Lady Hawkins Was a Cook.
The widowed Princess Alexander of Battenberg, whose husband at one time ruled over Bulgaria, may likewise be said to have sprung from the kitchen, her father having been the valet and her mother the cook of the old Austrian General de Martini. Yet in spite of this parentage, Princess Alexander is treated as a sister-in-law by the similarly widowed Princess Henry of Battenberg, who is a daughter of Queen Victoria. The late queen showed great kindness and consideration toward Princess Alexander of Battenberg, acknowledging her as a kinswoman.
The second wife of the late Lord Bramwell had originally been his cook, while Lady Hawkins, who is the better half of the eminent English judge of that name, and the aunt by marriage of “Anthony Hope,” the novelist, was originally a housemaid, as was also the widow of the “Grand Old Man” of Australia, Sir Henry Parkes.
King Joachim of Naples, from whom the entire princely house of Murat is descended, began life at the close of the last century as a mere stable-boy, while the first Prince Kutusoff, founder of the grand Russian family of that name, achieved his greatness a hundred years ago by the skill which he displayed as the valet and barber to Czar Paul, a monarch whose own great-grandmother, Empress Catherine, was the chambermaid of a village inn, where she first attracted the attention of Peter the Great, who ultimately married her.