Search results
- Widows held a unique position in Victorian society. While they were often seen as vulnerable and in need of protection, they were also expected to adhere to a strict code of behavior. There was a certain degree of reverence placed upon widows, particularly if they had lost their husbands in battle or to some sort of noble cause.
wechronicle.com/victorian-era/exploring-victorian-social-expectations-for-widows-mourning-periods-and-remarriage/Exploring Victorian Social Expectations for Widows: Mourning ...
People also ask
What was the role of a widow in Victorian times?
How did widowhood affect women in the Victorian era?
Who is a widowed woman in a Victorian novel?
Are Victorian widows Dangerous Women?
How was widowhood reflected in Victorian literature?
How did religion affect widowhood in Victorian era?
May 28, 2016 · The entire ensemble was colloquially known as “widow’s weeds” (from the Old English waed, meaning “garment”). Special caps and bonnets, usually in black or other dark colours, went with these ensembles. There was special mourning jewelry, often made of jet.
- Overview
- Widowhood of Victoria
After Albert’s death Victoria descended into deep depression—“those paroxysms of despair and yearning and longing and of daily, nightly longing to die…for the first three years never left me.” Even after climbing out of depression, she remained in mourning and in partial retirement. She balked at performing the ceremonial functions expected of the monarch and withdrew to Balmoral and Osborne four months out of every year, heedless of the inconvenience and strain this imposed on ministers. After an initial period of respect and sympathy for the queen’s grief, the public grew increasingly impatient with its absent sovereign. No one, however, could budge the stubborn Victoria.
Although Victoria resisted carrying out her ceremonial duties, she remained determined to retain an effective political role in the period after Albert’s death and to behave as he would have ordained. Her testing point was, then, her “dear one’s” point of view; and this she had known at a particular and thereafter not necessarily relevant period in British political life. Her training and his influence were ill-suited to the “swing of the pendulum” politics that better party organization and a wider electorate enjoined after the Reform Bill of 1867. And since she blamed her son and heir for Albert’s death—the prince consort had come back ill from Cambridge, where he had gone to see the prince of Wales regarding an indiscretion the young prince had committed in Ireland—she did not hesitate to vent her loneliness upon him or to refuse him all responsibility. “It quite irritates me to see him in the room,” she startled Lord Clarendon by saying. The breach was never really healed, and as time went on the queen was clearly envious of the popularity of the prince and princess of Wales. She liked to be, but she took little trouble to see that she was, popular.
It was despite, yet because of, Albert that Victoria succumbed to Benjamin Disraeli and thus made herself a partisan in the most famous political rivalry of the 19th century. Albert had thought Disraeli insufficiently a gentleman and remembered his bitter attacks on Peel over the repeal of the Corn Laws in 1846; the prince, on the other hand, had approved of Gladstone, Disraeli’s political rival. Yet Disraeli was able to enter into the queen’s grief, flatter her, restore her self-confidence, and make the lonely crown an easier burden. Behind all his calculated attacks on her affections there was a bond of mutual loneliness, a note of mystery and romanticism, and, besides, the return to good gossip. Disraeli, moreover, told the queen in 1868 that it would be “his delight and duty, to render the transaction of affairs as easy to your Majesty, as possible.” Since the queen was only too ready to consider herself overworked, this approach was especially successful. Gladstone, on the other hand, would never acknowledge that she was, as she put it, “dead beat,” perhaps because he never was himself; Disraeli, however, tired easily. The contrast between Disraeli’s gay, often malicious, gossipy letters and Gladstone’s 40 sides of foolscap is obvious. And there was no Albert to give her a neat précis. Gladstone, moreover, held the throne as an institution in such awe that it affected his relations with its essentially feminine occupant. His “feeling” for the crown, said Lady Ponsonby, was “always snubbed.” The queen had no patience with Gladstone’s moralistic (and, she believed, hypocritical) approach to politics and foreign affairs. His persistent and often tactless attempts to persuade her to resume her ceremonial duties especially enraged her.
Over the problem of Ireland their paths separated ever more widely. Whereas “to pacify Ireland” had become the “mission” of Gladstone’s life, the queen (like the majority of her subjects) had little understanding of, or sympathy for, Irish grievances. She disliked disorder and regarded the suggestion of Irish Home Rule as sheer disloyalty. The proposal of an Irish “Balmoral” was repugnant to her, especially when it was suggested that the prince of Wales might go in her place. To avoid the Irish Sea, she claimed to be a bad sailor; yet she was willing in her later years to cross the English Channel almost every year. In all, she made but four visits to Ireland, the last in 1900 being provoked by her appreciation of the gallantry of the Irish regiments in the South African War.
The news of Gladstone’s defeat in 1874 delighted the queen. “What an important turn the elections have taken,” she wrote.
It shows that the country is not Radical. What a triumph, too, Mr. Disraeli has obtained and what a good sign this large Conservative majority is of the state of the country, which really required (as formerly) a strong Conservative party!
After Albert’s death Victoria descended into deep depression—“those paroxysms of despair and yearning and longing and of daily, nightly longing to die…for the first three years never left me.” Even after climbing out of depression, she remained in mourning and in partial retirement. She balked at performing the ceremonial functions expected of the monarch and withdrew to Balmoral and Osborne four months out of every year, heedless of the inconvenience and strain this imposed on ministers. After an initial period of respect and sympathy for the queen’s grief, the public grew increasingly impatient with its absent sovereign. No one, however, could budge the stubborn Victoria.
Although Victoria resisted carrying out her ceremonial duties, she remained determined to retain an effective political role in the period after Albert’s death and to behave as he would have ordained. Her testing point was, then, her “dear one’s” point of view; and this she had known at a particular and thereafter not necessarily relevant period in British political life. Her training and his influence were ill-suited to the “swing of the pendulum” politics that better party organization and a wider electorate enjoined after the Reform Bill of 1867. And since she blamed her son and heir for Albert’s death—the prince consort had come back ill from Cambridge, where he had gone to see the prince of Wales regarding an indiscretion the young prince had committed in Ireland—she did not hesitate to vent her loneliness upon him or to refuse him all responsibility. “It quite irritates me to see him in the room,” she startled Lord Clarendon by saying. The breach was never really healed, and as time went on the queen was clearly envious of the popularity of the prince and princess of Wales. She liked to be, but she took little trouble to see that she was, popular.
It was despite, yet because of, Albert that Victoria succumbed to Benjamin Disraeli and thus made herself a partisan in the most famous political rivalry of the 19th century. Albert had thought Disraeli insufficiently a gentleman and remembered his bitter attacks on Peel over the repeal of the Corn Laws in 1846; the prince, on the other hand, had approved of Gladstone, Disraeli’s political rival. Yet Disraeli was able to enter into the queen’s grief, flatter her, restore her self-confidence, and make the lonely crown an easier burden. Behind all his calculated attacks on her affections there was a bond of mutual loneliness, a note of mystery and romanticism, and, besides, the return to good gossip. Disraeli, moreover, told the queen in 1868 that it would be “his delight and duty, to render the transaction of affairs as easy to your Majesty, as possible.” Since the queen was only too ready to consider herself overworked, this approach was especially successful. Gladstone, on the other hand, would never acknowledge that she was, as she put it, “dead beat,” perhaps because he never was himself; Disraeli, however, tired easily. The contrast between Disraeli’s gay, often malicious, gossipy letters and Gladstone’s 40 sides of foolscap is obvious. And there was no Albert to give her a neat précis. Gladstone, moreover, held the throne as an institution in such awe that it affected his relations with its essentially feminine occupant. His “feeling” for the crown, said Lady Ponsonby, was “always snubbed.” The queen had no patience with Gladstone’s moralistic (and, she believed, hypocritical) approach to politics and foreign affairs. His persistent and often tactless attempts to persuade her to resume her ceremonial duties especially enraged her.
Over the problem of Ireland their paths separated ever more widely. Whereas “to pacify Ireland” had become the “mission” of Gladstone’s life, the queen (like the majority of her subjects) had little understanding of, or sympathy for, Irish grievances. She disliked disorder and regarded the suggestion of Irish Home Rule as sheer disloyalty. The proposal of an Irish “Balmoral” was repugnant to her, especially when it was suggested that the prince of Wales might go in her place. To avoid the Irish Sea, she claimed to be a bad sailor; yet she was willing in her later years to cross the English Channel almost every year. In all, she made but four visits to Ireland, the last in 1900 being provoked by her appreciation of the gallantry of the Irish regiments in the South African War.
The news of Gladstone’s defeat in 1874 delighted the queen. “What an important turn the elections have taken,” she wrote.
It shows that the country is not Radical. What a triumph, too, Mr. Disraeli has obtained and what a good sign this large Conservative majority is of the state of the country, which really required (as formerly) a strong Conservative party!
Widowhood in the early Victorian times was often seen as an end of marriage, a devastating experience on women whose central role was to be a dutiful wife and guardian of the family. The status of widows in the Victorian period was greater than that of a spinster but less than that of a wife.
Oct 25, 2016 · If you’d like to know more about war widows in the Victorian period, why not take a look at our Library, where you’ll find links to newspaper articles, paintings, autobiographies, and other sources from this period.
The mourning period for widows was a significant aspect of Victorian culture. Depending on their relationship to their deceased husband and their social standing, the length of time that widows were expected to mourn varied.
Mar 1, 2023 · Widows were more financially and socially independent than either married or unmarried women; they were single and respectable but also sexually experienced – and Victorian society couldn’t make its peace with a woman being all of these things.
Feb 9, 2022 · One of the most fascinating photographs to illustrate this, through Victoria’s use of jewellery to emphasize her legacy as queen, wife, widow, and mother, is Gunn & Stuart’s official portrait, taken by royal command at Buckingham Palace in the sixtieth year of her reign (Fig. 4).
