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Queen Victoria in America

Representations of the British Queen in the United States of America

‘England and America. The visit of her majesty Queen Victoria to the Arctic ship Resolute - December 16th, 1856’ by G. Zobel.

Kiri Kolt

Graduate School of Humanities

University of Amsterdam

Student number: 10001869

Kiri.Kolt@student.uva.nl

Supervisor: Dr. H. B. Beukenhorst

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Table of Contents

 Introduction 3

 Chapter 1 Border disputes 12

o Quarrels in Canada 13

o Oregon Territory dispute 17

 Chapter 2 The defining 1860s 20

o Visit of the Prince of Wales 21

o Death of Prince Albert 24

o The Civil War and Trent Affair 26

o Lincoln Assassination 28

 Chapter 3 Queen Victoria’s reign 30

o Coronation 31

o The British monarchy 33

o Victorianism in the United States 37

o Jubilees 39

 Conclusion 43

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Introduction

American tributes to Queen Victoria. President McKinley cables condolences to the new king. Washington flags lowered. Such a mark of respect had never been before paid on the death of a monarch – action by congress.1

These were the headlines in the New York Times the day after Queen Victoria of Great Britain breathed her last breath. Other than flags lowered, the stock market closed, churches throughout the United States held special services and newspapers even appeared with black borders. It was an unusual reaction, to say the least, to the death of a foreign monarch and for a monarch of a former enemy too. It signified the change which apparently took place during the reign of Queen Victoria. Her grandfather George III, the last king of the colony America was widely despised in the States and at the beginning of Victoria’s reign the relationship between Great Britain and its former colony could at best be called cool. During her life and after her death the relationship improved so much that in the twentieth century it was even dubbed a “special relationship”. The Queen, however, never visited the United States, but as I will show in this thesis this distance caused her popularity to rise as much as it did.

In 1901 when Victoria died, she was not seen as the former colonizer anymore in America. Instead she had become a symbol of an era. We now speak of her reign as the Victorian Era and this

encompasses not just Great Britain or her empire, but has been applied to the whole world. The quote above confirms this, because it speaks of “the death of a monarch”. There is no mention of which monarch, because that is clear to everyone. The first and foremost monarch of the time was the British Queen. The fact that this monarch is not specified also hints at the sentiments this American editor feels towards the Queen. It is not a faraway foreign Queen, but a figure that transcends national prejudices. Through the years the representation of Victoria in America changed from merely a political symbol to a symbol with many more connotations. The fact that she was the head of state of a monarchical country faded to the background and Victoria as a symbol of Victorian values became more important.

When hearing the name Victoria today, almost immediately the grave-looking old widow with an expanding breast and hip size comes to mind. We think of a static figure of a woman who is the matriarch of most of the royal houses in Europe and who very rarely laughs. This image is iconic of the Queen, but it is also a symbol of her at the time this image was established. It is a symbol oozing the values of the Victorian age.

Victoria herself had a hand in this symbolization of her own persona. She published her journals of her life with Prince Albert, shortly after he died and thus gave an insight into her life. Her subjects, the British people and those in the empire helped build her as a symbol too. The papers published images of her as a grieving widow in a homely atmosphere, which caused connotations of the Queen as a mother who is stirring her household the best she can when her husband has died. The development of this image can be called only

1 AMERICAN TRIBUTES TO QUEEN VICTORIA: President McKinley Cables ...New York Times (1857-1922); Jan 23, 1901;

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natural, as the public got to know their monarch more, they formed a more intimate picture of her and applied her example to their own lives. What is remarkable though, is that this same development happened outside her empire too and especially in a country where the people did not believe in aristocracy, the United States of America.

The symbolism of Queen Victoria has come in many different varieties, which have been used for different purposes and which often contradicted each other. As Margaret Homans and Adrienne Munich say “many conflicting ideas of her increasingly came to be used to model or to justify a wide variety of cultural practises and personal self-fashionings.”2 This is why many authors point to Victoria as a person of great contradictions, while in fact it is the different meanings people have attributed to her as a symbol that have contradicted each other.

In this thesis the focus will be on the representations of Queen Victoria in America. My research question will be: How is Queen Victoria represented in America and what do the symbols of her mean? This is an interesting subject to look at, because it evokes all kinds of contrasts. For example, how does an American newspaper write about Queen Victoria as a head of state of a monarchy, whilst the very institution of the

monarchy is an antithesis of the American ideal of democracy? This contrast between monarchy and democracy is part of the first main theme in this thesis, the political theme. This theme will also include the contrast empire versus aspiring empire, because in the nineteenth century Great Britain was already an empire and the United States just started expanding their territory. The other theme is the cultural one; this will include the

representations of Queen Victoria in culture related subjects, such as the contrast between men and women or that between old Europe and modern America. The main themes will be used to explain how Victoria was represented in different times and what the representation meant. This will then lead us to understand the importance of the representations of Queen Victoria and can eventually help to gather why at the end of her reign she was so popular in America.

Duncan Andrew Campbell claims that Queen Victoria adopted an “early, friendly attitude towards the United States, even when the two nations were barely on civil terms.”3 Her contribution to the nineteenth century rapprochement could well may be one of the “great untold stories of the period.”4

An example of that early friendly attitude can be found in the event displayed at the print on the front of this thesis5. It is the visit of Queen Victoria to the British Arctic ship H.M.S. Resolute. In 1852 this ship was sent to the Arctic for a rescue operation, but was abandoned there. The Americans found the ship and returned it to Great Britain as a token of good will and friendship. The print shows the Queen visiting the ship when it had returned to British waters.

2 Margaret Homans and Adrienne Munich, Remaking Queen Victoria, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997, p. 3. 3 Duncan Andrew Campbell, Unlikely Allies: Britain, America and the Victorian Origins of the Special Relationship, London:

Hambledon Continuum, 2007, p. 255.

4 Idem.

5 G. Zobel, ‘England and America. The visit of her majesty Queen Victoria to the Arctic ship Resolute - December 16th, 1856, to

whom this engraving is by special permission respectfully dedicated by her obedient servants, P. & D. Colnaghi & Co.’, London : published by Colnaghi & Co., 1859. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA.

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After the ship retired, Victoria had a desk made from its timbers and presented it as a gift to the then president Rutherford Hayes. It has been used by almost every president since6.

It is however, not my aim in this thesis to tell the story of Victoria’s part in the rapprochement. What is important though, is to look briefly at the relationship between Great Britain and the United States in the nineteenth century, so that we then can understand how Queen Victoria’s image evolved against the background of this relationship.

Ever since the first Englishmen set foot on American soil there has been a relationship between the two countries. The term “special relationship” has been used since the Second World War especially, when it was first coined by Winston Churchill, who used the term “special relationship” to describe the connection between Great Britain and the United States of America as a part of the three circles of influence for Britain, the others being the Commonwealth and Europe. Subsequently a great amount of scholarly works have been written on the “special relationship” since the Second World War and during the Cold War.

The “special relationship” is a concept generally talked about in the context of a relationship between the political heads of state of Great Britain and the United States. Often omitted is the share monarchs have in this relationship. The monarch who has been omitted from the relationship most, is the one who was quite influential in the friendly attitudes between the two countries, Queen Victoria. She was the monarch with whom the monarchy as a popular institution began. Often spoken of as the first media monarch, Queen Victoria’s portrait hung not only everywhere in her own empire, but also in the political offices in the United States. How is it possible then that she evaporated from nineteenth century history in this context?

In the nineteenth century Great Britain and the United States were two countries with a same language, but otherwise a lot of differences. Victoria reigned an empire in which the sun never set, whilst the United States was an aspiring empire whose inhabitants had a civil war still to fight before they became united as a nation. Great Britain was a part of old Europe, being one of the foremost countries together with France and Germany, building on centuries of tradition, whilst the United States did not have a long history or independent neighbours, for on each border they were met with equally struggling former colonies. An advantage of

America’s lack of history was the development of their classless society as opposed to Britain’s aristocracy and royalty. This is an interesting contrast that becomes especially apparent in Victoria’s time. The next contrast has more to do with the Queen herself; Great Britain was a constitutional monarchy, whilst America was proud of its democracy. Moreover, America’s government was run by men, whilst Great Britain was ruled by a woman with limited power.

Literature on the subject of the Anglo-American relationship in general focusses very much on the aftermath of the Second World War and very scarcely on earlier appearances. The following secondary sources provide some information on earlier forms of the Anglo-American relationship.

6 Author unknown, ‘The President’s Desk’, The White House Museum,

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A standard work on Anglo-American relations, which cannot be said to be strictly political, nor cultural is The United States and Britain by H.G. Nicholas. Nicholas’ book tries to give an overview of

Anglo-American relations from 1776 to 1974. It is worth mentioning this book, because of its interesting introduction. In it, Nicholas takes a fierce stance for the uniqueness of the Anglo-American relationship. Nicholas talks about a “mother-daughter bond” and claims that ‘a shared language and a common historical inheritance of “Anglo-Saxon” polity created, for British and Americans alike, a set of immediately recognizable and axiomatically accepted habits of thought and behaviour – especially in the conduct of public affairs.’ 7 Nicholas further argues that this development inevitably led to an “Anglo-American consciousness”, which made Britons and

Americans alike feel a sense of superiority to other non-Anglo-Saxon cultures. Nicholas talks about family quarrels and that this bond explains the rustic relationship between Great Britain and America. Interestingly, Nicholas next remarks that Americans and Brits expect more from each other and are more disappointed if the other party fails to fulfil this want than in relations with other countries. However, because of the distance of the two countries, quarrels, as Nicholas calls it, would be overcome much quicker, because by the time the British got to America or the other way around the tempers would have already been cooled. Nicholas does mention the international context and its importance in understanding the history of the special relationship. He does argue that since France lost its importance to America then, Nicholas argues, “each nation recognized the dominant importance of its relationship with the other.”8

It is, however, the public, not the politicians who Nicholas in the end attributes the most important influence on the relationship. Because it concerned the nation, Nicholas argues, the people of that nation had the final say in the “special relationship”. H.G. Nicholas is quite radical about how close the relationship between Great Britain and America is. Using the metaphors of family, which is something that cultural historians tend to do a lot more than political ones, we are shown why the Anglo-American relationship is a relatively quiet one. That these metaphors tie in with Victorianism perfectly is nevertheless forgotten here. Victoria nor her actions are mentioned in this book, which leaves a small gap in the narrative.

One of the main books in the field of Anglo-American relations in the nineteenth century is Great

Britain and the United States of America by H.C. Allen. The object of this book is to see what the links are in

Anglo-American relations and how they came into being, though Allen states in the Preface that this book should not be read as an academic book entirely. He is a firm believer in the need for cordial relations between Britain and America for the future of the world. Part I traces the broad outline of the relationship and seeks to interpret the different aspects of the Anglo-American relationship, such as the economic, social and political, but also the cultural, emotional and diplomatic sides. The remaining three parts recount the history of Anglo-American diplomatic relations. Although other scholarship have set the relationship within a broader context, including Canada in the narrative, Allen wants to focus solely on the relationship between Great Britain and America. This is a vital subject to him as he argues that “the future of democracy can only be safe in the hands

7 H.G. Nicholas, The United States and Britain, (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1975), p..1. 8

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of an Anglo-American alliance.”9 H.G. Nicholas’ argument about family ties creeps into this work as well, because Allen cannot escape the assumption that through their common tongue a familiarity has arisen which led to more family disagreements. This work counts as one of the classical works on the Anglo-American relationship and this is shown in Allen’s introduction. There Allen explains “what really produces trouble between peoples is when one is quite certain that it understands the other – and in fact doesn’t. And I am perfectly certain that that has been from the first one of the primary causes of trouble between England and America.”10

There are two themes in this book; the first is the ripening friendship between the U.S. and Great Britain from the end of the eighteenth century up into the 1950’s. The second theme is the shifting balance of power within the increasing amiability of the relationship. Allen is particularly interested in seeing the story from the point of view of the changing policy of the United States11. Allen’s work is a classic, but maybe because it’s a classic it has caused other historians to lead his example in not giving any attention to Queen Victoria. He mentions Victoria only four times in the entire 983 pages and never goes into her personal relation with the U.S. or American reactions to her.

The central theme of Duncan Andrew Campbell’s Unlikely Allies is the evolving social, political, cultural, economic and diplomatic relationships between Great Britain and America during the nineteenth century. He argues that most writing on the nineteenth century Anglo-American relationship has been written from an American point of view and that he aims to write this book from a British perspective, while it places events in an international context. Immediately in the beginning, Campbell delivers sarcastic criticism on political historians who describe the process of Anglo-American rapprochement as a triumphant road to an inevitable reunion. He blames Churchill and the others who claimed there was a “special relationship” at the end of the Second World War for being oblivious to the importance of nineteenth century alliances between the two countries. Campbell says that the nineteenth century connection its European dimension was crucial in understanding the relationship in Churchill’s time.12

What is more, Campbell claims that several historians and British and American writers in the nineteenth century took far too narrow views of both nations and were not at all accurate. They all assumed the nineteenth century developing relationship was a natural move towards a closer connection. ‘In essence,’ Campbell objects, ‘from 1812-71, the relationship between the United States and Britain was one of a hostility that thawed to the point of chilly politeness (and sometimes less than this).13 Despite this negative look on Anglo-American relations in the nineteenth century, Campbell provides a detailed account of this history. Campbell acknowledges the lack of Victoria in his narrative in his conclusion, when he gives a brief summary of all that Victoria has done in relation to Britain. He says for example that though the visit of the Prince of Wales to the United States was eventually not the great triumph it was important, because

9 H.C. Allen, Great Britain and the United States: A History of Anglo-American Relations (1783-1952), London: Odhams Press

Limited, 1954, p. 19.

10

Idem, p. 21.

11 Idem, p. 29.

12 Duncan Andrew Campbell, Unlikely Allies: Britain, America and the Victorian Origins of the Special Relationship, London:

Hambledon Continuum, 2007, p. 4.

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“it was nonetheless the first time a member of the Royal Family toured the United States.”14

It was a friendly gesture to a country with which relations had not always been so amicable. “It is ironic,” Campbell continues, “that a Queen should take the lead in seeking rapprochement with a republic.”15

Exactly because this seems ironic, is why her contribution was so important and why the lack of this story is a shortcoming in these books.

A substantial amount of work has been written on Victoria and her personal life, especially after the publication of her diaries between 1907 and 1932. Consequently, we know a lot about her personal thoughts, affections and irritations. The readers of her journals have come to know her as a somewhat weary looking woman with a fierce will and a great love for her husband Prince Albert. She was nicknamed the “grandmother of Europe”, because she married her children into European royalty, but became very lonely after the death of Albert. She embraced modern technology, but had very conservative views when it came to social reform.

Literature on Queen Victoria is abundant, but scholarship on foreign attitudes to Queen Victoria and then especially American attitudes are much less available. Naturally, attitudes towards Queen Victoria and the monarchy were equally diverse as her own personality. Some research has been done on public opinion at the time, but these mainly focus on British attitudes or views from the Commonwealth countries. Here are a few examples of books that can be used for this research.

A very relevant book for my research is Stanley Weintraub’s Victorian Yankees at Queen Victoria's

Court: American Encounters with Victoria and Albert. The title already gives away the core of this book’s

content. Weintraub aims at telling the story from the perspective of Americans coming to Great Britain.

However, his goal is not to portray the Queen, but to show through the American observations of the Queen and her court, what the Americans thought of themselves and who they were. Weintraub argues that the “responses of Americans towards Victoria not only reveal what they thought of her (and her husband) as people and as monarchs, but reflect their own ambitions, confidence, smugness, insecurities – and sense of loss.”16 It also explains why the American public grew so extremely fond of the British monarchs, a sentiment which still persists today. Though this seems like the perfect way to look at Victoria in America, Weintraub does not explain the significance of his numerous examples of meetings between Americans and Victoria and Albert. Weintraub has written a full biography of Queen Victoria17 before and it seems like this book, however informative it is, follow the same lines of a biography with little contextual explanation.

Another view at the United States with a similar perspective is Victorianism in the United States: Its era

and its legacy edited by Steve Ickingrill and Stephan Mills. This book is a collection of essays presented at a

1990 conference from the European Association for American Studies. In the Introduction Stephen Mills raises some interesting questions when he talks about the problems in the relationship between Europe and the United

14 Duncan Andrew Campbell, Unlikely Allies: Britain, America and the Victorian Origins of the Special Relationship, London:

Hambledon Continuum, 2007, p. 254.

15 Idem, p. 255.

16 Stanley Weintraub, Victorian Yankees at Queen Victoria’s Court: American Encounters with Victoria and Albert, Newark:

University of Delaware Press, 2011, p. xii.

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States. “Is the New World an extension of the old, or a repudiation, a place for year zero regeneration? Or are Europe and the Unites States set on a path of cultural and economic convergence?”18 Mills also states that these are not twentieth century problems, but were very much apparent in the nineteenth century as well. Mills explores what exactly we mean with “Victorian America” and finds a possible definition in M.J. Sewell’s suggestion that “we attend to the last four decades of Victoria’s reign, that period within which the traditions, indeed the cult, of British royalty were invented.”19 This mention is of course very interesting, because it confirms what has been said earlier in this introduction, that America’s craziness of foreign monarchs, especially British ones, started in the nineteenth century. Mills intention however, lies much more with explaining Victorianism in the United States and he argues that one of the reasons for the growing connection between Great Britain and the United States lies with the globalization of trade and commerce. The namesake of Victorianism is not so much the focus of this book, though the concluding chapter by Michael J. Sewell aims at examining the Queen’s reputation in the United States and highlight the Victorian aspects of that

reputation.20

More political and less specifically focused on the United States is Frank Hardie’s The political

influence of Queen Victoria: 1861-1901. Hardie explains that he set out to write this book after the appearance

of Lytton Stratchey’s biography of Queen Victoria, which appeared in 1921. Hardie approaches Strachey for not being comprehensive in his story. As the last volume of the Queen’s diaries, those dealing with the period from 1861 to her death was not available yet at the time of his writing in 1921, Strachey could not paint the full picture of Victoria and her influence on politics. Hardie in this book sets out to fill in the blank and complete the story with the information from the 1932 publication of the last volume of the Queen’s diaries. Hardie’s main focus lies with Victoria’s influence on domestic policy and he has chosen 1861 as his starting point, because before that date Victoria was still very much under the influence of first Lord Melbourne and then of Prince Albert. Only from 1861 onwards, Hardie argues, we can speak of Victoria as having herself some political influence. Hardie also warns the reader that his book can also be read as Queen Victoria’s views of her prime ministers and that is exactly what is a deficiency of this book. It focusses almost solely on home affairs and the Queen’s communications with her prime ministers, primarily those with Mr. Gladstone. Foreign affairs are only dealt with briefly in one chapter and these deal mainly with conflicts in the British Empire. This thesis attempts to close the gap in Hardie’s narrative on Anglo-American affairs only a little, so that we may

understand how the Queen’s political influence on politics affected her representations in America.

Connected to this previous book is The Contentious Crown: Public Discussion of the British Monarchy

in the Reign of Queen Victoria by Richard Williams. Where Frank Hardie explores Victoria’s political

influence from her own point of view and from that of her ministers, Williams handles the subject of public opinion of the monarchy during the reign of Queen Victoria. Williams is not so much interested in what Queen

18

Steve Ickingrill and Stephan Mills eds., Victorianism in the United States: Its era and its legacy, Amsterdam: VU University Press, 1992, p. IX.

19 Idem, p. X.

20 Steve Ickingrill and Stephen Mills, Victorianism in the United States: Its era and its legacy, Amsterdam: VU University Press,

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Victoria did and what sort of Queen she was but more in what the people thought she did and what sort of Queen they thought she was. Williams presents his book as ‘an analysis of attitudes to the monarchy’21

. In his research he uses newspaper articles, speeches and pamphlets to illustrate how the general public thought and was encouraged to think about the royal family. He contrasts critic sources, such as republican pamphlets with loyal writings on the monarchy and uses these comments to highlight the changing attitudes to the British monarchy during Queen Victoria’s reign. Williams wants to show that discussion of the monarchy was far greater during the Victorian era than previously said and argues that the view we normally have that the

popularity of the monarchy changed from unpopular in the first half of Victoria’s reign to popular in the end of her reign, is an old model which needs correction. As this book’s subtitle is Public Discussion of the British

Monarchy in the Reign of Queen Victoria, one would expect that it includes public discussion from all sorts of

places. Williams’ study however, focusses largely on British history and thus includes almost solely British sources. In tracing the different representations of the Queen in the British press Williams does provide an example for what will be dealt with in this thesis, be it in a slimmed down form and with examples from the American press.

A last book is Remaking Queen Victoria edited by Margaret Homans and Adrienne Munich. This book is a collection of essays which aim at exploring what Victoria meant to her own subjects, but also to those outside her empire. The goal of the varies essays is highlighting the different identities of Victoria. The authors blame other authors like Stanley Weintraub for instance, for writing only personal stories on the Queen, which leave out her historical and cultural importance. In their introduction they explain why Victoria seems to have disappeared from history, it is not because “she was unimportant but because her importance – like her

monarchy itself – has been difficult to categorize.”22 Homans and Munich hint here exactly on the point that the books about the Anglo-American relationship are missing. At the same time almost all of the essays in

Remaking Queen Victoria are written by literary scholars, which causes a focus on the written works of her age

but leave out political or diplomatic aspects. Therefore this book is valuable because of its focus on symbolism, but misses the context in which these symbols are to be understood.

My analysis of the scholarly sources on the subject of the Anglo-American relationship shows that there are two main deficiencies in these works. The first couple of books focus too broadly on the relationship

between Great Britain and the United States and have an inclination to leave Victoria out of the narrative. The next couple of books either focus solely on British views and representations of the Queen or explore American opinion about her only briefly and in a superficial way. In this thesis I aim at putting the representations of Queen Victoria in America in the context of the happenings of the nineteenth century Anglo-American relationship and thus fill a part of the gap left open by the before mentioned scholars.

21 Richard Williams, The Contentious Crown: Public Discussion of the British Monarchy in the Reign of Queen Victoria, Aldershot:

Ashgate Publishing Limited, 1997, p. 1.

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The chapters in this thesis will trace Victoria’s reign chronologically with in every chapter first a focus on the situation, then some attention for Victoria’s and the British point of view and actions and then the American reaction to Victoria will be presented. Chapter 1 will thus include the border disputes between the United States and Canada. These started already before Queen Victoria came to the throne, but were only concluded in the 1860s and then still the danger of American annexation remained. Victoria’s voice is minor in these conflicts, but nevertheless worth mentioning as these are the first times she acts as a monarch in a

transatlantic communication.

The second chapter will include the 1860s which were a defining era in Anglo-American relations. The visit of the Prince of Wales to Canada and the United States in 1860 sparks an interest for Victoria in America which from then on only seems to be growing. The death of Prince Albert is influential in American attitudes as well as Victoria’s token of sympathy towards Mrs. Lincoln after President Lincoln was shot. The Civil War however, deteriorated relations between Great Britain and the United States and this affected attitudes towards Victoria as well.

This thesis will end with a conclusion about Victoria and the significance of her representations in America. I will summarise the many ways Victoria has been portrayed during her reign and explain how these resulted from contemporary happenings and Victoria’s part in these. To this will be added the importance of Victoria’s actions and symbolization in the context of the nineteenth century Anglo-American relationship. I will also explain what in the end was the lasting symbol of Victoria that remains with us to this day.

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Chapter 1 Border Disputes

When thinking about the United States of America and Great Britain in the nineteenth century, one does not immediately think of them as neighbours. However, British North America did share a border with America and as a part of the Great British Empire America was de facto a neighbour of America. Although Canada received its own government during Victoria’s reign, the mother country kept a tight control over its overseas dominions and was thus directly involved in any conflicts it might have.

One of the conflicts most apparent during the first half of Victoria’s reign were the border disputes. As the United States of America was continually expanding its territory and including other states in the union, its borders also expanded. This lead to several border disputes between 1823 and 1860, which were eventually settles through diplomatic agreements in which Victoria also had her say. In 1837 when Victoria ascended the throne of Great Britain the United States consisted of 26 states, all in the Eastern part of nowadays America23. The rest of the American continent was either independent, unorganized or disputed. At the end of her reign the number of states united in the United States of America had grown to 45.

The border disputes between Great Britain and America was a result of the expansionist attitudes of both. In the nineteenth century these two countries created the two foremost empires in the world. America was a regional and continental empire, whilst Great Britain was a global and maritime one. Their approaches were different, but they both acted out of self-interest24. This self-interest also influenced their relationship with each other. America had two powers to deal with, Great Britain and Mexico. Great Britain needed a much wider focus as its empire stretched the entire globe. Consequently American interest in Great Britain and their foreign policy was much greater than vice versa. This is echoed in British foreign policy papers and Victoria’s contact with her government. There are many more letters and documents on India and the Suez Canal for instance, than on America.

The Queen did have a bond with British North America or Canada. Her father had been stationed there during his military career and lived in Quebec for almost ten years and though she never heard him speak about it (the Duke of Kent died when Victoria was not yet one year old) she did have access to his knowledge by his writings. Furthermore, Victoria had been acquainted with several Canadians and in her later life she played a major part in the unification of the Canadian provinces.

In this chapter I will address the border disputes between British North America and the United States of America and I will briefly explain the nature of these disputes. What is more important here to explore is how Victoria was involved in these conflicts and how her involvement was portrayed in the United States. This is important, because it includes the earlier representations of the Queen which give us an idea of the general opinion of her in the United States at the beginning of her reign. As these disputes are largely political I will

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The United States in 1837 were Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, Arkansas, Tennessee, North Carolina, Virginia, Kentucky, Missouri, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania, New York, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine.

24 Duncan Andrew Campbell, Unlikely Allies: Britain, America and the Victorian Origins of the Special Relationship, London:

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handle the political theme as a guideline here and use it to see how the representations of Queen Victoria show the contrasts between monarchy and democracy and between empire and aspiring empire. First let us look at what exactly was going on the Canadian-American border.

The Canadian-American boundary problem

When Victoria became queen in 1837 she inherited a border problem between Canada and the United States too. This problem centred mostly on the northern border of Maine and the north-eastern border of the Wisconsin Territory (which nowadays is a part of Minnesota). There were also problems with the Oregon border, but these will be dealt with in a later section of this chapter. The boundaries in 1837 stemmed from the Treaty of Ghent from 1815, which established that the Passamaquoddy Islands (between Maine and New Brunswick) would be divided between Canada and the United States and that the official border would be from the St Lawrence River to the western shore of Lake Huron25. A convention in 1818 further “agreed that a Line drawn from the most North Western Point of the Lake of the Woods, along the forty Ninth Parallel of North Latitude”26

would be a definite border between the American and Canadian lands which would stop at the Rocky Mountains. From there the Oregon Territory began and this would be “free and open” for ten years.

Although the Treaty was a firm one, problems kept arising around the border. In 1827 the Canadian-American border again became a subject of dispute. Neither party was really content with the current demarcation line in the north-east of America. The problem consisted around “the boundary line from Lake Huron to the northeast corner of the lake of the Woods and the line from the source of the St Croix River in Maine to the St Lawrence River”27

. Two commissioners from both sides had been working on a plan to establish an official border for these areas since the Treaty of Ghent. In the end they did not agree and asked King William I of the Netherlands to act as arbiter. In 1831 he ruled that most of the territory belonged to the United States. The treaty that should have sealed this deal was successfully prevented from ratification by the Maine senators, which made the British suspicious of America’s intentions. The American states had been bold in their expansionist actions before and the British were very well aware of that fact. As if the boundary

problem was not enough, another problem arose at the same time within Canada.

Quarrels in Canada

In 1837 rebellions against the colonialists broke out in both Upper and Lower Canada28. The actual causes of these rebellions remain unclear, though Duncan Andrew Campbell argues that for French-speaking Lower Canada the problems arose from “economic, social and religious tensions”, whilst in English-speaking Upper

25 Idem, p. 118.

26 Author Unknown, "Text of "Convention of 1818 between the United States and Great Britain"". The Avalon Project at Yale Law

School. Retrieved at 16 June 2014.

27

Duncan Andrew Campbell, Unlikely Allies: Britain, America and the Victorian Origins of the Special Relationship, London: Hambledon Continuum, 2007, p. 126.

28 The Constitutional Act of 1791 “provided a new constitution for the two colonies to be called Lower Canada (the future Quebec)

and Upper Canada (the future Ontario), into which the territory was divided”. As cited from Encyclopædia Britannica Online, s. v. "Constitutional Act", retrieved on 16 June 2014, http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/134266/Constitutional-Act.

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Canada “the abuse of patronage, especially regarding land grants”29

fuelled the revolt. An ethnic element over the dispute between the English- and French-speaking populations also played a part. The British government held extra sessions on the troubles in Canada, but were divided in their opinion on what to do about the situation. As Lord Melbourne wrote to the Queen on the 27th of December 1837:

All are of opinion that strong measures should be taken for the repression of the insurrection, but some, and more particularly Lord Howick, think that these measures of vigour should be accompanied by measures of amendment and conciliation.30

It did not come to a real firm repression and only a limited number of armed forced were sent to the American continent. In fact, the revolts lacked the amount of support to be really successful. During the troubles however, it had become apparent that the rebels enjoyed American support. Although President Martin Van Buren had issued a proclamation of neutrality on the 5th of January 1838, during the struggles it turned out that some Americans too had joined the revolt. The Americans supported the Canadians because they saw in the Canadian struggle a copy of their own War of Independence. This view seemed to be confirmed when both Upper and Lower Canadian rebel leaders issued proclamations of independence in late December 1837 and early January 1838.

Just how much Americans believed in the right of the Canadians to independence is shown by how the Americans reacted to the uprisings. The Rutland Herald for example, brought a story in December 1837 about a meeting for volunteers for the “Independent Canadian Service”31

. The headline of the main article on this page is also revealing, it reads “The Canada War”, while no one in either Canada or Great Britain had mentioned war yet. Further on in the article a letter from a Canadian correspondent was cited. This article stated the demands of the Canadian Patriots. According to them they “require from the Governor that he shall dismiss the

Parliament, allow the people to elect the Legislative Council, and that he should leave the country within two weeks.”32

This was no war talk, but rather a demand for a greater say in the governing of Canada.

The situation became denser for both Great Britain and the United States when the rebel leaders settles themselves in the border area and started raids from there. On May 29th 1838 they attacked a British ship called the ‘Sir Robert Peel’, but as this happened at the border the attackers were arrested by American authorities. The Earl of Durham, who had been sent to Canada as governor-in-chief declared that he

demanded the delivery to the British authorities of the prisoners concerned in the burning of the Sir Robert Peel, and if it not complied with the American Government, he will take upon himself the responsibility, as

29 Duncan Andrew Campbell, Unlikely Allies: Britain, America and the Victorian Origins of the Special Relationship, London:

Hambledon Continuum, 2007, p. 128.

30

Arthur Christopher Benson and Viscount Esher, ed., The Letters of Queen Victoria : A Selection from Her Majesty's

Correspondence between the Years 1837 and 1861, London: John Murray, 1908, p. 98.

31 Rutland herald. (Rutland, Vt.), 19 Dec. 1837. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress.

<http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn84022355/1837-12-19/ed-1/seq-2/>

32

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15 he has the power of declaring war between Great Britain and the United States, and will proceed at once to

England in a ship of war.33

The Americans were thus not so neutral as they expressed with their proclamation of neutrality and exactly this fact was the thing the British government used in their suppression of the rebellion. According to Campbell, the colonial authorities portrayed the rebels as “Yankee pawns” and emphasized the American expansionist efforts as a danger to Canada. Thus, Anti-Americanism helped end the rebellions in Upper and Lower Canada. “All is well,” said Lord Melbourne in a letter to the Queen on the 3rd of December 1838, “Unless, therefore, the Americans make an attempt upon Upper Canada.”34

That this last line proved to be a legitimate fear The Queen discovered only five days later, when Lord Melbourne wrote that “The American force which made an incursion into Upper Canada have all been taken prisoners....”35

President van Buren at this moment stood behind his proclamation of neutrality, but especially Maine and New Brunswick called out their militia when Canadian lumberjacks crossed the border during the so-called Aroostook War of 1838-1839. This conflict, which did not contain any bloodshed started when British lumbermen occupied the Aroostook River at the Canadian-American border. An American official asked them to leave, but in reaction they only stationed more men there. The government of Maine sent out troops to re-establish its authority in the region and New Brunswick ordered the British to go to another part of the region outside their jurisdiction. The conflict was thus concluded with no real bloodshed, but it was a close call and the attitudes on both sides worsened.

American support for war with Great Britain rose quickly because of this conflict, but the President did not give in. Neither did the British government and according to Howard Jones and Kenneth Stevens it was the heads of state’s determination to avoid war that helped calm down the conflicts36

. Queen Victoria, as a young just ascended monarch was not one of these heads of state. Instead, it was her government who had succeeded in ending the conflict and Victoria’s voice was not heard.

The more remarkable then, is the fact that in the American press Victoria was portrayed as opposing the U.S. Newspapers did not spend much attention on Victoria. One even incorporated on one page a piece about the struggles in Canada followed by an article on the marriage of the Queen.37 The editor was oblivious for the link between her and the Canadian uprisings. In cartoons on the other hand, Victoria is included in the conflict. The following cartoon for example, shows Victoria sitting on a dog with the head of the Duke of Wellington. Opposite of her is President Van Buren sitting on an ox with the head of Fairfield.

33 ‘The United States And Canada.’ Times [London, England] 9 July 1838: 3. The Times Digital Archive. Web. 22 June 2014. 34

Arthur Christopher Benson and Viscount Esher, ed., The Letters of Queen Victoria : A Selection from Her Majesty's

Correspondence between the Years 1837 and 1861, London: John Murray, 1908, p.. 135.

35 Idem, p. 137.

36 Howard Jones, To the Webster-Ashburton Treaty: A Study in Anglo-American Relations, 1783-1843, Chapel Hill: University of

Caroline Press, 1977 and Kenneth r. Stevens, Border Diplomacy: The Caroline and McLeod Affairs in Anglo-American-Canadian

Relations, 1837-1842, Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 1989 as referred to by Marc L. Harris, ‘The Meaning of Patriot: The

Canadian Rebellion and American Republicanism, 1837-1839’, Michigan Historical Review, no. 1 (1997), pp. 36.

37 Burlington free press. (Burlington, Vt.), 13 March 1840. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress.

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16 ‘The Main Question’ by Henry Dacre38

Victoria says: “O fie Brother Jonathan, to threaten a young woman with a war about a few sticks of timber. If I have your property make it appear & I will pay for the value: do not compel me to quarrel when we ought to be friends.” Wellington pleads with Victoria: “My Royal Mistress let us give them a touch of

Waterloo, by so doing we can turn out the Whig Ministers.” Van Buren reacts: “I must make a flourish to please my Loco Foco friends, but in truth I don't relish committing myself in favor of war;--They may think I am not exactly the man to carry it on & call for Clay the never failing pacificator; but I must make a flourish.” Fairfield: “Go ahead Matty I want to be elected Governer again. Make them retreat, or pay for the timber. Maine wants money & must have it.” Virginia Congressman Henry A. Wise is standing behind the ox, puling at his tale. He says: “Come Matty be Wise, don't be so very warlike, it won't do to fight about the timber, let them pay the value to brother Jonathan & he will be satisfied.”

Victoria is portrayed here like a Greek war goddess with shining armour and her hair and clothes in Greek style. She does not hold a sword like Van Buren, but instead raises her shield and her other hand is occupied restraining the Duke of Wellington. This is peculiar, because she was no major player in this conflict and only signed the documents her government offered her. Apparently on the other side of the Atlantic this was seen differently, because Queen Victoria here is shown as the person leading her nation and the one who makes the decisions. In this cartoon for example, it seems as if Victoria is the one choosing not to go to war with America, because she is holding back her prime minister. Victoria here represents Great Britain and her Greek goddess outfit might refer to her as being the symbol of the nation. In the history of nationalism it is a common practise to identify the nation with a mythical woman. The French Marianne is the prime example of this practise, but the British have Britannia. It seems as if this cartoonist tried to incorporate Victoria into that Britannia symbolism and thus making her the symbol of the nation of Great Britain.

38 Henry Dacre, ‘The Main Question’, N.Y. : Pub. by H.R. Robinson, 1839. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division

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The British Parliament passed an Act in 1838 that suspended the constitution of Lower Canada and they sent out the Earl of Durham as governor-general to the region in order to get a clearer view of what exactly was going on there. The Earl did not stay long and as he could not calm the uprisings. His retreat to Great Britain was seen as somewhat of an embarrassment. The report he wrote however, later functioned as the basis for the constitution which united the provinces of Canada.

Oregon Territory

The Oregon Territory had been unorganized territory for a long time when in 1843 the Americans laid a claim on it on the basis that so many American were emigrating to the ground that it must become American. President James Polk offered a deal to Great Britain, settling the border at the 49 degree line, but the British refused, which started another dispute. Victoria was not immediately involved in this conflict either. In 1843 she had been on the throne for six years and still did not have a lot to say in international conflicts. Again newspapers did not mention Queen Victoria as a participant in the conflict. The following cartoon shows us another opinion of the conflict where Victoria does play a part.

‘Ultimatum on the Oregon Question’ by James Baillie39

In this cartoon Queen Victoria and Prince Albert stand on one side of the Ocean facing President Polk on the other side. Louis Philippe of France and Czar Nicholas I of Russia stand on the European mainland and watch the conflict as neutral spectators. Victoria says: “I've opened my Ports for the admission of your Corn, and I offer to settle the Oregon business by arbitration! What more can you expect? Beware how you rouse the British Lion!" Prince Albert’s German roots are being made fun of as he says: “I dink so doo!" The Duke of Wellington is also seen trying to restrain the British lion, who says, “Unloose my chains and fill my belly! Then

39 James Baillie, ‘Ultimatum on the Oregon Question’, N.Y. : Lith & pub. by James Baillie, 1846, Library of Congress Prints and

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I'll fight.” Polk says to Victoria: “You opened your ports to keep you from starvation! I offered to settle the Oregon question at 49 [degrees] and you refused--I won't arbitrate--I go the whole figure to 54 42. which, if you'll agree to, I am willing to negotiate!” A heavily armed General Bunkum with a bald eagle by his side says: “I'm for war and the whole of Oregon, Kalifornia, Kanada, and Kuba; here's a bird that will cut your British lion's liver out, and eat it cold without sugar, by thunder!!!” Close to Britain, Irish Repeal Movement leader Daniel O'Connell waves a club that says “Repeal” and he warns “Give us repale, or the divil an Irishman will you get to join your ranks!” He holds a bag which says “rent” in his hand, which refers to American funds contributed in support of his movement. Czar Nicholas then joins in saying: “I shall have no objection to see John Bull get a good licking; It will help my Eastern views.” Louis Philippe says: “I got my fingers burnt by meddling in the Texas business, so I shall not interfere in this; especially as a war will bring grist to my mill!”

Possibly drawn by the same artist that drew the ‘Main Question’, this cartoon again shows Victoria at the head of her government, though she is far more regal here. The Britannia allusions are left behind and she is shown in her royal robes with the crown on her hand and the sceptre in her hand. She is also sitting on a throne this time. These changes in her figure portray her as a lot less powerful than the Britannia figure, despite the regal attributes she is surrounded by. In fact, it is because of these regal attributes she comes across as less powerful, because they allude to her as the monarch and as a monarch she has very little power. The regal robe and other attributes create an illusion of power and the cartoonist probably tries to convey that Great Britain is also still clinging on to illusions of grandeur. Victoria here is thus again the symbol of Great Britain, but not as a warrior symbol of the nation, but as an illusion of power. She is further somewhat ridiculed by having Albert at her side who speaks with a thick German accent and can speak no other intelligible words than that he agrees. Added to that is the fact that her prime minister sits in a bowing position as if not to be taller than the monarch and thus upset her. All in all this can be seen, not as direct critique on Victoria, but as critique on the institution of the monarchy with Victoria as the symbol of that institution.

In February 1843 a treaty was negotiated for the Oregon Treaty. Again the Queen had little to do with these diplomatic actions, but her thoughts on them can be concluded from the speech she wrote which was read in Parliament. Her preference for pacifism and peace shown through in her words as her representative read:

By the Treaty which Her Majesty has concluded with the United States of America, and by the Adjustment of those Differences which, from their long Continuance, had endangered the Preservation of Peace, Her Majesty trusts that the amicable Relations of the Two Countries have been confirmed.40

Here prime minister was not too happy about her choice of words. Lord Melbourne wrote to the Queen on the 3rd of February:

40 UK Parliament, ‘MEETING OF PARLIAMENT. HL Deb 02 February 1843 vol 66 cc1-6’,

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19 ... Lord Melbourne thinks that the Speech was very well and judiciously drawn; the only paragraph which he does not like is that about the American treaty.10 It betrays too great an anxiety for peace, and too much fear of war.41

Thus whilst Victoria tried to establish friendly relations between the two countries, her government did not see the reason yet why they should attend to ameliorating the Anglo-American relationship. In this respect Andrew Duncan Campbell is right when he says that Victoria “adopted a generally more friendly view earlier than did most of her subject.”42 I would also add that Victoria’s words do not betray an anxiety for peace or a fear of war, but rather show a dislike of conflicts and an awareness of the advantages of amicable relations between Great Britain and the United States. The cartoonist of both prints shown in this chapter understood this quite well when he decided to portray the Queen rather with a defensive shield than with an aggressive sword. It is also the Queen who restrains her government from taking rash actions.

Conclusion

During the border disputes, which started before Victoria’s accession and ended only in the 1860s Victoria was often just a puppet of her government. She is the official head of state of Great Britain, but her opinions are those of her government and not those of herself. In cartoons about this however, and especially American cartoons, she is presented as the foremost head of state. Furthermore, Victoria her arises for the first time as a symbol. She is being identified with Britannia, the national symbol of Great Britain and thus becomes herself a symbol of the British state. The Oregon cartoon reverts the symbolism of Victoria as a heroic figure of the nation, instead it shows Victoria as the symbol of illusions of grandeur of Great Britain and also the British monarchy. This type of symbolism is the most expected kind of symbolism for a head of state, so in the next chapter I will look into how Victoria as a symbol developed and how varieties in her representations originated from her actions.

41 Arthur Christopher Benson and Viscount Esher, ed., The Letters of Queen Victoria : A Selection from Her Majesty's

Correspondence between the Years 1837 and 1861, London: John Murray, 1908, p. 461.

42 Duncan Andrew Campbell, Unlikely Allies: Britain, America and the Victorian Origins of the Special Relationship, London:

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Chapter 2 The Defining 1860s

The 1860s were turbulent times for the countries on both sides of the Atlantic. Most apparent is the American Civil War, which caused great chaos on the American continent. On several occasions it seemed like it was inevitable that Great Britain would be dragged into the conflict, but remarkably it was Victoria who played a substantial role in keeping her empire out of it. Her actions, and especially her reaction after Lincoln’s assassination made her very popular in the United States and are seen as of one of the causes of the changing relationship between Great Britain and America.

In her own attitude to the United States, Queen Victoria was heavily influenced by her antipathy against republicanism.43 She was impartial against democracy, inclining to be quite unsympathetic to democratic institutions like those in the U.S. Her foremost reason for this was that she found that no one else should mind her business of royalty.44 This became apparent in her fierce defence of the royal prerogatives and in the fact that she kept Prince Albert and her oldest son, Bertie, the Prince of Wales away from royal business as much as possible almost until the end of her life. Victoria’s views on her own powers however, will be dealt with in the second chapter. Her views on the Prince of Wales on the other, where very much changed in the 1860s.

Like the relations with France, her antipathy of republicanism did not make the Queen unfavourable towards the U.S. However, she was also warned by her ministers that the U.S. were always looking out for an opportunity to attack Great Britain or seize its dominions, as we have seen in the chapter on border disputes. This shaped her opinion of the U.S. role in various international conflicts and made her suspicious of the country across the Atlantic, in the time leading up to the 1860s. Even so, Victoria had little time to mind the doings in America as revolutions in Europe broke loose in 1848 and the Crimean War of 1853-1856 demanded her full attention. It is important also to remember that between 1840 and 1857 Victoria’s nine children were born and she delighted in the fact that during her pregnancies she could transfer her duties to her husband Albert. Due to the culmination of these facts, Stanley Weintraub says that the United States “remained an insignificant, if large and ungainly, ex-colony to the queen.”45 The 1860s saw a change in this attitude and in this chapter I will take a look at the tumultuous happenings of this decade. I will also look at what Victoria’s part was in them and how she was represented in America. The political theme will still be apparent in this chapter with Victoria’s actions during the Civil War as the most recognisable example of the contrast between monarchy and democracy. At the same time the cultural theme will her be integrated when I will discuss the visit of the Prince of Wales, for example. Combined these themes will lead to an explanation of the image of Queen Victoria in the 1860s.

43 Frank Hardie, The Political Influence of Queen Victoria, 1861-1901, London: Humphrey Milford, Oxford University Press, 1935,

p. 168.

44 Alfred T. Mahan, George F. Hoar and Charles Francis Adams, ‘January Meeting, 1904. The Frigate Constitution; Queen Victoria

and Our Civil War; Memoir of Horace Gray’, Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society, no. 18 (1903 - 1904), p. 129.

45 Stanley Weintraub, Victorian Yankees at Queen Victoria’s Court: American Encounters with Victoria and Albert, Newark:

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21

One part of the relationship between Queen Victoria and America consists of physical appearances. Though she herself never visited the country, the Queen was often represented by British ministers and diplomats. In 1860 however, she was represented by someone of equal royal importance, her son Albert

Edward, Prince of Wales. Although visiting the United States was not the main goal of his visit, his appearance was one defining moment in the American perception of Queen Victoria.

The visit of the Prince of Wales

On the 4th of May 1859 the Speaker of the House of Assembly presented an address to the Queen. It had come from the Legislative Assembly in British North America and expressed an invitation to the Queen to attend the opening of the Queen Victoria Bridge in Montreal with her husband Prince Albert and the royal family in 1860. This would be the first time that the Queen visited her overseas dominions. The Queen had promised such a visit previously after the British had won the Crimean War in 1856. With a visit to the overseas dominions she wanted to express her gratitude to the Canadians who had fought with the other British troops to win the Crimean War. The Queen however, declined. In the official answer to the Canadian government it said:

Her Majesty feels that her duties at the seat of the Empire prevent so long an absence, and at so great a distance, as a visit to Canada would necessarily require.46

The Queen had always been anxious to keep her royal power in her own hands. If she, her husband and the royal family were to travel to Canada she would have to entrust someone else with her duties. Sharing her duties with Prince Albert had been already quite difficult for her, let alone handing them over to someone from her government.

These requests had come before and Queen Victoria had always said she would not be able to come over. She did, however, give a vague promise of sending one of her sons over for a visit once they had reached maturity. Eventually it was decided that Albert Edward, Prince of Wales and the eldest son and heir of Queen Victoria would go to Canada and represent his mother there. The Queen had a difficult relationship with her twenty-year old son. Although he was her heir she would refuse to share any business of state with him until she was in her seventies. Despite all of this, she did want her son to know the Empire and thus let him go to Canada as her representative.

As soon as President Buchanan of the United States read about this visit he too sent an invitation to Great Britain. Buchanan was a familiar face to Queen Victoria. He had served as Secretary of State and Minister to Great Britain from 1853 to 1856 when he was elected as President. In this role he had been pivotal in the relations between Great Britain and the United States when he acted as a negotiator on the border disputes. In 1855 Lord Clarendon, one of Queen Victoria’s chief advisors wrote to the Queen claiming “the expediency of

46 Robert Celem, Visit of his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales to the British North American Provinces and United States in the

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22

inviting Mr Buchanan to Windsor”47

, which indicates how her government now had changed their opinion of Anglo-American relation as well. Following Victoria’s earlier example they now worked hard to forge friendly relations with the country on the other side of the Atlantic.

In his invitation, Buchanan not only stressed how happy he would be with a visit from the British heir to the throne, he also sheds a little bit of light on how the Queen was seen in America at the time. Before he ends his letter with claiming himself to be the Queen’s “most obedient servant”48, the President writes the following:

In this [the manner in which the American people will greet the Prince] they will manifest their deep sense of your [The Queen’s] domestic virtues, as well as their convictions of your merita as a wise, patriotic and constitutional sovereign.49

Referring to himself as a “most obedient servant” sounds quite peculiar for an American head of state to say. More interesting however, is how the President talks about the Queen herself. In praising her qualities he actually refers to what we call ‘Victorianism’, which is the cult that arose around the Queen and how she managed herself, her family and her household. What President Buchanan is basically saying here, is that he respects Queen Victoria for her “domestic virtues” and her “wise, patriotic and constitutional” ways of being a sovereign. These words are remarkable for a President of a republican country to say about a head of state of a monarchy, however, one must remember that Mr. Buchanan personally knew Queen Victoria from his time as Secretary to Great Britain and that he had seen how she reigned over her country. By looking closely at his words then, one discovers that Buchanan’s image of the Queen is a mix of what he has seen himself and how the Queen is represented more generally in America. When he knew here she was a young girl destined to be Queen one day. His words however, refer to her as a mother with “domestic virtues” and as a constitutional monarch who is wise and patriotic. We can conclude from his words that this was the general image of Victoria in America, a symbol of motherhood and the monarchy.

For now it is important to return to how the Queen responded to this letter, coming from a former colony with which the relations up until now had not always run very smooth. The Queen answered the letter personally. As her son was already planning to leave the American continent via the United States, President Buchanan’s invitation was graciously accepted. In a mark of respect for the republican country, Victoria further wrote to Buchanan that the Prince of Wales would “drop all Royal state” as soon as he left Canada and that he would travel through America under the name of ‘Lord Renfrew’50

. This is perhaps one of the actions that lead to the symbolization of the Queen as wise and caring figure. She shows herself considerate with the American public feeling about British aristocracy.

47 Arthur Christopher Benson and Viscount Esher, ed., The Letters of Queen Victoria : A Selection from Her Majesty's

Correspondence between the Years 1837 and 1861, London: John Murray, 1908, p. 105.

48 Robert Celem, Visit of his Royal Highness the Prince of Wales to the British North American Provinces and United States in the

Year 1860, Toronto: Henry Rowsell, 1861, p. 8.

49 Idem. 50

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23

Despite Victoria’s good intentions however, the American public did not react as enthusiastically as the British expected. Albert Edward visited almost every major city in the country, but only in New York and Boston was he greeted with the cheering crowds he knew from his home country. President Lincoln did not even go to the train station to greet the Prince in fear of losing votes for his election that came up in a few weeks, a reporter from the Times reported51. The low turnouts of crowds anxious to see the Prince possibly resulted from the fact that there were large Irish populations in the places he visited and the Irish blamed Great Britain for neglecting Ireland. Their anger now was projected on the Prince and there were several riots during his visit.

The visit knew some successes too. The people that did go out to meet the Prince, most of them persons were pleasantly surprised by him. They were elites and it benefited their social status when they were granted admission to one of the balls or receptions organised for the Prince of Wales52. American newspapers reported of the Prince’s gaiety and youthfulness and how extremely interested he was in all that was presented to him. In their view the visit of the Prince was a great success and especially in New York the turnout of people was immense.53 Some spectators commented on how the American atmosphere would free the Prince of the restraints he knew at home and give him a more intimate idea of the common man. After all, one article states “princes are human, and do not essentially differ from other men.”54

In September 1860 The Observer quoted an article on the visit from The New York Herald which shows another effect the visit had. In it the author explores the common origins of the Americans and the Brits, which lead him to conclude that in essence they are the same. “We speak the English language,” the author says, “and our social habits and manner assimilate to a great degree with those of the English people. Their blood in our blood; their interests are our interests.”55

By observing these words in an article about the Prince of Wales we can trace that a sentiment of kinship with the British surfaced at the time of his visit. The Prince himself might even be a reason for this realisation of kinship as he is here portrayed as the symbol of Great Britain.

The American more positive view of the visit is the one that survived in the public memory. Years after writers reflected on the event as being a great triumph for the Prince and his parents. The reason of kinship became more and more popular, but as Michael J. Sewell rightly suggests the visit also formed “a unique and curious event featuring an exotic specimen alien to North America.”56 Whatever the true reason behind American enthusiasm for the visit and whether or not the visit was the great success it was claimed to be later

51 Mrs. Steuart Erskine, ed., Memoirs of Edward, Earl of Sandwich, 1839-1916 (London: John Murray, 1919), p. 46; Earl Schenck

Miers, ed., Lincoln Day by Day: A Chronology, 1809-1865 (Washington, D.C.: Sesquicentennial Commission, 1960), II, 292 as cited by Thomas Keiser, ‘The Prince of Wales in the United States: A Harbinger of English Opinion of the Civil War’, Illinois Historical

Journal, no. 4 (1990), p. 240.

52 Steve Ickingrill and Stephen Mills, Victorianism in the United States: Its era and its legacy, Amsterdam: VU University Press,

1992, p. 216.

53 Author unknown, ‘THE PRINCE OF WALES IN THE UNITED STATES’, The Observer (1791- 1900); Oct 22, 1860; ProQuest

Historical Newspapers: The Guardian (1821-2003) and The Observer (1791-2003), pg. 4.

54 Author unknown, ‘The Ovations to the Prince of Wales - The Effect of His Visit to the United States’, New York Herald, August 9,

1860.

55 Author unknown, ‘THE PRINCE OF WALES IN THE NEW WORLD’, The Observer (1791- 1900); Sep 3, 1860; ProQuest

Historical Newspapers: The Guardian (1821-2003) and The Observer (1791-2003), pg. 4.

56 Steve Ickingrill and Stephen Mills, Victorianism in the United States: Its era and its legacy, Amsterdam: VU University Press,

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