Morbid Fact Du Jour For October 22, 2011
Today’s Dignified Yet Truly Morbid Fact!
The procession of English and Scottish kings and queens offers up few examples of dignified death and burial. Perhaps this is because medieval kings frequently met violent ends – by torture, murder, death in battle or execution; or when they did die natural deaths, lurid descriptions of their terminal agonies have come down to us. In such a pageant of ignominy and commonplace, the paradigm for a noble death was given by a queen who conspired to die in the manner in which she had endeavoured to live. Queen Victoria (1819-1901) died with regal dignity, going down “like a great three-decker ship”.
Victoria died at Osborne House on the Isle of Wight, surrounded by many members of her large family – including her son Bertie, later king Edward VII, and her grandson the German kaiser. The queen lapsed in and out of consciousness but retained her mental functions to the last. When awake she would ask to have her Pomeranian, Turi, up on the bed beside her. Her children would come and go and at each visit would announce themselves to Victoria, who had long since been virtually blind. Finally the kaiser’s presence was revealed: “Your Majesty, your grandson is here; he has come to see you as you are so ill.” The queen smiled and understood. To everyone’s relief the kaiser behaved impeccably. Sinking by slow degrees, Victoria seemed free of pain, her expression calm and dignified “like that of an old Roman”. She would apologize for the trouble she was causing and would address the dressers as “my poor girls”.
At about 6:30 p.m. on January 22nd the family were summoned for a final time by Sir James Reid, the royal physician. The queen was supported in bed by Reid on the one said and the kaiser on the other. Victoria turned her eyes and gazed at The Entombment of Christ, hanging over the fireplace. And thus she died.
Culled from: Death: A History Of Man’s Obsessions and Fears by Robert Wilkins
