



Produced by David McClamrock







MEMOIR OF QUEEN ADELAIDE,

CONSORT OF KING WILLIAM IV.


BY DR. DORAN,

AUTHOR OF "LIVES OF THE QUEENS OF ENGLAND OF THE HOUSE OF HANOVER," ETC.



LONDON:

RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET.

1861.

[The right of Translation is reserved.]



LONDON:

PRINTED BY G. PHIPPS, 13 & 14, TOTHILL STREET, WESTMINSTER.




ADELAIDE OF SAXE-MEINENGEN.

  Und ich an meinem Abend, wollte,
  Ich haette, diesem Weibe gleich,
  Erfuellt was ich erfuellen sollte
  In meinen Graenzen und Bereich.

  A. VON CHAMISSO.




The pocket Duchy--Old customs--Early training--The Father of the
Princess Adelaide--Social life at the ducal court--Training of the
Princess Adelaide--Marriage preliminaries--English parliament--The Duke
of Clarence--Arrival in London of the Princess--Quaint royal
weddings--At home and abroad--Duke and Duchess of Clarence at
Bushey--"State and Dirt" at St. James's--William IV. and Queen
Adelaide--Course of life of the new Queen Consort--King's gallantry to
an old love--Royal simplicity--The Sovereigns and the Sovereign
people--Court anecdotes--Drawing rooms--Princess Victoria--The
coronation--Incidents of the day--Coronation finery of George
IV.--Princess Victoria not present--Revolutionary period--Reform
question--Unpopularity of the Queen--Attacks against her on the part of
the press--Violence of party-spirit--Friends and foes--Bearing of the
King and Queen--Duchess of Augouleme--King a republican--His
indiscretion--Want of temper--Continental press adverse to the
Queen--King's declining health--Conduct of Queen Adelaide--King
William's death--Declining health of the Queen--Her travels in search
of health--Her last illness--Her will--Death--And funeral.




THE little Duchy of Saxe-Meinengen was once a portion of the
inheritance of the princely Franconian house of Henneberg. The failure
of the male line transferred it, in 1583, to the family of reigning
Saxon princes. In 1680, it fell to the third son of the Saxon Duke,
Ernest the Pious. The name of this son was Bernard. This Duke is looked
upon as the founder of the House of Meinengen. He was much devoted to
the study of Alchemy, and was of a pious turn, like his father, as far,
as may be judged by the volumes of manuscript notes he left behind
him--which he had made on the sermons of his various court-preachers.

The law of primogeniture was not yet in force when Duke Bernard died,
in 1706. One consequence was, that Bernard's three sons, with Bernard's
brother, ruled the little domain in common. In 1746, the sole surviving
brother, Antony Ulrich, the luckiest of this ducal Tontine, was monarch
of all he surveyed, within a limited space. The conglomerate ducal
sovereigns were plain men, formal, much given to ceremony, and not much
embarrassed by intellect. There was one man, however, who had enough
for them all: namely, George Spanginburg, brother of the Moravian
bishop of the latter name, and who was, for some time, the Secretary of
State at the court of Saxe-Meinengen.

Antony Ulrich reigned alone from 1746 to 1763. He was of a more
enlightened character than any of the preceding princes, had a taste
for the arts, when he could procure pictures cheaply, and strong
inclination towards pretty living pictures, which led to lively rather
than pleasant controversies at court. His own marriage with Madame
Scharmann disgusted the young ladies of princely houses in Germany, and
especially exasperated the aristocracy of Meinengen. They were scarcely
pacified by the fact, that the issue of the marriage was declared
incapable of succeeding to the inheritance.

The latter fell in 1763 to two young brothers, kinsfolk of Antony, and
sons of the late Duke of Gotha, who reigned for some years together.
The elder, Charles, died in 1782. From that period till 1803, the other
brother, George, reigned alone. He had no sooner become sole sovereign,
than he married the Princess Louisa of Hohenlohe Langenburg. At the end
of ten years, the first child of this marriage was born, namely
Adelaide, the future Queen of England.

Eight years later, in the last year of the last century A.D. 1800, a
male heir to the pocket-duchy was born, and then was introduced into
Meinengen the law which fixed the succession in the eldest male heir
only. Saxe-Meinengen was the last country in Europe in which this law
was established.

The father of the Princess Adelaide, like his brother Charles, was a
man of no mean powers. Both were condescending enough to visit even the
burgher families of Saxe-Meinengen; and Charles had so little respect
for vice in high places, that when a German prince acted contrary to
the rights of his people, the offender found himself soundly lashed in
paper and pamphlet, the pseudonymous signature to which could not
conceal the person of the writer--the hasty Duke Charles. If this
sometimes made him unpopular over the frontier, he was beloved within
it. How could the people but love a sovereign Duke who, when a child
was born to him, asked citizens of good repute rather than of high rank
to come and be gossips?

In the revolutionary war, Duke George fought like a hero. At home, he
afforded refuge to bold but honest writers, driven from more mighty
states. He beautified his city, improved the country; and, without
being of great mental cultivation himself, he loved to collect around
him, scholars, philosophers, artists, authors, gentlemen. With these he
lived on the most familiar terms, and when I say that Schiller and John
Paul Richter were of the number, I afford some idea of the society
which Duke George cared chiefly to cultivate. He buried his own mother
in the common church-yard, because she was worthy, he said, of lying
among her own subjects. The majority of these were country folk, but
George esteemed the country folk, and at rustic festivals he was not
unwilling to share a jug of beer with any of them. Perhaps the rustics
loved him more truly than the sages, to whom he proved, occasionally,
something wearisome. But these were often hard to please. All, however,
felt an honest grief, when, on the Christmas night, of 1803, Duke
George died, after a brief illness, caused, it is said, by a neglected
cold, and the rage at an urgent demand from the Kaiser, of 60,000
florins, fine-money for knightly orders, ducally declined.

The Duke left a young family, Adelaide, Ida, and his son and successor,
Bernard, then only three years of age. The mother of these fatherless
children took upon herself the office of guardian, with that of Regent
of the duchy. The duties of both were performed with rare judgment and
firmness, during a time of much trouble and peril, especially when the
French armies were overrunning and devastating Germany.

On the young ladies, gently and wisely reared in this little court,
Queen Charlotte had begun to look with the foresight of a mother who
had elderly and wayward sons to marry. When the