Princess Victoria’s first public tour
Life lessons and souvenirs from the industrial Midlands
Date: 09 September 2026
Author:
Dr Myles Campbell
Image: A pencil and watercolour portrait of Princess Victoria made by John Bradley at Great Malvern during her first royal tour in 1830. © Royal Collection Enterprises Ltd 2026 | Royal Collection Trust.
Throughout her teenage years, Queen Victoria (1837-1901) criss-crossed the country on a series of busy royal tours. Sometimes dismissed as attempts to seek popularity, new research suggests that these trips were a serious and successful effort by her mother to educate Victoria about British industry, decorative arts and working-class life. Assistant Curator of Collections Myles Campbell delves into the archives to retrace Victoria’s steps on her very first public tour.
A royal welcome
The fresh paint had barely dried at Frederick Dee’s Royal Hotel in Birmingham on 4 August 1830 when a much-anticipated guest crossed its threshold. The grand entrance hall had been newly hung with ‘splendid fancy papering’, plush carpet had been laid down right to the street door, and images of Antony and Cleopatra graced the walls of the newly papered drawing room, all courtesy of the Birmingham decorators Seaton and Co.
The focus of these efforts was the 11-year-old girl who, despite her tender age, stood first in line to inherit the British throne. Just after 6pm, Princess Victoria, the future queen, stepped into these elegant surroundings to perform the first duty of her first ever public tour. Hoisted up in a chair, she appeared at the front windows of the hotel and drew the immediate, resounding roar of the crowd. Amid ‘deafening cheers’, the people of Birmingham were witnessing the first act in the making of a major public figure.
Tour manager: Victoria’s mother
The meticulous preparations of Mr Dee at his hotel had been matched by Victoria’s mother, the Duchess of Kent. When King George III visited the Midlands in 1788, his engagements had been relatively spontaneous. But the Duchess devised a much more carefully planned itinerary to maximise this tour’s educational benefit for her daughter.
Letters in the Birmingham Archives record the preparations. At the end of July, the Comptroller of the Duchess’s household at Kensington Palace, Sir John Conroy, wrote to the Birmingham engineer James Watt Jr to arrange tours of the city’s famous factories.
‘The Duchess of Kent’, he wrote, ‘is most anxious … for the instruction of the Princess that they should avail themselves of their nearness to Birmingham to visit it’, adding that she wished, in particular, to tour ‘those manufactories [factories] that would be best for the Princess to see.’ Watt immediately wrote to Matthew Robinson Boulton, his partner at Birmingham’s pioneering industrial complex the Soho Foundry, and a plan took shape.
Image: Portrait of Victoria's mother, Victoire, Duchess of Kent by Richard Rothwell in 1832. © Royal Collection Enterprises Ltd 2026 | Royal Collection Trust.
Birmingham's best bits
Victoria’s packed Birmingham itinerary began at 9am on Thursday 5 August with a visit to the Union Rolling Mills. Led by the civil engineer Charles Henry Capper, she witnessed the process of rolling metals and came away with several specimens. At the button factory of Hammond, Turner and Sons, the Princess tried her hand at button making and showed a ‘lively interest’ in the operation. Jennens and Bettridge of Constitution Hill was the next port of call, where the royal party were ‘much pleased’ with the process of finishing furniture in imitation of Japanese lacquer.
In the afternoon, they joined Edward Thomason, a notable manufacturer of jewellery, buttons and medals, for a tour of his extensive factory and showrooms. Victoria and her mother then proceeded to the glass works of Bacchus, Green and Bacchus, where they watched the making of a handsome two-handled glass goblet. They were reportedly ‘much astonished and pleased at witnessing the progress … from the sand up to the perfect and most splendid specimens of the art.’ Having accepted the goblet as a gift, they pressed on to the Britannia Nail Manufactory at Walmer Lane and, loaded down with souvenirs, returned to Dee’s Royal Hotel after 5pm.
Image: Buttons made by Victoria at the factory of Hammond, Turner and Sons on 5 August 1830. Currently on display at Osborne House. © Royal Collection Enterprises Ltd 2026 | Royal Collection Trust.
'The Duchess of Kent' wished, in particular, to tour ‘those manufactories [factories] that would be best for the Princess to see.’
Sir John Conroy, Comptroller of the Duchess of Kent's household
A growing interest in arts and culture
The next day was equally hectic. It began with a stop at the Birmingham Society of Arts, where the Duchess made an address in support of the fine arts. ‘I have much pleasure in visiting this valuable institution’, she declared, ‘and I could wish, as a mark of the feeling with which the Princess and myself must ever recollect Birmingham, to be considered one of its Patronesses.’
Victoria and her mother both signed the visitors’ book and, in the years that followed, their names continued to appear as patronesses in the Society’s annual exhibition catalogues. For the artistic young princess, who had commenced weekly drawing lessons three years earlier, this pledge of support helped to set a template for her steady patronage of the arts as queen.
At the city’s News Room, with its selection of local, national and international newspapers, Victoria was given a glimpse of the recreational and reading facilities provided for members of the public. The decision to spend time in this public space was interpreted as ‘a high compliment’ to the people of Birmingham and helped to shape positive impressions of Victoria as a socially engaged queen-in-waiting.
I have much pleasure in visiting this valuable institution... and I could wish, as a mark of the feeling with which the Princess and myself must ever recollect Birmingham, to be considered one of its Patronesses.
Victoria's mother, the Duchess of Kent speaking about the Birmingham Society of Arts
Image: The exhibition rooms of the Birmingham Society of Arts, 1829. © Public Domain, from the British Library's collections, 2013.
Image: Portrait of the Scottish engineer and inventor, William Murdoch by John Graham-Gilbert in 1823. Birmingham Museums Trust (Public domain).
Witnessing the Industrial Revolution in action
After a stop at the glass and china showrooms of Mary Rollason, which had been smartened up especially for the occasion, the day concluded with a tour of the vast Soho Foundry in the company of James Watt Jr. At this great powerhouse of the Industrial Revolution, Victoria saw the processes of boiler making, iron casting, boring and turning that employed hundreds of people and made the production of steam engines possible.
She also made the acquaintance of the local gentry, along with two of the country’s most distinguished inventors, William Murdock and Peter Ewart, pioneers of gas light and turbine technology respectively. At the Soho mint, the Princess drew the visit to a close by striking a commemorative medal. Bearing the date of the visit and a Latin inscription, it optimistically proclaimed her ‘the next hope of Great Britain’.
Fresh air and a royal scent
Leaving the hustle and bustle of Birmingham’s factories behind, the royal party spent the following six weeks in the tranquil surroundings of Holly Mount, a villa at Great Malvern. According to the Duchess, she and Victoria were ‘charmed with this quiet retreat’ and its abundant fresh air, which had ‘the best influence.’ A watercolour painted at Malvern depicts the Princess with rosy cheeks and a fresh complexion, while several contemporary prints show her enjoying donkey rides, all apparently confirming this impression of a pastoral idyll.
Did you know?
Before modern-day celebrities had their own fragrances, teenage Victoria had her own signature scent, ‘The Victoria Perfume’. It was presented to her at Malvern in Worcestershire during her first public tour.
But even at Malvern, the Princess was still connected to the public. Sniffing a PR opportunity, the enterprising Worcester perfumer John Kendall managed to secure a meeting with Victoria, at which he presented her with a perfume formulated especially for the visit.
Victoria praised its ‘delicious qualities’ and, permitting him to name it in her honour, spawned one of the first ‘celebrity’ perfumes. It was a marketing gift for Kendall, who lost no time in advertising the ‘odoriferous and fragrant Victoria perfume’ to customers seeking the signature scent of royalty.
Image: Trade-card of Kendall & Son, perfumers, cabinet case makers and importers of foreign fancy goods to the Royal family. Google books (Public domain).
Image: Sugar bowl with cover from a miniature tea service presented to Victoria by Chamberlain and Sons in Worcester, 1830. Reproduced by kind permission of the Museum of Royal Worcester © Dyson Perrins Museum Trust CIO. Currently on display in Queen Victoria's childhood rooms at Kensington Palace.
Souvenir shopping at Worcester
On 7 September, the church bells of Worcester rang merrily as Victoria and the Duchess arrived in the city for a day of engagements. As in Birmingham, the emphasis was on introducing the Princess to the work of local manufacturers. They first visited the porcelain showrooms of Chamberlain and Sons – official porcelain makers to Victoria and the Duchess since 1828 – where they went on a shopping spree and ordered dinner services for Kensington Palace.
At the premises of Grainger, Lea and Co., their purchases included a pair of vases to be sent to Saxony, the hub of the porcelain industry in the Duchess’s native Germany, ‘as a specimen of Worcester porcelain’. Finally, they spent two hours ‘minutely’ inspecting the skilled work carried out at the Royal Porcelain Works of Flight, Barr and Barr, where they left a donation of £5 for the factory workers. As a memento of her Worcester visit, Victoria received a miniature tea service made by Chamberlain and Sons. Decorated with a painting of Malvern, where she stayed during the trip, it was designed to keep her memory of the Midlands alive.
This was a valuable lesson to my child, and will leave a lasting impression upon her.
Victoria's mother, the Duchess of Kent reflecting on the tour in a letter to her friend
Positive first impressions...
For Victoria and the Duchess, the tour was an unqualified success. Newspapers reported that the Princess’s observations during the factory tours showed ‘an attentive and intelligent mind.’ They considered it ‘highly gratifying’ that their future queen had been encouraged ‘to take an interest in personally inspecting the manufactures of her country.’ Although we know little of Victoria’s thoughts about the experience, the ‘very curious’ factories of Birmingham, as she described them, remained vivid in her memory.
...despite some disapproval
For Victoria’s uncle, King William IV, these tours risked exposing the Princess to ‘mixed society’, and he was ‘disgusted’ by them. But Victoria’s mother would not be deterred. From cotton milling in Derbyshire to poplin weaving in Dublin, she took a progressive interest in modern industry and workers’ welfare. She was determined to open her daughter’s eyes to the harsh realities and great skill of manual labour by introducing her to people ‘of all classes’ across the country.
In a letter to a friend, the Duchess reflected on the benefits of the Midlands tour: ‘I made our journey here, both entertaining and instructive … we went to Birmingham, where, we devoted nearly two days to view the manufactories: This was a valuable lesson to my child, and will leave a lasting impression upon her.’
Like Cleopatra, whose image stared down at young Victoria from the hotel walls during that first visit to Birmingham, the young princess was destined to become queen at the impressionable age of 18. But as surviving objects and royal warrants show, Victoria’s patronage of the artisans she met in Birmingham and Worcester continued throughout her teenage years and into her reign, helping to bolster her image as a supporter of national industry, even from an early age. Together, they are the material evidence of a lesson’s lasting impression.