Almost as much as for the death of her children, the Queen mourned the loss of the gallant General Gordon at Khartoum early in 1885. She wrote from Osborne to Miss Gordon in February of that year:—
Dear Miss Gordon,—How shall I write to you, or how shall I attempt to express what I feel! To think of your dear, noble, heroic brother, who served his country and his Queen so truly, so heroically, with a self-sacrifice so edifying to the world, not having been rescued. That the promises of support were not fulfilled—which I so frequently and constantly pressed on those who asked him to go—is to me grief inexpressible! indeed, it has made me ill! My heart bleeds for you, his sister.... Some day I hope to see you again, to tell you all I cannot express.... Would you express to your other sisters and your elder brother my true sympathy, and what I do so keenly feel, the stain left upon England for your dear brother’s cruel, though heroic fate! Ever, dear Miss Gordon, yours sincerely and sympathizingly.
V. R. I.
A few weeks later, Miss Gordon presented her brother’s Bible (which he had constantly carried with him) to the Queen, and again Her Majesty wrote a letter, vivid with her grief and shame and high appreciation of the hero whose life had been sacrificed. This second letter was left by Miss Gordon to the nation, and may now be seen, one of the most interesting of the collection of royal autographs, in the British Museum. The well-worn Bible now lies open in an enamel and crystal case, called the St. George’s Casket, in the south corridor of the private apartments at Windsor.
The death of her dearly loved eldest son-in-law in 1888 was a real heart-sorrow to the Queen. Those who saw the Jubilee procession in 1887 retain a vivid recollection that among all that splendid retinue there was no figure more noble and impressive than that of the Prince Imperial of Germany. His tall figure, martial bearing, and bronzed, manly face, set off by the white uniform he wore, made him conspicuous among the crowds of Princes and notabilities. But a cruel disease had already laid hold of him, and almost exactly a year after his apparently magnificent physique had attracted universal admiration in the crowds collected for the Jubilee, he was gathered to his fathers, and his son, our Queen’s eldest grandson, William II, reigned in his stead. The Emperor Frederick reigned for three months only; his aged father, the Emperor William I., having died in March, 1888. Many noble hopes and ambitions died with the Emperor Frederick. He had been one of the chief authors of the unity of Germany, and was the constant representative in German politics of the principle of constitutional liberty. When he took his bride from England, on a bitter winter’s day in 1858, the little Princess cried bitterly at parting from her parents and her native country. Her tears were misinterpreted by the crowd, from whom a shout proceeded, “If he doesn’t treat you well, come back to us.” The implied distrust of the Prince was wholly uncalled for; he adored his wife, and those two shared the burdens and hopes and responsibilities of their position in a way that any husband and wife might envy. It had been from first to last a marriage of true minds.
The death of the Duke of Clarence, the eldest son of the Prince and Princess of Wales, and heir to the throne in the second generation, on January 14th, 1892, was another heavy blow to the Royal House. The Duke had only lately become engaged to the Princess Victoria Mary of Teck, when all the preparations for the wedding were ended by the death of the bridegroom-elect. Influenza, followed by acute pneumonia, was the cause. The whole nation mourned with and for the Queen. The tragic circumstances of the unexpected transition from wedding to funeral, from the throne to the bier, called forth a genuine expression of deep feeling from all classes. But just as a discord sometimes serves to prepare the ear for the full sweetness of a harmony, so in this case one of the most touching expressions of sympathy was called for by the refusal of some boorish members of the Miners’ Federation at Stoke to pass a vote of condolence to the Queen on the death of her grandson and heir. There were women in the immediate neighborhood, widows of men who had perished in the Oaks Colliery explosion, twenty-six years earlier. They retained a lively recollection of the Queen’s sympathy with them in their bitter grief, and the aid she had given to the fund for their relief; and to think that any men connected with coal mining should now refuse to express sympathy with the Queen, was enough, they felt, to make the very stones cry out. Little accustomed as these poor women were to address letters to great personages, they sent the following to Her Majesty:—
“To our beloved Queen, Victoria.
“Dear Lady,—We, the surviving widows and mothers of some of the men and boys who lost their lives by the explosion which occurred in the Oaks Colliery, near Barnsley, in December, 1866, desire to tell your Majesty how stunned we all feel by the cruel and unexpected blow which has taken Prince Eddie from his dear grandmother, his loving parents, his beloved intended, and an admiring nation. The sad news affected us deeply, we all believing that his youthful strength would carry him safely through the danger. Dear Lady, we feel more than we can express. To tell you that we sincerely condole with your Majesty and the Prince and Princess of Wales in your and their sad bereavement and great distress is not to tell you all we feel; but the widow of Albert the Good and the parents of Prince Eddie will understand what we feel when we say that we feel all that widows and mothers feel who have lost those who were as dear as life to them. Dear Lady, we remember with gratitude all that you did for us Oaks widows in the time of our great trouble, and we cannot forget you in yours. We have not forgotten that it was you, dear Queen, who set the example, so promptly followed by all feeling people, of forming a fund for the relief of our distress,—a fund which kept us out of the workhouse at the time, and has kept us out ever since. Dear Lady, we cannot make you understand how grieved we all are to learn that a miner, and that miner a Barnsley miner, though, happily, not a native of Barnsley, should have forgotten not only all that you have done for the widows and orphans of miners, but also for the suffering, the afflicted and desolate of every other class of workers in England, and that he should have shown himself so devoid of all human feeling as to refuse, and lead others to refuse, your Majesty and poor Eddie’s parents one kind word of sympathy in your and their great sorrow. We feel ashamed of that man, for he has covered us all with disgrace, and filled our hearts with pain. We hope he may live to feel ashamed of himself, and to know what it is to be refused any sympathy in any great trouble he may have. We wish it were in our power, dear Lady, to dry up your tears and comfort you, but that we cannot do. But what we can do, and will do, is to pray God, in His mercy and goodness, to comfort and strengthen you in this your time of great trouble. Wishing your Majesty, the Prince and Princess of Wales, and the Princess May, so cruelly bereaved and utterly disconsolate, all the strength, consolation, and comfort which God alone can give, and which He never fails to give to all who seek Him in truth and sincerity, we remain, beloved Queen, your loving and grateful though sorrowing subjects, The Oaks Widows.” (Signed on behalf of the widows by Sarah Bradley, one of them.)
“Poor Eddie! to die so young, and so much happiness in prospect. Oh! ’tis hard.”
The secretary to the fund, Mr. G. W. Atkinson, of Barnsley, having been requested to forward the letter to Her Majesty, accompanied it with a note to Her Majesty’s private secretary, in which he stated that “the poor people seemed greatly troubled at the misfortune which had befallen the Royal Family of England.”