Title: Queen Victoria: the day the people vented their fury
Headings: Queen Victoria: the day the people vented their fury
Queen Victoria: the day the people vented their fury
Content: It is hard to think of a greater disgrace that could be levelled then at an unmarried, aristocratic woman and her family. As to why Flora's reputation should be so eagerly tossed aside, one must consider the rancour that existed between the Queen and her mother, the Duchess. Victoria's early court was a febrile, factionalised place, and Flora was caught in the middle of it. An accomplished linguist and poet, she also possessed a sharp wit, with Baroness Lehzen at times the target. Her portraits show an attractive, slender girl, with large eyes, a wide forehead, long neck and dark hair, yet Melbourne called her the ugliest woman he had ever seen, and to Victoria, she was "that nasty woman". In addition, Queen and court ardently supported the Whig government, to the extent, wrote a contemporary observer, "that a Conservative cat was not permitted to mew in the precincts of the Palace". The Hastings family were Tories. Two weeks after first attending Flora, Clark went to see her to inform her that, because of her appearance, the Queen's ladies were convinced that she must be "privately married, or at least ought to be so". He exhorted her to confess. On Flora's emphatic denial, Clark told her that the only way to satisfy the ladies of her innocence was to submit to a medical examination, a suggestion that Flora's horrified mother called "this most revolting proposal".