Queen Victoria’s Two Controversial Relationships
Queen Victoria took a strong liking to an Indian attendant named Abdul Karim. Karim was a servant who eventually was promoted into her inner circle. Queen Victoria’s unusually close friendship with her Indian servant began at the 1887 celebration and spanned 14 years, a period captured in the new movie Victoria & Abdul, starring Judi Dench as the titular queen. Karim was the queen’s beloved munshi, the teacher who gave her daily Urdu lessons, educated her on Indian affairs, and introduced her to curry. Queen Victoria in turn showered him with gifts, titles and honors, much to the resentment of the royal family. When Victoria passed in 1901, her family members deported him back to India and attempted to erase his existence from history.
But Victoria had more than one controversial relationship. Prior to Karim, she put her trust in a Scottish servant named John Brown following her husband’s demise. There is, however, no evidence that Brown and Victoria were lovers. By 1866 gossip about the relationship between the Queen and her extremely informal servant had started. Brown was the only person around Victoria prepared to “tell it like it was”, and he often proved abrasive with members of the Royal Household: even, it is said, on at least one occasion giving the Prince of Wales the rough edge of his tongue. Rumors soon spread more widely, and Brown was featured in the satirical magazine Punch on 30 June 1866, and Queen Victoria came to be referred to by some members of her household (behind her back) as “Mrs. Brown”. Meanwhile, a Swiss newspaper went as far as suggesting that the two had actually married. “Mrs. Brown” became the title of a 1997 film about the relationship, starring Dame Judi Dench as Queen Victoria and Billy Connolly as John Brown.