THE MARQUESS OF CAMBRIDGE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20282, 15 December 1927, Page 15

THE MARQUESS OF CAMBRIDGE

QUEEN’S ELDEST BROTHER. SUDDEN DEATH AFTER OPERATION. FUNERAL CEREMONY AT WINDSOR. (From Odr Own Correspondent.) LONDON, November 2. Much sympathy has been expressed for the Queen who has, with tragic suddenness, lost her eldest brother, the Marquess of Cambridge. Following a very critical operation one morning in the Salop Nursing Institution, the Marquess died the same afternoon in tho presence of the Marchioness and other members of his family. He had not been well for some time. The oldest son of the late Duke and Duchess of Teck, he was formerly known as Prince Adolphus, and was often spoken of as “Prince Dolly,” especially by his mother. In 1900 ho succeeded to his fatk.r’s title of Prince and Duke of Teck, and 11 years later was granted the style of “Highness.” During the Great War, at the King’s request, he relinquished that designation for himself, and those who came after him, and also the titles and designations of “ Prince,” “ Duke of Teck,” and “ of Teck,” and assumed by royal license the surname of Cambridge. This was in July, 1917, and he was at the same time created Marquess of Cambridge. Earl of Eltham, and Viscount Northallerton. The Marquess of Cambridge chose one of the fighting services as his profession. He entered the array before he was 20, and served with distinction both in the South African war and the Great War. Unhappily, his health broke down after he had taken part in the first Ypres engagement, and served for' some time in the trenches, and it again gave way when he returned to the western front for duty at Genfcral Headquarters, so that he was compelled, much against his will, to retire from active service in the summer of 1916. As Prince Adolphus of Teck he was educated at Wellington College, and in due course went to the Royal Military College, Sandhurst. He obtained a commission in the 17th Lancers in April, 1888. Ho served at various heme stations with tho .Lancers, and was promoted lieutenant in 1893. In the following year he married Lady Margaret Evelyn Grosvenor, daughter of the first Duke of Westminster, and two years later he was transferred to the Ist Life Guards as captain, being shortly afterwards created a K.C.V.O. by Queen Victoria. He is survived by the Marchioness and their four children—George Frederick Hugh, the Earl of Eltham; Lady Yictona Constance Mary, who is married- to the Duke of Beaufort; Lady Helen Frances Augusta, who is the wife of Lieutenantcolonel J. E. Gibbii, M.C., of the Goldstream Guards; and Lord Frederick Charles Edward Cambridge, born in 1907. The Earl of Eltham was born in October, 1805, hnd was formerly a lieutenant in the Ist Life Guards. Ho now holds a commission in the Shropshire Yeomanry. He married in 1923 Dorothy, daughter of the Hon. Osmond Hastings, of Longrood", Bilton, Rugby, and has a daughter. A QUIET LIFE. The Marquess of Cambridge was made a K.C.V.O. in 1897, a G.0.V.0. in 1901, a C.M.G. in 1909, and a G.C.B. in 1911. Ho also had the Grand Cross of the Star of Rumania and the Grand Cordon of Leopold of Belgium and the Croix de Guerre of Belgium, and was a Commander of the_ Legion of Honour of Franck, and a Knight of Justice of St. John of Jerusalem. He was a deputy lieutenant and magistrate for Shropshire, among the people of which he ha- made himself very popular since he went to reside at Shotton Hall. A large part of the money for the new women's and children’s wing of tho Royal Salop Infirmary was raised by a public subscription organised by the four great hospitals of Salop, under the leadership of the Marquess. In Shropshire, where he spent the greater part of the year, the Marquess fulfilled the duties and responsibilities of a country gentleman. He put himself at the head of the British Legion and the Boy Scouts in that part of the country, and interested himself in the social efforts that were made, in the form of public pageants and other ways, to provide funds for good purposes. He also interested himself in Red Cross work, and was a Knight of Justice of St. John of Jerusalem. Lord Cambridge loved the quiet, secluded life he had lived since leaving the army. When it was stated some time ago that he was to be asked to become King of Hungary he treated the suggestion as a matter for amusement. “Don’t you think ,1 would make a nice-looking King?” he smilingly asked, and he made it quite clear that nothing would induce him to leave his delightful English home in order to ascend a foreign throne. He always wqlked three miles to the village church (in' Sunday morning. A KNIFE AND PROMISE OF A •v , SWORD. On his ninth birthday a pretty interchange of letters occurred between the young prince and Lord Beaconsfield. The Earl wrote: — 2 Whitehall Gardens, August 13, 1877. My Bear Little Prince, —As this is your birthday, I send you a knife, because at your age that was the kind of thing I liked to have. When you arc a man I will send you a sword. — Your friend, Beaconsfield. To this characteristic epistle the princo replied:— Kensington Palace, August 17,1877. Dear Lord 1 Beaconsfield, —I tll9.uk you very much for tho beautiful knife you sent mo,, as well as for your nice letter. It was very kind of you to remember my birthday. I only wish I could bo sure of keeping the knife ever as a remembrance of you. You are very good to promise mo a sword when I am a man, and I can promise you in return I will try not to disgrace _ tho giver, but use it like a trim Briton! Please to accept tho enclosed, and believe mo, dear Lord Beaconsfidd, your over grateful little friend, Adolphus of Teck. What the enclosure was Princess Mary Adelaide, his mother, has not left on record. Lord Boaconsliold’s mention of tho sword indicates, doubtless, that Princo .Adolphus was intended for the army; but tho gift did not follow, for four years later the great statesman had passed awav. SHROPSHIRE’S TRIBUTE. The remains of tho Marquess were , removed by road from Shrewsbury to Windsor. Tho coffin, made of Shropshire oak, was placed in a motor hoarse at the nursing institution whore he died. It/was covered with the Union Jack, on which rested a single floral tribute—a cross of white chrysanthemums and red carnations and ferns—from tho Marchioness. Three members of the family—the Earl of Eltham, Lord Frederick Cambridge, and tho Duke of Beaufort—took their places behind the hearse, in front of which wore tho chief constables of Shropshire and Shrewsbury, who were preceded by a posse of country and borough police. Brigadier-general Lloyd, Mr Bates Maddieon, Deputy-mayor of Shrewsbury, who represented the Mayor and the town clerk (Mr R F. Prideaux), and Mr Fleming the Marquess’s butler, were also in the procession which accompanied the coffin to tho towering columns raised to tho memory of Lord Hill. AT WINDSOR. Tho motor hoarse arrived at Windsor in tho afternoon. As tho procession passed through Henry VIII’s gateway at Windsor Castle, the 3rd Battalion Coldstream Guards, posted outside tho guard chamber, presented arms. Tho Castle grounds were temporarily closed to the public. After tho cars had entered the Royal precincts they stopped outside the entrance to the Dean’s Cloister, and half a dozen warrant and non-commissioned officers of tho Ist and, 2nd Battalions Life Guards removed tho coffin from tho hearse and boro it into the Albert Memorial Chapel, where it was received by the Comptroller cf the Lord Chamberlain’s Office, Colonel iho Hon Sir George Crichton, and the Doan of Windsor. On Saturday it was removed to George’s Chapel for the funeral service. THE QUEEN’S GRIEF. ■ Clothed in black from head to foot, a black veil falling from her black headdress, the Queen stood beside Princess Mary and the Duchess- of York', under the splendid banners of the Knights of the Garter. As the Queen saw the Marquess’s coffin, with his military helmet and his

sword resting upon it, sink slowly through the chapel floor upon its bier she raised her handkerchief to her eyes. She saw the Marquess’s eldest son step forward from his place beside the King, his sword scabbard tapping the ground. She saw him gaze sadly down at the coffin as it sank still further and then sprinkle a handful of earth upon it —upon the Union Jack which covered it, upon the crossshaped wreath of Madonna lilies and red roses which lay with the helmet and the sword. She saw him pause for one long moment and then step back hesitatingly. Twice (says one who was present) was the Queen visibly moved. Once, at the son’s gesture of farewell to his father, the other at the end of the funeral service, when all the prayers had been said and the hymns sung, and from the courtyard outside the chapel came the muffled notes of tho “Last Post,” sounded byfour Life Guards trumpeters in state dress. She raised her handkerchief again, and so stood until tho last note faded into silence. THE MARQUESS’S BUTLER. There was something strangely impressive about the service. All its ceremony—the uniforms and the swords and , the glittering medals —could not hide the intimate grief of everyone. It was a private sendee of farewell, with only a few score or two of mourners there. Its family nature was revealed by the presence 01 a sad-faced man in black standing by the door. Ho was tho Marquiiss’s old butler, Mr Fleming. He had carried his master s insignia in front of the coffin and then walked to His place near the door, his eyes filled with tears. Perhaps no other butler has ever figured in’ a royal procession in that old chapel. The coffin had been borne through cloisters lined by Life Guardsmen with drawn swords. Behind it had come the brilliant procession—the King in the uniform of a field marshal, the sash of the Garter a vivid blue across his breast, with the Earl of Eltham and Lord Frederick Cambridge beside him; the Prince of Wales, his Guards bearskin in hand, walking with the Duke of York, tall and striking in the blue dress of the Air Force; and Prince Henry, the roman-tic-looking Hussar; and a dozen other great men. The coffin was placed on its purple bier, and then they stood as still as statues drawn up behind it. . ihe Queen and the Princesses (Princess Beatrice, Princess Helena Victoria, Princess Marie Louise) awaited its arrival. MAN OF THE COUNTRY. Clear and poignant in the utter stillness sounded the voice of the Dean of Windsor, saying those ringing words of Revelations: — ~ , "And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.”, - The 'people in that stilled procession thought of the man they were burying there. They Remembered him as a man of the open air whose joy it was to tramp the hills around his Shropshire home and talk with the countryfolk of the little villages. Now this man of the country, who, for all that he was. Governor of Windsor Castle, had no love of courts, was being laid to rest beside the Kings and Queens of six centuries. <( That gathering sang the old hymn, Foi all the Saints Who from their Labours Rost.” A few brief prayers and then another hymn, which was a favourite of the dead Marquess— Abide with Me. The Dean read the blessing, and then came a note of hope—the singing, of that stirring hymn, “ Onward, Christian So - diors ” with its martial rhythm, the Last Post ” sounded, the King led the procession past the open grave. As the. King reached the door the Queen joined hi n, and they moved away together along the cloisters. „ . . t ~ j. The High Commissioners of the do minions attended a special memorial service in the Chapel Royal, St. James s.