Teen Queen wanted to make her Coronation a people’s spectacle

VAST numbers of people poured into London for the biggest event they had ever seen.

It’s thought more than 400,000 came from all over Britain to witness the 18-yearold Victoria’s Coronation on June 28, 1838.

Buckingham Palace had just been completed, so the new monarch also had a new home, but she got there from Westminster Abbey via a very circuitous route, allowing as many people as possible to see her.

The service lasted more than five hours, with two dress changes for the Queen.

“There were millions of my loyal subjects assembled in every spot, to witness the procession,” she wrote in her personal journal.

“Their good humour and excessive loyalty was everything. I really cannot say how proud I felt to be the queen of such a nation.”

Both Tories and Radicals, opponents of the Whig Government, disliked how the money had been spent.

They reckoned more should have been spent on the ceremony itself, and much less on the procession and spectacle that thrilled the crowds of ordinary folk outside.

Thankfully, unlike them, Victoria was a queen of the people, not the toffs!