Who Was Queen Adelaide Of Saxe-Meiningen? | Wife Of William Iv | Britain’S Forgotten Queen

She's Britain's forgotten queen and the wife of William IV, but who was Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen really and what do we know about her life? In this video from History Calling, we look at the last Hanoverian queen consort. From her arranged marriage to a total stranger and unexpected path to the crown, to the tragedies of her lost children, the scandals attached to her as queen, which even led to her coach being attacked by a mob at one point, and her time as Queen Dowager during the reign of her niece, Victoria. Before I start, please remember that you can join my free mailing list on my website historycallingofficial.com to get two complimentary downloads and my newsletter, and you can also buy my book, Find Your Irish Ancestors Online, from Amazon as an ebook or paperback. Details are below. Adelaide Louisa Theresa Caroline Amelia, though some sources say Amelia was actually her first name, was born in Meiningen, which I hope I'm pronouncing correctly, please forgive me if I'm not, on the 13th of August 1792, the daughter of George Frederick Charles, Duke of Saxe-Meiningen, and his wife Louisa Eleonora. She was baptised on the 19th of that month and had a whopping 21 godparents. The eldest of three surviving children, she had a younger sister called Ida, born in 1795, and a brother Bernard, born in 1800, and she grew up in her father's duchy, which was a mere 423 square miles in size. She was well educated, and beginning when she was five, she had a tutor named Friedrich Schenk, who taught her languages such as French and Italian. Later on, other tutors were added, and Adelaide was taught the tenets of the Lutheran faith and even learned Greek. She was raised in a surprisingly liberal environment too. The duchy may have been an absolute monarchy, but it had a free press and her father was a patron of liberal academics, who endeared himself to his people by doing things like burying his mother in a public cemetery, because quote, she was worthy to lie among her subjects. As such, the duke was well loved by his people, and sincerely mourned when he died on Christmas Eve, 1803, aged only 43, after what had started as a cold, turned fatal. After that, Louisa Eleonora ruled as regent, and managed to guide her son's little duchy through the Napoleonic Wars successfully, and joined the Allies in 1813. That same year, the Emperor of Russia was even entertained by the Duchess in the family castle, and we might assume that the now 21-year-old Adelaide was present. She was not considered a beauty, thin and with a poor complexion are the comments often made about her, nor did she have a great fortune, but she was known for her kindness and her devotion to charitable works. According to her biographer Mary Sanders, in the mid-1810s she formed quote, an association of the women of the country to work hand in hand with the Poor Law Commission in discouraging begging and in assisting deserving cases with food and with work. She was of course very respectable, and in 1818 she was 25 years old, and this and her other attributes made her one of the few Protestant princesses who could potentially marry into the British royal family. How did this seemingly unlikely turn of events come about though? The situation of the British monarchy in 1818 was rather dire. The King George III was mad, and being held in seclusion at Windsor Castle, while his eldest son, the future George IV, ruled in his stead as Prince Regent. George had married his cousin Caroline of Brunswick in 1795, but their marriage had been a complete disaster from literally the first day, and had only produced one child, Princess Charlotte, born in January 1796. Charlotte married Prince Leopold of Saxe-Coburg-Solfeld in 1816, but in November 1817, at the age of just 21, she died in childbirth, as did her infant son. This left the royals in quite the pickle. There was little chance that the heir to the throne, the Prince Regent, would ever produce another legitimate child, and though he was one of 15 children sired by George III and Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, none of his siblings had any legitimate living offspring either. As it stood, when he died, the throne would pass to his elderly surviving brothers, then his surviving sisters until they were all dead, then it would go to a list of other foreign and rather obscure relatives, starting with Charles, Duke of Brunswick. Something had to be done. One or more of the Regent's six surviving brothers, the sisters were all likely past childbearing, would need to produce a legitimate child, preferably several of them in fact. Brother number two, after the Regent, was Prince Frederick, Duke of York, but he was estranged from his wife and they had no children. Number three was Prince William, Duke of Clarence. It seemed increasingly likely that he would be king if he could just outlive his older two brothers, and if he could get a young enough wife, he could also potentially father a royal heir. The problem was that apart from his claim to the throne, he wasn't much of a catch. Any wife would need to put up with a xenophobic man in his early 50s who drank too much, swore like the former sailor he was, had ten ever-present illegitimate children by his now deceased former mistress, Dorothea Jordan, was bogged down by a mountain of debt and who made such a bad impression on the wife of the Russian ambassador in the 1810s that she thought he was literally mad, just like his father. And she may not have been completely wrong, we'll come back to that later. By 1818, he'd actually been trying to secure a wife for a while in the hopes of getting more money out of Parliament once he was wed, but his preferred candidates were either not acceptable to the Regent and Parliament, or William was not acceptable to them. Enter Adelaide. Inquiries were made to establish if the princess and her family would be open to the marriage, and when the answer came back in the affirmative, this unlikely couple swapped portraits with one another and the engagement was announced in the Saxe-Meiningen court on the 19th of April, 1818. The situation was anything but romantic. Clarence told his oldest son that he was only marrying for public and private duty, and in the House of Commons, MP George Canning admitted to that the prince would never have thought of marrying except that it had, quote, been pressed upon him as an act of public duty for the political purpose of providing for the succession to the throne. In fact, William had nearly backed out of the whole thing as late as April when Parliament didn't vote him as much money as he wanted. As for Adelaide, who knows why she said yes. She apparently was not keen on the idea of potentially becoming Queen, but life as an English royal duchess would get her out of the tiny Saxe-Meiningen, give her her own household, and possibly allow her to become a mother. She and her own mother therefore arrived in England for the wedding on the 2nd of July, 1818, after a journey lasting about 12 days. She was warmly welcomed by the public upon landing at Diehl, and met William for the first time at Grillands Hotel at Albemarle Street on the 4th of July, where they got along well, although the first person he'd sent to meet her was actually his oldest illegitimate son, which was rather tactless, but Adelaide evidently didn't make a fuss. His younger brother, Prince Edward, had also recently become engaged, this time to the widowed Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, sister of Princess Charlotte's widower, and so the two couples had a double wedding on the 11th of July at Kew. Adelaide's dress was silver tissue trimmed with lace and she had diamonds in her hair. The new Duchess of Kent wore gold. Adelaide brought a dowry of 20,000 florins and was to receive a further 6,000 per year from Saxe-Meiningen as her pin money, that was basically her spending money. William promised her an additional 2,000 pounds and she would have another 5,000 florins a year if and when she produced a child. Her jointure, if she was widowed, would be 6,000 pounds a year. The Kents, incidentally, would become the parents of the future Queen Victoria the following year, and if you'd like to know more about that little girl's unusual route to the throne and the marriages of the other royal brothers, I'll leave my episode all about it linked for you. The Clarence's marriage was an immediate success, with onlookers reporting approvingly just days after the nuptials that the pair got along very well and that the new Duchess was well liked by those she interacted with. She had a tall order to fulfil though, for she had been warned by her new mother-in-law, Queen Charlotte, that she should amend Prince William's behaviour and finances and produce an heir. As Parliament had not increased his alliance as much as he had hoped for, the couple relocated to Hanover a few weeks after the wedding as a cost-cutting measure where they lived in the Fürstenhof. Life there was quiet and fairly uneventful, except that it seemed that the Duchess was going to fulfil her number one duty very fast indeed, for she became pregnant in the autumn. Then tragedy struck. Adelaide fell ill with pleurisy and went into premature labour. Her daughter, named Charlotte Augusta Louisa, was born on the 26th or 27th of March 1819, but died after just a few hours. Sanders argues that the supposed treatment of bleeding had been applied to the Duchess for her illness and this had caused the early birth. It must have felt like a slap in the face that her husband's brother, Prince Adolphus, had a healthy son just a day before her own loss, while Prince Edward, Duke of Kent, welcomed little Princess Victoria in May, and another brother, Prince Ernest, welcomed a son three days after that. Still, if Adelaide could only produce a healthy child, it wouldn't matter. Her husband was older than all of these brothers and he and Adelaide's son or daughter would outrank all of these new babies. The pressure on her must have felt incredibly real, for the British press was very taken with this royal baby race. Prince appeared as early as spring 1819, in which the royal brothers and their wives were shown to be in competition with each other to provide an heir, one showing Adelaide looking on as Adolphus and his wife showed off their son and commenting that her baby, which was incorrectly identified as a boy, had been much prettier, while William stands nearby and says that they will try again. After the loss of little Charlotte, the Clarences went travelling, first to visit Prince William's sister, the Queen of Württemberg, then to see the Landgravine of Hesse, then to Meiningen. Considering the pressure to literally deliver, the Duchess must surely have been delighted to find herself pregnant once more later in 1819, only for tragedy to strike again. On the trip back to England in September, she suffered a miscarriage. Still, she was only in her 20s, she evidently had no trouble conceiving and there was every reason to be optimistic. She and William lived largely at their home, Bushy House, and tried again. At the start of 1820, they moved one step closer to becoming King and Queen, as Adelaide's father-in-law finally died, and the regent ascended as King George IV. Prince Edward died that month too, and Adelaide comforted her sister-in-law, the Duchess of Kent, as best she could, helped by the fact that they shared a mother tongue. Adelaide was also noted as being very fond of her little niece, Princess Victoria. Prince Frederick was now the immediate heir, and the death of his estranged wife in August created at least the theoretical possibility that he would remarry and produce an heir who would outrank any Clarence baby, but this never happened. What did happen though, was that Adelaide conceived again. On the afternoon of the 10th of December, 1820, just six days after attending the wedding of one of her stepdaughters, and in the presence of the Duke of York, Lord Chancellor, and George Canning, she seemed to fulfil her destiny. She gave birth to a baby girl, apparently around six weeks early, but seemingly healthy, who was named Princess Elizabeth Georgina Adelaide of Clarence. Duchess Adelaide's recovery was slow, and it was six weeks later before she was able to go riding in the nearby park, but at least the child was alive. Had she stayed that way, she would have become Elizabeth II, but tragically she passed away from convulsions on the 4th of March, 1821, and was buried in St George's Chapel, Windsor. I actually already have a little podcast on her life on my Patreon site, which I'll leave details of below if you want to consider signing up to get access to it, and to a whole host of other bonus material, including other podcasts that I don't publish elsewhere, that discuss history and some behind-the-scenes information about my various online channels, plus early access to ad-free episodes. Alternatively, you can join my YouTube membership, don't forget to subscribe to the channel first of all and switch on the notification bell, for other perks and bonuses. Just click the join button underneath videos. Adelaide's sister Ida came to visit her in the aftermath of this loss with her own children, and the Duchess continued trying to replace Elizabeth with a new heir. By the end of the year, she was pregnant yet again, this time with twin boys, only to lose them both on the 8th of April 1822. Despite still only being 29, this was her last confirmed pregnancy, though there were rumours of later ones. After over three years and four experiences of either childbirth or miscarriage, sadly she and the Duke of Clarence had no children together to show for it. It is to her great credit in the face of this misery, that Adelaide was so kind and accepting of her husband's many illegitimate children from his liaison with Dorothea Jordan, some of whom lived with the Clarences at times, plus her nieces and nephews, including Victoria, who had only regained her position in the succession because of little Princess Elizabeth's death. A letter she wrote to the two-year-old just a couple of months after losing her daughter exemplifies this, I think. It reads, My dear little heart, I hope you are well and don't forget Aunt Adelaide, who loves you so fondly. Lulu and Wilhelm, Ida's children then visiting her, desire their love to you, and Uncle William also. God bless and preserve you is the constant prayer of your most truly affectionate Aunt Adelaide. Elsewhere in the royal family, Caroline of Brunswick, technically the Queen Consort, despite the fact that she was totally estranged from her husband, had died in August 1821 and At the end of June 1822, just a couple of months after losing their twins, William and Adelaide set off for the continent once more. On their travels, which were extensive, they visited, among other places, Antwerp, then the home of Adelaide's brother near Ghent, as well as going through Brussels, Aisle Chapelle, along the Rhine and visiting Prince Maximilian of Neuwied at Andernach. There was time spent in Frankfurt, where they were hosted by the Landgrave and Landravine of Hessenburg, the latter of whom was Prince William's sister, and someone with whom Adelaide got along very well, and a trip home to Saxe-Meiningen too. The travels continued, with trips to Liebenstein, where Adelaide could see her mother, while William went to visit the Queen of Württemberg again, and on the 1st of September, the Clarences set off for home once more, passing through many other states along the way, and continuing to catch up with family members as they went. They were back in England on the 21st. Once home again, their generally quiet life at Bouchy continued, punctuated by occasional visits to see George IV. There was another six-month trip to mainland Europe in 1825, along with three of William's Fitzclarence children, during which Adelaide was able to see her own family and attend her brother's wedding, as well as spending time with her in-laws. By this stage, it was evident to those around them that she had succeeded in moderating some of the worst excesses in her husband's character as well. One observer said that, His wife, it is said, has entirely reformed him, and instead of the polisson manor, that's a French word meaning naughty, for which he used to be celebrated, In 1826, there was another trip to the continent, but this was to be the couple's last together. When Prince Frederick died in January 1827, William became the heir apparent, an extremely unusual turn of events for a third surviving son. This led to an increase in both he and his wife's allowances, and to his delight, he was made Lord High Admiral, a position not used since early in the previous century. He was limited in what he could do without the approval of the government though, and when he disregarded this rule in 1828, to the point of sailing off into the sunset with a squadron of ships for ten days without permission, he was made to resign. Apparently, and this is according to a letter from 1834 written by the Princess Levanne, wife of the Russian ambassador, he had also been suffering from a kind of mental breakdown at the same time, and had to be put in a straitjacket for a fortnight, though fortunately he recovered and life went back to normal at Bouchy. It was now very likely that Adelaide was going to become the Queen of the United Kingdom, and this she did on the 26th of June 1830, when King George passed away. The new King and Queen, despite all William's misbehaviour in the past, were very popular, helped no doubt by how unpopular George IV had been. Adelaide was seen as the woman who had reformed William, which was a pretty fair assessment, and though they weren't particularly young or glamorous, they were seemingly respectable enough all things considered, and she was credited with getting William and his remaining brothers on better, though still not always really good, terms with each other. The Duke of Cumberland supposedly thought that William IV should be passed over for the crown in favour of himself, mind you, due to the new King's eccentric nature, which made some worry about the continuing state of his mental health. The next in line was actually Princess Victoria though, so if Cumberland was trying to get rid of William, I don't see how he would have gotten the crown, unless we're talking about the crown of Hanover, which did come to him upon William's death. The Queen's new household was established. She held drawing rooms and dinners for the courtiers and went riding with them, and the couple had a relatively cheap coronation in September 1831, so much so that it was derisively referred to as the half-crownation in some quarters, a play on the word coronation and the coin known as a half-crown. In fact, it cost £43,159, but compared to George IV's, which came in at £238,000, that was nothing. The Queen had her crown made up from jewels she already owned to save money, and sourced fabric for her coronation dress from English makers to support local industry. Adelaide's new dower was set at £100,000, and she was to have Bushy Park and Marlborough House in the event of William's death. The new King and Queen's establishment didn't burn through nearly as much money as George IV's had, and William even provided dinner for 3,000 of London's poorer citizens on his birthday. In fact, he was so genial that it was thought to be a little undignified at times for one of his rank. For instance, at the end of one party at St James's Palace, he told his guests he wouldn't detain them any longer because he was going to bed now, and finished by saying, Come along, my Queen. One observer noted at the start of the reign that, Altogether, he seems a kind-hearted, well-meaning, not-stupid, burlesque, bustling old fellow, and if he doesn't go mad, may make a very decent king. But he exhibits oddities. For her part, Adelaide was always credited with performing her role very well, with great grace and propriety, and by the end of 1830 it was settled that if she had a child who came to the throne as a minor, she would be regent. There were storm clouds gathering over the couple from the early days of William's reign, however. Cracks in family relations became apparent over how Princess Victoria was being raised. Her mother wanted to keep her away from court and her illegitimate Fitzclaren's cousins and their children, despite how fond both the king and queen were of the girl, with the result that they saw little of her. This and the fact that Adelaide did not support the nomination of the Duchess of Kent's brother, Leopold, to the throne of Belgium in 1831 meant that the once close relationship between the queen and her sister-in-law soured, even more so when the Duchess refused to attend the coronation or allow Victoria to do so either. There were also disagreements with some of the Fitzclarences themselves when they expected their father to do more for them than he was willing or able to, given their illegitimate status. Added to that, their high visibility around the monarch was considered scandalous by some. It was the issue of the reform bill which really damaged the couple's reputations though. In November 1830, the Tory Prime Minister, the Duke of Wellington, was replaced by the Whig, Earl Grey. No tea jokes please. Grey led a cabinet who wanted to reform parliamentary representation to make it somewhat fairer by getting rid of or overhauling many rotten boroughs where the number of voters and even just people living in the area was ridiculous compared to the number of MPs that borough returned. The reformists also wanted to expand the number of people, for which read men, who could vote. The measures were popular with the public and the king seemed to be in favour of them, at least outwardly. He was conservative really but he thought he should support his government. The Whigs got their reform bill passed in the House of Commons in 1831 only to see it rejected by the House of Lords. A general election saw the Whigs win overwhelmingly and the bill was again passed by the Commons in September but rejected by the Lords. This led to mass protests around the country. The only viable option seemed to be that the king create a slew of new Whig peers who were in favour of the bill and who would then get it through the House of Lords. But would he do it? Adelaide and most of the royal family and court in fact were dead set against the idea of any reform. Remember that the queen was from a state where her father, then her brother, had ruled as absolute monarchs, dukes to be precise, and was not in favour of political reform in general. Even reforms which to us today seem very reasonable and quite limited even. The proposals were still going to leave most of the population, including all women, disenfranchised after all. Still to her, changing the established order of things was something to be avoided as it risked the very foundation that the monarchy was built on to be seen giving in to reformers. Both contemporaries and historians remain divided however as to whether she was actually able to influence her husband's beliefs and actions in that direction. William's own secretary and his sister, Princess Augusta, both said that she could not and didn't even try to, though I'm sure they wouldn't have been privy to every conversation the king and queen had, while Earl Grey had his suspicions that perhaps she was a background influence. True or not, the notion amongst some that she was poisoning the king against reform did nothing for her reputation and at one point her carriage was attacked by a mob and the assailants had to be beaten off with canes by her footmen, leaving her badly shaken. The country's sexism and xenophobia were on full display as well, as she was criticised for being female and foreign and therefore not an appropriate person to express an opinion on British politics. Even if she was trying to prevent William from supporting the bill though, it did no good in the end. By January 1832, the king agreed to create more peers, as long as these creations were the sons of men who were wig lords and so would have inherited their father's positions anyway. Even then, it still wasn't enough to get the reform bill through the lords and Grey came back asking for more. At this point, William refused to stack the deck any further, causing his own popularity to tumble and leading to Grey leaving his post and Wellington coming back in May 1832. This didn't work though, public opinion was now so strongly in favour of reform that it looked like a full-blown revolution might be on the cards, something the royals would have been very concerned about given the recent past, which had seen the American Revolution and two revolutions in France which had eliminated its monarchy. Again, Adelaide suffered a raft of bad press as she was blamed for the situation. According to the newspaper The Morning Chronicle on the 9th of May 1832, the Queen has done more injury to the cause of reform than any person living. Very quickly, Wellington had to leave office once more and Grey returned as Prime Minister. Under threat of being swamped by new wake peers, something William had now agreed to do if necessary, the House of Lords finally passed the reform bill and it became law on the 7th of June 1832. The whole experience, which I've only outlined very briefly for you here, had been a bruising one for all involved. As all this went on, there were other rumours about Adelaide which seemed designed to harm her reputation. The gossip mongers said that she was having an affair with her chamberlain, Lord Who for instance, though no evidence has ever emerged to support this and in the end, the pro-Tory, anti-reform Who was made to resign from her household, more for his political views than anything else. Adelaide was furious, refusing to dine with her husband for a week as she felt that William should have protected her wishes and interests better. Mind you, Who simply continued to perform the duties of his former office unofficially. More grief soon followed in August 1832 when her 15-year-old disabled niece, Princess Louise, daughter of her sister Ida, died in England where she had been staying under her aunt's care. She was buried at Windsor and Adelaide was crushed by the loss. In 1834, William arranged, as a surprise, for her to make a trip home to Saxe-Meningen in July to see her ailing mother, though there was concern in England at the prospect of her leaving the increasingly eccentric king for six weeks and in the end, both were anxious at the parting. Off she went though and as had been usual when she travelled with William when they were the Duke and Duchess of Clarence, she adopted a pseudonym to try to protect her anonymity, in this case, the Countess of Lancaster. People knew who she was though and she was warmly received on her travels, with cannon fire, church bells ringing and crowds of well-wishers wherever she went. She visited with various family members and was home by the 20th of August, though unfortunately the busy programme of her trip had left her run down and ill. She continued to suffer unpopularity in England as she was blamed for political decisions, including the dismissal of the Prime Minister, Lord Melbourne, and his government in November 1834 – he was back six months later – for which the Times newspaper savaged her, only to say two days later that actually they thought she had nothing to do with it after all. Whether she had any impact on that decision remains to be seen, for just as with the Reform Bill, there are conflicting statements as to her influence with the king on politics. Even some of William's children turned on her though, despite all the kindness she had shown them over the years, and she remained ill with a cough. Still, at the same time it was rumoured that she was pregnant once again, something rather unlikely given her age and the general state of her health, and which came to nothing. Relations with the Duchess of Kent continue to be extremely poor, and at a dinner at which she and Princess Victoria were present in 1836, the king announced that he hoped he would live at least another nine months so that Victoria would be of age when he died, and her mother could never be regent, for she was incompetent and surrounded by evil advisers. He also let rip on the Duchess for not showing him proper respect, and for keeping the heiress to the throne away from him. Adelaide and Princess Victoria were both visibly distressed at the incident, and it was only with great difficulty that the Duchess could be persuaded not to leave Windsor Castle right away. Still, there were some nice things that year too. The city of Adelaide in Australia was named after the Queen for instance, and is probably her best known and most impressive memorial today. The year 1837 was to be a momentous and miserable one for Adelaide. She remained very ill with what was termed a cough, but which seems to have been far more serious. Then in April, her stepdaughter Sophia, Lady Delisle and Dudley died at Kensington Palace. King William's health took an immediate downturn at the loss of his beloved child, of whom Adelaide was very fond too, and at the end of the same month came the news that her own mother had died as well. Less than three weeks later, William's health began its final failure. Adelaide stayed with him constantly in his last weeks, until he finally passed away in the early hours of the 20th of June. He had, as he had wished, lived long enough for the new Queen, Victoria, to turn 18. Adelaide, now the Dowager Queen at the age of 44, was heartbroken at this latest loss. Queen Victoria was very kind to her and allowed her to remain at Windsor until after the funeral, and the two exchanged warm letters in the days after the death, with the Queen making a point of visiting her aunt within the week. William was buried at St George's Chapel Windsor on the 10th of July, and Adelaide was present for the funeral. She now returned to Bushy, taking with her, with Victoria's permission, the cup she had used to give drinks to her husband during his final illness, and a portrait of a bust of William surrounded by his children. She lived mostly in retirement whilst in England, not attending the coronation in June 1838, though it might have given her a laugh if she had, as Victoria's crowning was beset by a list of comical errors. I'll leave my episode all about it linked for you. She had her enormous income of £100,000 a year, of which half went to charitable causes. She still travelled, partly in hopes of improving her health, and toured the Mediterranean in 1838, before going to Malta where she was warmly received, stayed three months, and ultimately had an Anglican church erected there starting in 1839, the Colicia Church of St Paul at Valera, as the island did not then have one. It cost her £18,000 and was opened in 1842. Back in England, she attended Victoria's wedding to Prince Albert on the 10th of February 1840 at St James's Palace, and was one of the godmothers to their first child, Princess Vicky, who was born on the 21st of November that same year, and who had the name Adelaide as her first middle name. Relations with the new Queen, and even the Duchess of Kent, were very warm once again, but the Dowager did occasionally put her foot in it with the new monarch, most notably when she wrote to congratulate Victoria on a change of government which had caused the young Queen to lose her beloved Lord Melbourne as Prime Minister in 1841, telling her that, Victoria was not amused, telling her half-sister that Adelaide's letter was well meant, but Still, minor issues like these aside, the Dowager Queen stayed close to the new one. Her sister Ida was a frequent visitor too, and her nephew, Prince Edward of Saxe-Weimar, lived with her much of the time as well. Even most of her surviving stepchildren stayed on close terms with her, visiting often with their own offspring. There was another visit to her homeland in 1844, where she saw a monument to her mother, and when she was back in England, she moved around different houses in between visits to Windsor to see the Queen and her growing family. By 1847, her health was in its final decline, and she was an invalid. She went to Madeira to see if the climate would help, and had an leaving in 1849. By that autumn, she was staying in Bentley Prairie in Stanmore, and it was clear that she was dying. Her sister and nephew Edward were with her, and the Queen, Prince Albert and the Duchess of Kent came to visit in her final days. At 2am on the 2nd of December 1849, Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen, and Dowager Queen of the United Kingdom, passed away peacefully. She was 57, really rather young by modern standards. By now, the old public enmity against her had been forgotten, and she was lauded as Good Queen Adelaide, and buried near her husband and baby daughter at Windsor on the 11th of December. She had requested no lying in state, a simple daylight funeral, no autopsy or embalming, and to be carried to her grave by sailors. On all points, her wishes were met. I hope you enjoyed learning about the life of this rather overlooked Queen Consort of the United Kingdom, and the last one which the House of Hanover produced. Let me know below what you think Adelaide's greatest accomplishment was, and to learn more about the Hanoverian Queens, try my videos on Queen Caroline of Ansbach, Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz or Victoria. Whatever you choose, please enjoy, and until next time, keep learning!