“Married the Princess Maud to Prince Charles of Denmark. The brightest of the Princesses, and almost as young as when I confirmed her. He is a tall, gallant-looking sailor. Hope he will make her happy. The Chapel and old conservatory ineffectually disguised by church furniture—all well arranged, and the banquet also. The whole very royally done. The group of great peers of the Queen’s Household afterwards was striking, as were the greater peers also in Chapel, and Mr. Gladstone decidedly ageing and paling, though they say he is well. The Queen was the wonderful sight—so vigorous. In the Bow Room afterwards, where fifty Royalties signed the book, she called me to her, and I knelt and kissed her hand, and she talked very spiritedly a few minutes. As soon as it was over an Indian servant wheeled in her chair to take her out; she instantly waved it back. ‘Behind the door,’ she said, and walked all across the room with her stick most gallantly.”
The month of May was naturally a very busy one for the King and Queen. On the 22nd their Majesties, representing Queen Victoria, opened the new Blackwall tunnel in State, the East End of London giving them a right Royal reception. On this occasion His Majesty was presented with one of the heaviest gold medals ever struck in England, weighing 12 ounces, and bearing on the reverse a representation of the tunnel in perspective. On the 26th His Majesty opened the new Medical School of Guy’s Hospital; on the 27th the King and Queen, with their son and two of their daughters, opened the Royal Military Tournament; on the 28th, at the request of Queen Victoria, the King and Queen, accompanied by Princess Victoria, laid the first stone of the Royal London Ophthalmic Hospital in the City Road; on the 29th the King and Queen, with their son and two of their daughters, went down to Canterbury to open the restored Chapter-house of the Cathedral, and in the evening the King dined with the past and present officers of the Norfolk Artillery Militia, of which he is honorary colonel. On the 31st the King held a levée at St. James’s Palace, and in the evening dined with the 1st Guards Club.
The King in the Undress Uniform of an Admiral of the Fleet
From a Photograph taken in 1897 by Mullins, Ryde
This is a short summary, which does not pretend to be by any means exhaustive of His Majesty’s engagements for a very few days, but it brings out perhaps more vividly than a detailed list could possibly do the whole-hearted manner in which the King threw himself into the great tide of national rejoicing which reached its flood in that memorable June of 1897.
King Edward, for a variety of reasons, took a much greater part in the Diamond Jubilee festivities of 1897 than he did in those of ten years before. All the arrangements were submitted for his approval as well as Queen Victoria’s, and it was largely owing to his conspicuous organising ability that everything went off with such triumphant success. Both the King and Queen Alexandra associated themselves in a special manner with the occasion, the former by his Hospital Fund for London, and the latter by her thoughtful scheme of providing one good dinner for the very poorest. The Hospital Fund greatly benefited by the sale of a special stamp, the design of which was selected by the King himself.
King Edward, who had been made an honorary Admiral of the Fleet at the Golden Jubilee of 1887, represented his mother at the magnificent naval review at Spithead, which was generally agreed to be, in its way, the finest spectacle of all that the Jubilee festivities afforded. Many foreign warships were sent by other countries as tokens of international courtesy. Towards the officers of these vessels the King displayed all his wonted cordiality; and in the arrangements for their entertainment his efforts were heartily seconded by Viscount Goschen, then First Lord of the Admiralty, and the other naval authorities. The spectacle of so vast a concourse of British vessels was rendered doubly impressive by the knowledge that it had been assembled without weakening in the slightest degree the squadrons on the numerous British naval stations all over the world. There was much point in the remark said to have been made by the United States Special Ambassador to the First Lord: “I guess, sir, this makes for peace!”
On the eventful morning of the 22nd June, when the Jubilee honours were announced, it was found that Queen Victoria, while conferring some mark of her favour on each of her sons, had created a new and special dignity for the Heir-Apparent. The announcement was made in the following terms:—
“The Queen has been graciously pleased, on the occasion of Her Majesty’s Diamond Jubilee, to appoint Field-Marshal His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, K.G., G.C.B., to be Great Master and Principal Knight Grand Cross of the Most Honourable Order of the Bath.”