With the summer holiday season in swing, Dr Karen Attar takes a look at a journal in Senate House Library by a woman who protested that ‘she had no skill whatever in authorship’. It took England by storm when first published widely 150 years ago in 1868: Queen Victoria’s accounts of holidays in Scotland comprising ‘Leaves from the Journal of our Life in the Highlands, from 1848-1861’.
Queen Victoria is not just a major woman in British history generally, but an important figure for the University of London specifically. As the monarch she signed five of the university’s first six charters, including one re-founding the university (the first charter having expired upon William IV’s death), and the supplemental charters which granted special examination, and then full degrees, to women in 1867 and 1878 respectively. Not for nothing is there a large oil portrait of her in Macmillan Hall replicating the first of many pictures painted by Franz Xaver Winterhalter.
Queen Victoria began a journal in 1832, at the age of 13, and continued to write daily entries until a few days before her death. Publication was far from her mind. But at Balmoral in the 1860s, after Prince Albert’s death, rereading her journal entries of their times in Scotland together was a way of remembering him.
As Arthur Helps (1813–75), Clerk of the Privy Council and editor of the Leaves, describes in his preface, the Queen allowed him to see some of the entries when he was on an official visit to Balmoral. When he expressed an interest in them, she thought of printing the extracts privately to give to family and close friends, especially those who had been present on the tours.
Helps and ‘a near and dear relative of the Queen’ (not named) suggested that the broader public would share their interest and that, as excerpts from a privately printed edition would inevitably be leaked to public journals and could appear incorrectly, it would be advisable to print an authorised version for wide circulation. After initial protest of lack of skill in authorship and the homely content of the subject matter, the Queen acceded. She dedicated the result to Albert with words: ‘to the dear memory of him who made the life of the writer bright and happy’.
The main body of the journal begins with Victoria’s first sight of Balmoral (‘a pretty little castle’), includes its rebuilding (‘perfection’), and ends with the account of a long expedition made on 16 October 1861. Helps edited these records of the royal visits, and suggested prefacing the book with three earlier trips to Scotland that took place between 1842 and 1847, and ending it with four entries within the timespan of the journal about excursions to other parts of Britain (‘Tours in England and Ireland, and yacht excursions,’ 2 August 1849– 27 August 1861).
Presumably, it was he who added a summary title to each entry, such as: First impressions of Balmoral; Salmon leistering; The Betrothal of the Princess Royal; Visits to the Old Women; and A Fall of Snow. Helps states editorial policy as follows: All references to political questions, or to affairs of Government, have for obvious reasons, been studiously omitted. (An exception is an entry for 10 September, 1855, ‘News of the Fall of Sevastopol’, recording delight at the news.) The book is mainly confined to the natural expressions of a mind rejoicing in the beauties of nature, and throwing itself, with a delight rendered keener by the rarity of its opportunities, into the enjoyment of life removed, for the moment, from the pressure of public cares (p. x).
Victoria’s subjects received the journal with enthusiasm, astonishing and gratifying the royal writer. According to a statement of 1880, she earned more than £30,000 in royalties (equivalent to over £1.5 million today), which she gave to charity.
While Helps noted Victoria’s ‘picturesque description of scenery’, her faithful narration of her thoughts and feelings, and her willingness to be pleased, part of the journal’s attraction was that it was a guided tour of royal family life. Members of the royal family are referred to in familiar terms, by their first names, doing familiar things.
Examples include:
- ‘… the sea was dreadfully rough. I was very ill. Albert, however, stood it perfectly, and the children very tolerably’ (19 September 1847)
- ‘I heard the children repeat some poetry in German’ (11 September 1849)
- ‘After luncheon, Albert decided to walk through the wood for the last time, to have a last chance, and allowed Vicky and me to go with him’ (11 October 1852)
- ‘Albert went out with Alfred for the day’ (26 September 1857).
The public could identify with Victoria as a woman with a middle-class sense of propriety, sharing such middle-class values as thrift, morality and domesticity. She loved Scotland and spent almost one-tenth of her reign there. Her rosy view of the country, evident throughout the journal, had various results. Her adoration of Sir Walter Scott’s works helped to keep his readership high. That the Queen worshipped at Crathie Kirk at Balmoral gave endorsement to the Scottish church. Balmoral became a part of the British heritage and Deeside a tourist mecca. Victoria reconnected Scotland with its royal past.
More information
- The text of the journal is available in modern editions and online. In its special collections, Senate House Library holds a copy of the first edition, enabling readers today to connect with those who welcomed the journal 150 years ago this year.
- Leaves from the Journal of our Life in the Highlands, from 1848–1861,Queen Victoria, London: Smith, Elder, 1868, [Rare] (IX) Cc [Victoria]
- Image is a picture of Balmoral Castle taken from the book
Dr Karen Attar is the curator of rare books and university art at Senate House Library, and a research fellow at the Institute of English Studies at the School of Advanced Study, University of London.