My Recollections

These memoirs by Adaline de Horsey, who was born in 1824, provide a glimpse of society in Victorian England from the upper most echelons looking down. As made clear in her first paragraph, she was the daughter of "Spencer Horsey de Horsey, of the ancient family of de Horsey," and her mother was the daughter of the Earl of Stradbroke. She recounts being a young girl and meeting King William IV when she attended a party for the young Princess Victoria (later Quenn Victoria).

This sets the tone of the entire volume. Adaline tells of her courtship with a Prince of Spain before she finally married the Earl of Cardigan. After his death she married the Portugese Count of Lancastre. Although she came from a wealthy, well-placed family, her show more marriage to Cardigan brought her to a vast landed estate. She lived a very full and privileged life as a free-spirited woman (by Victorian standards). However, with the exception of some vignettes of better known people, these memoirs are largely devoted to personal experiences. One will find very little history beyond the subject's own life. As for her life, the perspective is from the uppermost reaches of society and she betrays herself to be largely out of touch with the average person. At the end of the book, she concedes that her "critics" might find her remembrances to be "trivial." They are truly that, but they are such in a most delightful way. The value of this volume is to show us from our vantage point of over a hundred year's later what life was like for the English aristocracy during the long Victorian era. show less