who had a boarding school for English girls at Darmstadt, and who had been selected for her by my mother just before her death. ...
Every other year at least we went to some seaside resort with our parents, where we bathed and played on the sands to our heart's content. Blankenberghe, then a modest little place with a couple of big hotels on the "Dunes" with a town behind them was one of the places we went to in the '70. ...
Off and on we went to Osborne in the summer and the last year of my mother's life we went to Eastbourne. Here we met the children of my mother's friends and the younger lot of Prussian cousins, who also had been sent over for sea-bathing, and who ranged in age with Irene, Ernie and Alix. ...
... Once when Alix was a baby, we paid a visit to the Grand Duke and Grand Duchess of Baden at the Mainau. ...
Early in November 1878 I fell ill with diphtheria. Well do I remember the Saturday half-holiday when, in spite of a very sore throat, I read aloud parts of Alice in Wonderland to the little ones. That night I had high fever and, the illness being recognised, Ella was moved downstairs to Irene's room. When the latter in her turn developed the disease, Ella, still not showing signs of it, was sent to my grandmother and remained free of it. All the other children and my father went down with it in turn. My father was very ill and so was Ernie, and my poor little sister May died of it on November 16th. The disease was very virulent that year, and of course no serum existed at that time. Slowly the others all recovered and rooms had already been taken for us at the big hotel above the old Schloss at Heidelberg to convalesce. Then my mother fell ill too and we children were all moved to the Schloss at Darmstadt, only my father remaining at the New Palace with her. She had no strength left to resist the disease, thoroughly worn out as she was by nursing us all, and died on the 14th of December, the anniversary of the death day of her beloved father. ...
My mother's death was an irreparable loss to us all and left a great gap in our lives. She had, indeed, been the mistress of the house, a wise and loving wife and mother, whom we respected as much as we loved her. ...
We all went to Osborne to the Queen in January 1879. ...
Of course we had a family physician who came when any of us was not well, but Orchie looked after our little ailments. My father had three standard remedies, with which he was inclined to treat all ailments: tincture of bark "if you felt run down", quinine for all feverish symptoms, and tincture of rhubarb for the stomach. Rhubarb was a loathsome medicine specially when given in the form of a powder, stirred up in water. Orchie's system for punishing lying in the nursery, was to put a pinch of rhubarb powder on the tip of the tongue, the conveyor of the lie, but she progressed with the times, and with the younger lot, a pinch of quinine replaced the rhubarb.
On the whole, we were a healthy family and not given to coddling. ...
... We only spent the summer at Wolfsgarten after my mother's death. ...
Wilhelmine von Grancy, Wilhelmine we called her, remained with us after our mother's death as our lady-in-waiting and later on at Uncle Ernie's Court until her death in 1915. ...
Wilhelmine was a great figure in our house and we were all devoted to her. She had very precise, rather old fashioned manners, but was most broad-minded and took a motherly interest in us all so that we could rely on her advice. ...
Irene, Ernie and Alix were overjoyed at the acquisition of a prospective brother-in-law and Louis and I rarely had the occasion of being alone together. Grandmama was at first not very pleased at our engagement as she wished me, as the eldest, to continue looking after the younger ones and keeping my father company. ...
Sometimes on a Sunday afternoon in our young days, my father would propose taking us crayfishing with him, in the Kranichstein Park. This consisted, on our part in wading in the small brook and turning up stones under which crayfish lay hidden, which we then pounced on and carefully grabbed with our fingers. It was a somewhat wet amusement. My father suggested we should wear any old clothes for this, but my mother firmly decreed that as we messed enough dresses on week days, we should learn to take care of our Sunday clothes and if we were unable to do so, had better not go crayfishing. She used to look on, superintending the arrangements for tea. ...
Early in June we rejoined my father at Darmstadt and together with him, Ella, Irene, Ernie and Alix we went to Russia, stopping at Peterhof for a week before Ella's wedding. We were lodged at the Big Palace and there was always a large family gathering for dinner at "Alexandria". This being the season of the long nights, we afterwards made up a party in many carriages and drove about the park. ...
Alix was a pretty little girl of 12 at the time, and with her loose hair and smart frock looked very well at the wedding. She was led in to the ceremony by the immensely tall Nikolasha who had to stoop down to talk to her. We met him and many members of the Russian family for the first time on that occasion. Serge, of course, we had known since our childhood, as also his brother Paul, they having been so often at the Heiligenberg with their mother and it was one of Serge's standing jokes against Alix to remind her that he had seen her bathed. ...
On February 13 [1890] Papa arrived with Alix, accompanied by Wilhelmine and her brother Albert Grancy. I was able to put the two former up in the quaint house we had taken that winter. ...
Madelaine [Zannotti] was Alix's maid under Orchie and remained her maid when Alix became Empress of Russia. She followed her to Tobolsk but was not allowed to see her in captivity there. ...
I think Papa and Alix enjoyed their stay at Malta. We were asked out to many dinners and dances, picnics, etc. Mark Kerr used to be lent by the Admiral to make himself useful to my guests and Alix nicknamed him "her Malta aide-de-camp."
... On the 19th [May 1891] I went to London and spent a few days there, and with Papa and Alix went on to Balmoral in time for Grandmama's birthday. ...
On the 4th of March [1892] ... whilst we were playing Halma, I was sent for to go up to the New Palace immediately, as Papa had had a stroke during lunch time. By the time I got up to the house Papa had been put to bed in the library. The stroke had affected his whole right side, and he was very restless. On the next morning he was quieter and drowsy, but his breathing had become heavy and irregular. Irene and Henry arrived that night and Louis on the following afternoon. Every day my father's condition grew slowly worse, and he could only be roused with difficulty. Ernie, who was in the South of France, arrived on the 7th and Papa recognized him but could not speak. On the 9th, when Ella and Serge arrived, we were able to rouse him sufficiently to know them, but on the 13th of March he passed away peacefully. His body lay in state for some days and the Hessian mourning for him was universal and sincere. He was one of the kindest-hearted and most just men I have ever known. ...
... We, with little Alice, Irene, Alix and Ernie went to Coburg to spend Easter there. ... That summer Ernie and Alix took a cure at Schwalbach, where I went to see them. ...
... When Nicky visited us [at Walton-on-Thames in 1894], we ... went on the river. He was a good oarsman, but so energetic that by the time we got back he had taken off all the skin under the finger on which he wore his engagement ring to Alix. ...
On April 1st Alix, Louis and I accompanied Ernie to Coburg where he was married to Ducky [Victoria Melita] on the 19th. ...
There was a very large family gathering at Coburg for the wedding, amongst them Grandmama with Aunt Beatrice, Uncle Bertie, the Connaughts, Vladimir and Miechen of Russia, Ella and Serge, Henry and Irene and William II. Nicky was sent to represent him by his father and it was in Coburg that he and Alix became engaged. They had been in love with each other ever since she and Papa had spent a winter at Petersburg a couple of years before, but there had been many difficulties in the way, one of which was Alix's objection to changing her religion [from Lutheranism to Russian Orthodoxy]. These scruples William successfully overcame in a long conversation with her. He was so keenly in favour of the marriage ... — he proved to Alix that it was her bounden duty, for the sake of the peace of Europe, to sacrifice her scruples and marry the heir to the Russian throne. Furthermore, he maintained that the difference between the two confessions were only superficial. Poor Alix, who had felt very lonely after Papa's death and who now would no longer be so needed by Ernie, was as happy as Nicky when their engagement became a fact.
Alix returned to England with us and went to stop with Grandmama at Windsor. ...
Alix had been suffering for some time from attacks of sciatica and took a cure at Harrogate against it. I spent a couple of days with her there; we had great fun going about in tricycle bath chairs, worked by a man sitting behind us. We used to urge them to race each other. When her Harrogate cure had ended, Alix came back to us at Walton and there Nicky joined us for the 20th to the 23rd of June. He came quite alone with his old valet and he and Alix were free to spend as much time as they liked together. Then this private intermezzo came to an end and we four were fetched by a Royal carriage with an outrider to go to Windsor, much to the surprise of the Waltonians, who never realized who the important people stopping with us had been.
We left Elmgrove for good on the last day of July and, picking up Alix at Osborne, crossed to Flushing on board the V & A. ...
... In October ... the news of Sasha's (Emperor Alexander III) health was so disquieting that it was considered advisable for Alix to go to Livadia, as she had not seen him since her Russian visit with my father.
I accompanied her as far as Warsaw, leaving her on October 19th, from where Ella took her on. ... On our 1st November, Ella's birthday, Sasha died from kidney disease, and immediately after the funeral at Petersburg, Alix and Nicky were married (November 26th), the deep court mourning having been suspended on that day. ...
... Leaving the children at Heiligenberg, we left with Ernie and Ducky for Moscow on May 16th [1896] to attend the coronation. ...
The Coronation itself I need not describe beyond saying it was a very magnificent sight. Alix looked beautiful in her Coronation Robes, Crown, and the obligatory side-curls. ...
... By the 7th of June when the festivities were over and we moved to Illinskoje, trees and flowers were in full bloom and the weather was quite warm. Our party there besides our hosts and us, not counting the necessary suites, consisted of Nicky and Alix with their baby, Olga, Aunt Marie and Bee, Ernie and Ducky with baby Elisabeth and Paul, who was quartered at Oussove. It was lovely being in the country after the strenuous days we had just gone through. By July the 4th all the guests had departed. Louis had already to leave on the 15th of June and Alix and Nicky left on July 3rd.
In October Nicky and Alix paid their first visit to Wolfsgarten as a married couple, bringing baby Olga with them. They had been visiting Grandmama at Balmoral and afterwards had paid an official accession visit to Paris from where they came to Ernie. ...
... That autumn [1897] Nicky and Alix again came to Darmstadt with little Olga and the new baby, Tatiana my godchild, and I moved into the Altes Palace. Many relations came to visit them and the foundation stone of the Russian Chapel at the Mathildenhöhe was laid in Nicky's and Alix's presence. ...
... On the 9th [August 1901] we left for Peterhof on a visit to Alix and Nicky. ... On the 18th of August ... went with Nicky and Alix to see the Manoevres at Narva, living in the Imperial train with them for several days. ...
... On the 24th [September 1903] I moved with Nona and the children to the Altes Palais to prepare for Alice's wedding.
There was a very large gathering for it. Ernie put up the whole Greek family at the Schloss, as well as Vera of Würtenberg, Aunt Olga's sister. Ella and Serge with Marie and Dimitry, Nicky, Alix and the children, Aunt Alix and Toria all lived with him at the New Palace. ...
... Nona was left at the Alte Palais to look after Sonia Orbeliani, Alix's lady-in-waiting. She was a charming, intelligent and merry girl, most loyal and honest, whom we were all very fond of. For a couple of years she had showed symptoms of spinal trouble, and on arrival at Darmstadt she suddenly almost lost the use of her legs. It was out of the question she should go to Wolfsgarten, so Alix took her in an ambulance to the Alte Palais, which was now empty and quiet. ...
Later in the month [August 1904] Louis was sent to Peterhof to represent Uncle Bertie at the christening of Nicky and Alix's son and heir, Alexei. ...
... In the summer [1910] we all went at first to the Heiligenberg, ... and then moved on to Friedberg, where there was a large family gathering, as Nicky and Alix and all their children lived there with Ernie, during a cure that Alix took at Nauheim. Alix was not able to do much and spent the afternoon sitting quietly in the grounds, where I generally kept her company. ...
In 1913 the tricentenary of the reign of the Romanoff dynasty had been celebrated in Russia, and Nicky and Alix visited the home towns of the family, Jaroslaw and Kostroma on the Volga. ...
... We reached St Petersburg on the evening of August 4th [1914], just on the day that England had also declared war. Sir George Buchanan and Isa Buxhoeveden, one of Alix's ladies-in-waiting received us at the station and the latter took us to the Winter Palace where she had rooms hurriedly prepared for us, as the Palace was in disuse in the summer. We felt we could not put up at Peterhof as Alix had intended, the patients having to be kept in bed and there was a risk of spreading the infection. Alix, with the two eldest girls, came to see Ella and me on the following forenoon, and I spent the next day with her and her family at Peterhof. ... Valentin Schmidt, as a German subject, we left behind very ill in bed still and Alix managed to send him back to Germany later. She came again to St. Petersburg to see us before we left and, with loving forethought, equipped us with thick coats and other serviceable clothing for the sea journey, we only having the lightest of summer clothing with us, also giving us smaller and lighter travelling trunks.
Above: Alexandra.
Above: Victoria.
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