Last Princess

Product Description

Beatrice was the last child born to Queen Victoria & Prince Albert. Her father died when she was four & as Matthew Dennison relates Victoria came to depend on her youngest daughter absolutely but she also demanded from her complete submission. It is an enthralling story not just of a mother/daughter relationship but of a Queen & subject relationship. Beatrice succumbed to her mothers obsessive love so that by the time she was in her late teens she was her constant companion & running her mothers office which meant that when Victoria died her daughter became literary executor a role she conducted with teutonic thoroughness. She edited & bowdlerised her mothers Journals that cover 70 years & where possible her voluminous correspondence. Although Victoria tried to prevent Beatrice even so much as thinking of love her guard slipped when Beatrice was 29. She met Liko Prince Henry of Battenberg & fell in love. Beatrice however did not end up simply as a wife & mother. She loved music & composed a military march which remains in the repertoire of British regimental bands she sang & she painted. Matthew Dennison draws on extensive new material to restore Princess Beatrice to her rightful place as a key figure in the Victorian dynasty.