Queen Victoria’s Children

Queen Victoria’s Children episode 3 – Princes Will Be Princes – This final episode focuses on Victoria’s relationship with her sons and how, after Albert’s death, they struggled to live up to his model of purity. It explores Victoria’s difficult relationship with her eldest son Bertie, whom she blamed for Albert’s death, believing his sexual indiscretions to have fatally weakened her husband.     It also examines her relationship with her son Leopold, the physically weak but spirited haemophiliac who put up the most determined effort to break free from his mother’s control. Ultimately, the idea of monarchy based on […]

Queen Victoria’s Children episode 2 – A Domestic Tyrant: This episode concentrates on Victoria’s relationship with her daughters. It looks at how, after Albert’s death, Victoria clung to and bullied them and arranged their marriages. In response the princesses fought back, becoming independent women determined to find love and fresh purpose. From sculpture to medicine, the daughters became champions of women for a new era.     Queen Victoria and Prince Albert shared a passionate marriage. Behind closed doors, royal domestic life often seemed like a battlefield. In a 60-year family saga this new three-part series explores the reign of

Queen Victoria’s Children episode 1: Queen Victoria and Prince Albert shared a passionate marriage. Behind closed doors, royal domestic life often seemed like a battlefield.     In a 60-year family saga this new three-part series explores the reign of Victoria through her personal relationships with her husband and her nine children. It is a story of manipulation, conflict, intimidation, emotional blackmail, and fevered attempts by her children to escape the clutches of their domineering and needy mother. The series uses a wealth of written material and photos left by Victoria, Albert and their children, including letters, diaries, memoirs and