The Lost Diary of Queen Victoria’s Undermaid

MESSAGE TO READERS (#ulink_afa83870-37c2-5b31-8429-bff01407d565)

The diaries of Mrs Flora Porter, née Flossie Ramsbotham, were found beneath the floorboards at Hampton Court Palace, during recent building works. The little notebooks were tied with pink ribbon and wrapped in a pair of red tartan knickerbockers. Whilst the knickerbockers were graciously received on behalf of the nation by the Victoria and Albert Museum, the diaries themselves met with nothing but scorn. The eminent historian, Professor Dullas Ditchwater (author of dozens of long and extremely dusty volumes about Queen Victoria) dismissed Flora’s diaries as ‘worthless gossip’ and ‘scandalous tittle-tattle’.

When Professor Ditchwater lobbed Flora’s diaries out of his window, they fell into the hands of Alex Parsons, a not-so-eminent or expert historian. She immediately realised that important issues were revealed in the diaries, namely that even Kings and Queens wear underpants, and someone has to wash them. Now, thanks to Ms Parsons’ timely catch, you too can view Queen Victoria’s life and times from the unique perspective of the wash tub.

THIS DIARY BELONGS TO:

January 1st, 1837 (#ulink_41eb85fa-4e1b-583e-86da-791eca6898ac)

Snobby Manor, Snootyshire (#ulink_41eb85fa-4e1b-583e-86da-791eca6898ac).

‘Do not forget, gentle reader; servants are also human beings,’ it says in this book of Household Management I dug out of Lady Snobby’s library. Oh yeah! That’ll come as news to Lady La-di-dah Bossy Boots. Since when do I have time to be a human being, I’d like to know? Sixteen hours a day up to my elbows in soap suds, and life not made easier with the wretched butler trying to kiss me. (I wouldn’t mind so much but he’s got a wart on the end of his nose with three wiry hairs sticking out of it, yeeuch!) Miserable wages, miserable household, and the Snobbies are unbearable. Flossie Ramsbotham, you were born for better things.

Since this is the day to make New Year’s resolutions here are mine:

That should do it, I reckon.

Spring 1837 (#ulink_86c43d93-2494-52bf-8b22-2a2c2422099e)

Buckingham Palace (#ulink_86c43d93-2494-52bf-8b22-2a2c2422099e)

Made it! What can one say about my new boss, our esteemed monarch, William one-vee? Well, to put it kindly, our dear King looks about a hundred years old and his eyes stick out like a frog’s. He has zillions of children by an actress called Mrs Jordan and none at all by his wife, the rather dotty Queen Adelaide. Setting an example to the lower orders indeed!

The heir to the throne of England is his niece, Princess Victoria, who lives with her pushy mama in Kensington Palace. Princess Victoria is exactly the same age as me and she keeps a diary. I think this is an omen.

Meanwhile down at the palace laundry I get to wash the king’s drawers. They are not a pretty sight. He has three hundred pairs of fine linen underpants with holes in the front so he doesn’t have to take all his clothes off when he goes for a piddle. The Queen has the same number of roomy drawers, trimmed with pintucks and lace.

As everybody knows, ladies’ drawers are not stitched together, otherwise we’d have to rummage about in an unseemly way under layers of petticoats every time nature called.

The head laundry maid told me that pants were named after a Christian martyr called Saint Pantalone. I have to take an interest in these things or I’d go mad.

Summer 1837 (#ulink_e059f582-bc1f-55a4-af04-e5d07b262d34)

Buckingham Palace (#ulink_e059f582-bc1f-55a4-af04-e5d07b262d34)

It’s been all go here. King William died on the 20th June, and now we have a new monarch. A mere slip of a girl (that’s a polite way of saying she’s short). She’s the same age as me but she’s ruling the country and I’m washing the sheets. There is no justice.

All the talk in the servants’ hall is who the young Queen will marry. To my mind she seems a little over-friendly with Lord Melbourne, her Prime Minister, in spite of the fact he’s as old as the hills. According to the underfootman, he’s had a lot to put up with in his life. His wife, Lady Caroline Lamb, was completely unhinged and got up to all kinds of wild things with a very naughty poet called Lord Byron. The under-footman was trying to demonstrate some of the wilder things to me, when the housekeeper came in. She was not convinced that we were only playing at being Lord Byron and Lady Lamb, thus demonstrating our loyalty to Lord Melbourne.

I have been told to watch my step. The underfootman is called Brian and he is very handsome.

28th June, 1838 (#ulink_e8eb3dfb-8760-5866-80be-afd9b08cf180)

Buckingham Palace (#ulink_e8eb3dfb-8760-5866-80be-afd9b08cf180)

What a day! The gun salutes started at 4am and no one’s had a wink of sleep since. Today the Queen was crowned in Westminster Abbey. It has been a wonderful day, the whole of the country has taken the young Queen to their hearts. Not surprising, considering what our last three kings were like. Sir Somebody Something described them as ‘an imbecile, a profligate and a buffoon’. I’ve asked around and apparently that means a madman, a ladies’ man, and a fool. Why don’t people say what they mean?

Apparently the Coronation didn’t go quite as smoothly as planned, and that’s probably because nobody planned it. Nobody understood the long, boring service and no-one noticed when the Archbishop turned over two pages at once.

All the Lords of the Realm had to go up to the Queen and kiss her hand. Lord Rolle, who is eighty-two and very frail, tottered up the altar steps, overbalanced with the weight of his robes, and fell over backwards. It’s a day he’ll not forget in a hurry!

A couple of the Lords started in on the champagne and cucumber sandwiches before the ceremony was over and were seen staggering about with their coronets over their noses and their stockings wrinkled round their ankles. One day, someone’s going to invent stockings that stay up, just you wait and see.

After the Coronation celebrations were over, the new Queen rushed up the stairs to her room in the Palace to give her little spaniel, Dash, a bath. There’s no telling how excitement takes people, is there? I think, if I’d just been crowned Queen, I’d be bathing in milk, swigging down the champers and inviting all my friends over to party, party, party.

Winter 1838 (#ulink_ee0e444e-029f-5fcb-9afe-93bad64ec4ec)

Buckingham Palace (#ulink_ee0e444e-029f-5fcb-9afe-93bad64ec4ec)

After all the excitement, life goes on. I don’t get to see much of Queen Vic, actually. She doesn’t visit the laundry and I’m not exactly invited to tea in the Grand Saloon. Most of what I know I get from QV’s Maids of the Bedchamber when they bring me the hampers of dirty linen to scrub. It’s the gossip – and Brian the underfootman – that keeps me going. Take this week for instance. QV is not having a good time.

She’s got a problem with her mother, the Duchess, who is plotting behind her daughter’s back to be the power behind the throne, along with her ‘financial adviser’ (ho ho) Sir John Conroy. QV has started a rumour that Sir John is having an affair with one of the Ladies in Waiting. So you can imagine the atmosphere at the dinner table.

She’s got a problem with her relations, who all turn out to be kings of Holland and Belgium and other such places, and all want favours from her while they fight with each other.

She’s got a problem with her weight. She’s getting distinctly plump and being so short, it shows. Her drawers are a size larger than they used to be. I should know. Lord M is trying to get her to take some exercise, but she says she won’t and queens don’t do what they don’t want to do. She may live to regret this.

She’s got an even bigger problem with Lord Melbourne. The thing is she’s so dependent on him. She thinks everybody at the Palace (apart from Lord M and her beloved Baroness Lehzen – her old governess) are deaf, stupid and vulgar bores. She may be right of course, but what’s going to happen to her when Lord M’s party gets voted out of office? I think she can see it coming and it’s making her sulky and lazy. Apparently she’s even given up brushing her teeth.

January 1839 (#ulink_83aecff3-3bd7-55b0-84d3-1b3f641e9b23)

Buckingham Palace (#ulink_83aecff3-3bd7-55b0-84d3-1b3f641e9b23)

What strange ideas some people have. The Queen’s doctor is mad about fresh air, but just opening the windows doesn’t seem to be enough for him, oh no! Dr. Clark wants to build a machine to pump air into Buckingham Palace because he thinks the corridors are clogged up with moisture from the trees in the back garden. He may be right – it is very stuffy here, especially in the laundry.

March 1839 (#ulink_c9072b97-f87e-51d0-a7d1-60b0cd279a40)

Buckingham Palace (#ulink_c9072b97-f87e-51d0-a7d1-60b0cd279a40)

Well, finally there’s a bit of life around the place. Some of QV’s cousins have come on a visit, and for the first time in ages QV has got people of her own age to be with. I think she’s rather taken with Prince Albert of Saxe Coburg, who is actually quite handsome (but not as handsome as Brian).

A Post Script to the Great Buckingham Palace Ventilation Debate. A friend of Dr Clark’s was due to come up with a new health and hygiene plan for the Palace, until someone read his latest book and realised that Dr Arnott was off with the fairies. Apparently he believes we could all live to be 300 years old if we breathed enough fresh air. I’d like to give it a try!

Spring 1839 (#ulink_87c4b928-8576-5653-bc7b-5c79d51584fd)

Buckingham Palace (#ulink_87c4b928-8576-5653-bc7b-5c79d51584fd)

Just as I thought. QV’s in a real tizzy about losing Lord Melbourne and she’s taken against the man who’s due to be the next Prime Minister. According to her, Robert Peel minces about, shuffles his feet and points his toes. But is this a hanging offence? Is it not possible to govern a country whilst pointing one’s toes?

The only bright side of it (as far as she’s concerned) is that all the fretting about his mincing has made her a little less porky, so I’ve got a busy week ahead of me taking tucks in her drawers.

Autumn 1839 (#ulink_9b036a01-7ebe-51e2-91c1-f895de23e8d0)

Buckingham Palace (#ulink_9b036a01-7ebe-51e2-91c1-f895de23e8d0)

Well, did I or did I not predict that QV had her eye on Prince Albert? He’d only been here five days when she started laughing too loudly, shaking her ringlets and generally going weak at the knees. He seems utterly taken with her, too (maybe she’s started brushing her teeth again). QV didn’t waste any time proposing to Albert, because that’s the way queens do things.

I mentioned this to Brian but he has not taken the hint.