ABSTRACT
In October of 1864, nearly three years after the death of Prince Albert, Royal Physician Dr. William Jenner suggested that in order for Queen Victoria to emerge from the deep, reclusive mourning that was interfering with her public duties, she needed exercise and fresh air. Her daughter, Princess Alice, remembered that “[t]he Queen … had always enjoyed the pony cart rides at Balmoral.”1 It was decided, therefore, that along with the Queen’s favorite pony, Lochnagar, the groom John Brown be brought from the Scottish estate to Osborne to escort the Queen on horseback, in hopes that the diversion would remind her of the “‘happier times’” she had spent with her husband in the Highlands during his lifetime.2 Thus began an intimate and lasting friendship between Queen and servant that was to create a royal scandal.
