Albert, Prince 1819-61
Prince consort to Queen Victoria of Great Britain

Born at Schloss Rosenau, near Coburg, he was the younger son of the Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and Louisa, daughter of the Duke of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg. Studious and earnest by nature, he was educated in Brussels and Bonn, and in 1840 married his first cousin, Queen Victoria - a marriage that became a lifelong love-match. He was given the title Prince Consort (1857) and throughout their marriage he was, in effect, the Queen's private secretary. Ministerial distrust and public mis-givings because of his German connections limited his political influence, although his advice was usually judicious and far-sighted. He was interested in the encouragement of the arts and the promotion of social and industrial reforms. He designed Osborne House on the Isle of Wight, was a patron of Franz Winterhalter and Sir Edwin Landseer, and he planned and managed the Great Exhibition of 1851, whose profits enabled the building of museum sites in South Kensington (including the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Science Museum, and the Natural History Museum) and the Royal Albert Hall (1871). His death, possibly from cancer rather than typhoid, led to a long period of seclusion by his widow. The Albert Memorial in Kensington Gardens, designed by Sir George Gilbert Scott, was erected in his memory (1871).

Bibliography: Daphne Bennet, King Without a Crown: Albert Prince Consort of England 1819-1861 (1977)