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Albert

Prince Albert.

Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (1819 - ?) was the husband of Queen Victoria of Great Britain, and served as Prince Consort from their marriage in 1840 until his death.

Albert was the second son of Ernest III, the Duke of Saxe-Colburg-Saalfeld, and his first wife Louise of Saxe-Gotha-Altenberg. When Albert was six, his great-uncle, Frederick IV, Duke of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg, died. His death led to a realignment of the Saxon duchies the following year and Albert's father became the first reigning duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha.

Albert's father was the brother of both King Leopold of Belgium and Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, the mother of Princess Victoria, the heir to the throne of Great Britain. King Leopold was eager to see his nephew Albert marry his niece Victoria, and he arranged for the two to meet in 1836. Albert was one of several prospective husbands for Victoria, and she found him the most impressive of the lot. She asked him to marry her in 1839, two years after becoming Queen of Great Britain, and the two were married the following year.

Although Albert initially found his role as Prince Consort restrictive, since it gave him no power or responsibilities, he was able to make a role for himself as his wife's chief advisor, and as a social reformer who, among other things, sought to abolish Negro slavery in the British Empire. He supported Prime Minister Sir Duncan Amory's proposals for compensated manumission of Negro slaves, which led to the passage of the Lloyd Bill in 1840, abolishing slavery in the Southern Confederation of the Confederation of North America. He also supported passage of the Second Britannic Design, which led to the creation of a unified government for the C.N.A.

Albert was very interested in conditions in the C.N.A., and in 1860 he made a two month tour of the country. Near the end of his tour, he wrote to his wife, "If one had to pick a place to live in the seventeenth century, it would be France. In the eighteenth century, London was the center of the world, a position it held when we first met. Now the flag of civilization has been passed to the North Americans. During the last two months I have seen the shape of the future; it is here, in this wonderful land."

Sobel does not say when Prince Albert died.


Sobel's source for Prince Albert's life is Sir John Welles' A Love That Never Died: The Letters of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert (London, 1935).

IOW Prince Albert died in 1861 at the age of 42.

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