On the day of April 25th 1843, Her Royal Highness Princess Alice Maud Mary of United Kingdom, of the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, was born. Being the second daughter and third child of the infamous Queen Victoria and her husband, the Prince Consort Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Alice would be known to History as only the daughter of one of the longest rulers of Britain and as the mother of Empress Alexandra, who was unfortunately murdered at the Russian Revolution in 1818.
But this princess was more than that. She received this name because her mother's Minister at the time, Lord Melbourne, commented with the Queen how fond he was of this name, Maud was chosen after Alice's godmother, Sophia Matilda, and Mary was chosen in the honour of the Queen's aunt who was the last of King George III's daughters to die.
As said in memoirs written by her sister, Helena, "Her childhood was, like that of all her brothers and sisters, a very happy one. Indeed, few children can ever have been more blessed in their home life. When she was a year old, her father mentions her as the "beauty of the family, and an extraordinarily good and merry child" and her mother adds, "she was a very vain little person".
Contact with her parents was, as was common with royals and back to the nineteenth century, not often but Prince Albert often took care of his children's education, choosing himself the tutors to his children with the Queen. In matters of education, Victoria and her husband wanted Alice and her siblings to be brought as "simply and domestic as possible". Following this, when " (...) leaving the nursery the children were entrusted to the care of an English governess and of a German and a French governess. These again were under a lady superintendent."
Alice would develop skills on music and drawing subjects, and no single detail of her education was passed to her parents without supervision of the ladies that she was under the care. Her character was a cheerful, kind one, and full of mischief. Often seen at the side of her oldest siblings, Alice was not rare caught in playful activities with her oldest sister, princess royal Vicky, and her favourite brother, Prince of Wales Albert Edward, nicknamed as Bertie. Another of Alice's habits were gymnastics, skating and horse-back riding.
Alice's character is often remembered as being a kind, good one; she had full consideration with others around her and for this she was called as the peacemaker of the family: she was the one who aparted fights in the family and was always trying to be just to all.
After her sister Vicky was married to the Crown Prince of Prussia, Alice was the oldest daughter at Buckingham Palace and, as such, she had her sister's previous domestic roles. With her parents, she developed a more intimate relationship: for example, with her father, to whom she grew closer, she shared a common passion for arts. But then it was also time to choose a husband for her. Although Queen Victoria insisted her children should marry for affection, this feeling should be found amongst the royal houses of Europe. On Alice's case, she found herself very attracted to the heir of the duchy of Hesse and Rhine, Louis. As her father recalled of the occasion in letters sent to Vicky, now Crown Princess of Prussia: "Alice and Louis are as happy as mortals can be, and I need scarcely say this makes my heart as a father glad"
It must be remembered of another trace of Princess Alice. Her sweet nature was very characteristical of her so when the Dowager Duchess of Kent, her grandmother, to whom she was very close, died, it was Alice who her father sent to be at her mother's side to give Queen Victoria comfort, as her grief was very intense. When Prince Albert was very ill, Alice "devoted her entire time to nursing her father in order to allow the Queen to attend to the business of the monarchy. Everything in Alice's life was put on hold, and she spent endless days and nights reading to her father and trying to ease his pain".
But her father did not resist it and on December 14th, 1861, he came to die, changing drastically Alice's life. Her mother came to grief deeply, but even so, the marriage of her daughter was not cancelled. In fact, it occurred seven months later and Queen Victoria stated on her journal that it looked more like a funeral than a wedding festivity.
Having moved to Hesse, Alice established a life that came to disappoint her. Often she complained of poverty and how small it was the duchy was, but, nevertheless, she was happy still. Not much later, she gave birth to her oldest daughter Victoria (who was the current Prince Consort of United Kingdom's grandmother, making Alice, thus, as his great-grandmother). The breast feeding, amongst other feminine rights, turned the princess into a patron of the women's cause. Upon becoming Grand Duchess of Hesse, she also started exchanging letters with Florence Nightingale about nursery, another cause she was very fond in defending.
In domestic life, Alice grew a bit more disappointed with her husband, whose intelectual did not correspond hers. Nevertheless, they remained closed still. She gave Louis six children: Victoria, Elisabeth, Irene, Ernest Louis, Friedrich, Alix and May. Of these, two would die in infancy: Friedrich, who was born hemophiliac, suffered an accident by falling from a widow; and May, this latter having died when diphteria fell upon Alice and Louis's household.
Alice too would be affected from this disease: she spent night and day devouting herself in the care of her family, but she caught the disease and had little time to take care of herself. She would die in December 14th, 1868, the anniversary of her father's death. She was the first children of Queen Victoria's to die and her favourite brother, the Prince of Wales, in a letter said that "Alice was my favourite sister. So good, so kind, so clever! We had gone through so much together..."
The legacy she left for her children was not only her character and consideration for others, but religious views and the causes her daughters would defend (for example, Elisabeth, later know as Grand Duchess Ella, and Alix, later Empress Alexandra of Russia, would practice charity always). As a matter of a fact, Alice's death would leave in her youngest surviving daughter, Alix, a great impact.
Sources: https://archive.org/stream/alicegrandduches04alic/alicegrandduches04alic_djvu.txt
http://www.alexanderpalace.org/palace/alicehessebio.html
http://www.unofficialroyalty.com/princess-alice-of-the-united-kingdom-grand-duchess-of-hesse-and-by-rhine/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Princess_Alice_of_the_United_Kingdom
Nenhum comentário:
Postar um comentário