3-085-700 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Views of Kensington Palace, the State Rooms of which are, by the Queen's command, to be restored and thrown open to the public; the room in which the Queen was born, 1898. 'With the graceful thought for her people which characterises all her royal bounty, the Queen has this New Year presented to her loyal subjects, the public, two gifts which will be highly valued not only by the present generation of Londoners and sightseers generally, but by their children and their children's children. The State Rooms of Kensington Palace, which have been closed for many a long year, are...to be...thrown open to the public...Kensington's homely red-brick Palace is endeared to countless numbers of the Queen's subjects, primarily as her Majesty's birthplace. For the Queen herself it must have many happy memories of a childhood far removed from the pomps and cares of Queenship...Many deaths had occurred in the Palace, but never a birth until that of the Queen. In the north-west corner of the structure there is a room with three windows overlooking the Gardens towards the Round Pond. There is nothing notable about the apartment save a brass plate which bears the legend - "In this Room Queen Victoria was Born, May 24, 1819."' From "Illustrated London News", 1898.