From Queen Victoria to the Crown Princess of Prussia – 27 January 1872

Osborne, 27 January 1872

Let me begin by wishing you warmly joy of this dear day, your dear eldest child’s birthday and his first entering his teens as they used to call it here. May God bless and protect him and fit him for his fearfully difficult position. May he grow up good, honest, straightforward, humble and simple-minded – and religious without which no one can be happy and no one can really be successful in what he undertakes in this world! I chose the shell links in recollection of Osborne. Unfortunately, the last fortnight’s recollections of Osborne and the last summer are most painful for me – for I did feel so ill. I am very grateful that I am as well as I am now – though I am not strong – and often have rheumatic pains – but nothing thank God! to prevent my walking or going out in all weathers.¹

1. Roger Fulford – Darling Child, Private Correspondence of Queen Victoria and the German Crown Princess 1871 – 1878