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The Kensington System was a strict and elaborate set of rules designed by Victoria, Duchess of Kent, along with her attendant, Sir John Conroy, concerning the upbringing of the Duchess's daughter, the future Queen Victoria. It is named after Kensington Palace in London, where they resided prior to Queen Victoria's accession to the throne.
The System was aimed at rendering the young Princess Victoria weak and dependent and thus unlikely to adhere to her other relatives in the House of Hanover against her mother and Conroy. The young Victoria was never allowed to be apart from her mother, her tutor or her governesses (Baroness Lehzen and the Duchess of Northumberland). She was kept isolated from other children, and her mother and Conroy strictly monitored and recorded her every action and entirely controlled whom she was allowed to meet. [1]
Victoria had only two playmates during her adolescence: her half-sister, Princess Feodora of Leiningen, and Conroy's daughter, Victoire. Only occasional trips were made outside the palace grounds; two visits to Claremont to see her uncle Leopold I of Belgium greatly influenced Victoria's opinion on the System. [2] When it became clear that Victoria would inherit the throne, her keepers tried to induce Victoria to appoint Conroy her personal secretary and treasurer via a long series of threats and browbeating, to no avail.[ citation needed ]
Victoria's education began at the age of five. Her first teacher, Reverend George Davys, Dean of Chester, instructed her on scripture. The Duchess of Kent would personally drill her daughter after each lesson. At eight years old, Victoria began learning decorum, reading, and writing from Baroness Lehzen. She studied Greek, Latin, Italian, French, and German. The Duchess of Kent instituted a strict daily schedule for Victoria's education. Morning lessons began at 9:30 sharp with a break at 11:30. Lessons would resume for the afternoon at 3:00 and would last until 5:00. [3]
The system was endorsed by Queen Victoria's half-brother, Carl, 3rd Prince of Leiningen, who supported their mother's ambitions for a regency. In 1841, after Victoria had become queen and had made known her displeasure with the system, Carl attempted to justify it in his book A Complete History of the Policy Followed at Kensington, Under Sir John Conroy's Guidance. [4]
The System was an utter failure and backfired spectacularly. Victoria grew to hate her mother, Conroy, and her mother's lady-in-waiting (Lady Flora Hastings) over the system. Her first two requests, upon her accession four weeks after her 18th birthday (she received the delegation informing her of the king's death by herself), were that she should be allowed an hour by herself, which the System had never permitted, and that her bed should be removed from her mother's room, which presaged the cessation of her mother's influence, and, through her mother, that of Conroy. [5] Among Victoria's first acts upon her accession to the throne at the age of 18 was to ban Conroy from her apartments permanently.
After a brief engagement, Victoria married Prince Albert in 1840 and thus was no longer conventionally required to live with her mother. At the conclusion of her wedding ceremony, she shook hands only with the Duchess and soon evicted her mother from the palace. She rarely visited her mother and remained cold and distant from her until the birth of her first child.[ citation needed ]
Victoria was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 216 days, which was longer than any of her predecessors, is known as the Victorian era. It was a period of industrial, political, scientific, and military change within the United Kingdom, and was marked by a great expansion of the British Empire. In 1876, the British Parliament voted to grant her the additional title of Empress of India.
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Kensington Palace is a royal residence set in Kensington Gardens, in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in London, England. It has been a residence of the British royal family since the 17th century, and is currently the official London residence of the Prince and Princess of Wales, the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester, the Duke and Duchess of Kent, and Prince and Princess Michael of Kent.
Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, later Princess of Leiningen and subsequently Duchess of Kent and Strathearn, was a German princess and the mother of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom. As the widow of Charles, Prince of Leiningen, from 1814, she served as regent of the Principality during the minority of her son from her first marriage, Carl, until her second wedding in 1818 to Prince Edward, fourth son of George III.
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Johanna Clara Louise Lehzen, also known as Baroness Louise Lehzen, was the governess and later companion to Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom.
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Sir John Ponsonby Conroy, 1st Baronet, KCH was a British Army officer who served as comptroller to the Duchess of Kent and her young daughter, Princess Victoria, the future Queen of the United Kingdom.
Princess Feodora of Leiningen was the only daughter of Emich Carl, Prince of Leiningen (1763–1814) and Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. Feodora and her older brother Carl, Prince of Leiningen, were maternal half-siblings to Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom. She is a matrilineal ancestress of Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden and of Felipe VI of Spain.
Lady Flora Elizabeth Rawdon-Hastings was a British aristocrat and lady-in-waiting to Queen Victoria's mother, the Duchess of Kent. Her death in 1839 was the subject of a court scandal that gave the Queen a negative image.
Victoria the Great is a 1937 British historical film directed by Herbert Wilcox and starring Anna Neagle, Anton Walbrook and Walter Rilla. When Laurence Housman's play Victoria Regina was banned by the Lord Chamberlain, its subsequent Broadway success prompted King Edward VIII to commission producer Herbert Wilcox to turn it into a film, commemorating the centenary of Victoria's reign. The film biography of Queen Victoria concentrates initially on the early years of her reign with her marriage to Prince Albert and her subsequent rule after Albert's death in 1861. It was released in the year of Victoria’s great-grandson King George VI's coronation, which was also the centennial of Victoria's own accession to the throne. The movie was so successful that a sequel appeared the following year, Sixty Glorious Years.
The Young Victoria is a 2009 British period drama film directed by Jean-Marc Vallée and written by Julian Fellowes, based on the early life and reign of Queen Victoria, and her marriage to Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. Produced by Graham King, Martin Scorsese, Sarah Ferguson, and Timothy Headington, the film stars Emily Blunt, Rupert Friend, Paul Bettany, Miranda Richardson, Harriet Walter, Mark Strong, and Jim Broadbent among a large ensemble cast.
Feodora of Hohenlohe-Langenburg was the daughter of Ernst I, Prince of Hohenlohe-Langenburg and Princess Feodora of Leiningen. She married Georg of Saxe-Meiningen and was the Duchess of Saxe-Meiningen from his accession as Duke Georg II on 20 September 1866 until her death in 1872.
Dash (1830–1840) was a King Charles Spaniel owned by Queen Victoria. Victoria's biographer Elizabeth Longford, called him "the Queen's closest childhood companion", and in the words of the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, he "was the first in a long line of beloved little dogs".
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Charlotte Florentia Percy, Duchess of Northumberland, was governess of the future Queen Victoria.
The wedding of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom and Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha took place on 10 February 1840 at Chapel Royal, St. James's Palace, in London.
A statue of Queen Victoria stands near Kensington Palace. It was sculpted by Victoria's fourth daughter Princess Louise, Duchess of Argyll and erected in 1893. The statue was made from white marble on a Portland stone base. It depicts Victoria aged 18, seated in her coronation robes, resembling the painting of Victoria at her coronation by Sir George Hayter. The statue received a Grade II listing in 1969.