QUEEN VICTORIA (GREAT BRITAIN) - DOCUMENT SIGNED 11/15/1839 - HFSID 82244

QUEEN VICTORIA
The Queen signs off the sale of a "deodand" in brown ink
Document Signed: "Victoria Reg" as Queen of England in brown ink. 2 pages, front and verso, 9½x14¾. Windsor Castle, Windsor, England. 1839 November 15. To the Sheriff of Middlesex County. Countersigned by three officials. In part: "Whereas the Commissioner of Our Treasury have recommended unto us to remit the amount of a Deodand of £500 imposed on the French steam vessel 'Castor' the property of Monsieur Dagneaux Merchant of Paris and others, by a Coroners jury in an inquest on the body of Marcus Bock on the 12th day of June 1839 to which We are graciously pleased to condescend. Our Will and Pleasure is that the above Deodand of five hundred pounds be remitted...." The definition of "deodand" from the 1828 edition of Webster's Dictionary published in 1828: "In England, a personal chattel which is the immediate occasion of the death of a rational creature, and for that reason, given to God, that is, forfeited to the king, to be applied to pious uses, and distributed in alms by his high almoner. Thus, if a cart runs over a man and kills him, the cart is forfeited as a deodand". Despite the impressive size of his own family, with the death of King George III, the crown passed through his children in quick succession, first to his eldest son George IV (1820-1830), than to his third son William IV (1830-1837), and eventually to one of his more unlikely heirs, his granddaughter by his fourth son, Princess Victoria. Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom and the Empress of India (1819-1901) ascended the throne at the young age of 18, beginning the longest reign in British history and ruling over a time soon to be known as the Victorian Era. This time period was remembered for its industrial, cultural, political, scientific and military change within the United Kingdom with massive growth of the British Empire. More of a national icon rather than a direct political power, Victoria's name was synonymous with strict standards of personal morality. Her great affection for her husband, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, remains a renowned love story in her history; they had nine children together, all married into royal and noble families across the continent, tying them together and earning her the nickname "Grandmother of Europe". Her reign lasted sixty-three years and seven months, and with her death so ended the House of Hanover in the British monarchy, and her legacy of her detailed correspondence and journals have displayed her previously unknown political straight-talking which was emotional, obstinate, and honest. Lightly creased, slightly stained and soiled. Pencil notes at left and lower margins (unknown hand). Penciled "X" touches the "Vic" in signature. ½-inch triangular hole at blank upper left margin, silked there on verso.