Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught
Prince Arthur William Patrick Albert was born 8:20 am 1st May 1850. The seventh child and third son of Queen Victoria. By all accounts he was her favourite son.
Prince Arthur was a career soldier and rose in rank, being promoted in 1902 to the rank of Field Marshal.
He entered the Royal Military College, Woolwich, in 1866 and started his career as a lieutenant in the Royal Engineers. He spent a year with his regiment in Montreal, and served on the Red River expedition of 1870 - early connections with the country he was to return to as Governor-General.
After serving with the Rifle Brigade at Tell-el-Kebir in 1882, he served in India, Ireland, the Mediterranean and South Africa.
It is reported that he was bitterly disappointed not to succeed the Duke of Cambridge as Commander-in-Chief in 1895.
Named Duke of Connaught in 1874 (or more precicely, the 1st Duke of Connaught and Strathern), he married the shy Princess Louise, daughter of Prince Frederick of Prussia, in 1879. They had two daughters and one son.
In 1905 their elder
daughter, Margaret, married into the Swedish Royal family and became Crown
Princess Mararet, wife of King Gustav VI of Sweden.
Their younger daughter, Princess Patricia, is well known to Canadians
as Lady Patricia Ramsey, and gave her name to a famous Canadian army regiment,
Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry. Lady Patricia lived locally
and worshipped at St Anne's Church until her death in 1974. A memorial
plaque to Lady Patricia was unveiled by Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth the
Queen Mother, in St Anne's Church, Bagshot, on 25 March 1990.
Their son, also Prince Arthur of Connaught, died four years before his father and so never inherited the title, which passed to his son Alistair Arthur, 2nd Duke of Connaught. He was was Duke for only a very short while, dying in 1943 at the age of 29 without any successors.
The Duke's personal banner bearing his coat of arms which hung over
his stall as a Knight of the Garter in St George's Chapel, Windsor, until
his death in 1942.
The Duke served as Govenor General of Canada from 1911 to 1916, he performed many civic duties, he clearly had a great affinity for the country and was very popular.
Many Canadian places and institutions were named after him, including Prince Arthur's Landing, formerly Port Arthur and now Thnder Bay; and The British Columbia Regiment (Duke of Connaught's Own).
It is not just Canadian places that are named after him. The following are just a few select examples:
- several Indian Army units bear his title, including the 129th Duke of Connaught's Own Baluchis, a unit from whose ranks came the first Indian citizen to be awarded the Victoria Cross.
- at least one British army unit: the 6th Hampshire Regiment (TA) (Duke of Connaught's Own) Battn (Portsmouth).
- street names, such as Connaught Place, Edinburgh. (Though some may also have been named after Connaught in Ireland)
- New Delhi's original shopping arcade
- a G.W.R. locomotive built in 1897 and which achieved an average speed of 71½ m.p.h. from Bristol to London in 1903.
It is reported that the Duke was heavily involved in German affairs. This would not be too surprising as his father (Prince Albert of Coburg), his maternal grandmother and his wife were all German. One might speculate that the reason for an eminent Field Marshal being posted to Canada in 1911 may have been to distance him from the military aspects of a deteriorating German situation.
The Duke was a freemason. He became Grand Master in 1901 when his brother, who had held that post for the previous 27 years, acceded to the Throne as King Edward VII. The Duke served as Grand Master to his death in 1942.
"Up The Dukes!"
The
British Columbia Regiment
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E-mail: history@bcregiment.com