Royal sisters: the tragic lives of Queen Victoria's granddaughters

Welcome to the History Extra podcast, fascinating historical conversations from the makers of BBC History magazine. Alex of Hess has gone down in history as the doomed wife of Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, a woman who placed too much trust in a mystic called Rasputin as political tumult brewed in the country. and was then murdered in a basement by revolutionaries in 1918, along with her husband and children. But how did Alex, a favoured granddaughter of Queen Victoria, come to be in Russia at all? Well, to understand her life, we can turn to the story of the four Hesse sisters Victoria, Ella, Irene, and Alex.

Francis Welch joined us on the podcast recently to share more about these four royal women's lives and marriages and what they can reveal about the maelstrom of early 20th century Europe. Francis was speaking to Ellen Evans. So I hoped we could start by acknowledging that these sisters led lives that were both immensely privileged, but also touched by intense tragedy. They were caught up in a story of huge importance and geopolitical impact in the late 19th and early 20th century. So I hoped you could start this episode for us by situating us in this royal story with a figure that hopefully a lot of listeners would be familiar with, Queen Victoria.

So if we start with her, where are these princesses in that story? Queen Victoria was the four girls' grandmama. Grosse mamma, as they called her, and she became incredibly important to them because their mother, Princess Alice, died when she was thirty-five of diphtheria, leaving the girls orphaned, at which point the Queen decided to take over their lives completely, dictating what they read, what they wore, sort of how they spent their money. I mean, patterns for dresses were even sent to her. And as the girls grew older, Queen Victoria then felt, well, I do need to get them married.

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