A pregnancy at that age in Victorian times was unthinkable and also extremely dangerous.A medical examination of Queen Victoria’s body after her death revealed that for some years she had suffered a ventral hernia, which had damaged the walls of the abdomen, and a prolapse of the uterus, which would have made sexual intercourse not only uncomfortable but difficult, and child-bearing out of the question.Victoria’s secretary, Sir Henry Ponsonby, commented that Brown was ‘certainly a favourite, but he is only a servant and nothing more — and what I suppose began as a joke has been perverted into a libel’.But the republican Press  now referred to Victoria as ‘Mrs Brown’, and later, after her  elevation as Empress of India,  as ‘the Empress Brown’.It was only Brown’s courageous action in foiling an assassination attempt on the Queen in 1872 that changed public opinion, converted him into a national hero and restored Victoria to popularity.After Brown’s death in 1883 from a severe form of the skin complaint erysipelas, at the age of 56, Victoria showed that her appetite for masculine attention had not diminished.In 1887, she replaced Brown with a low-caste, uneducated and exploitative Indian, Abdul Karim, whom she called ‘The Munshi’.He rose from waiting on her at table to become her ‘Indian Secretary’.She gave him three houses:  a cottage at Windsor, a bungalow on the Isle of Wight and a lovely house at Balmoral, all of which he filled with his penniless Indian relations at the British taxpayer’s expense.On Victoria’s own death in 1901, at the age of 81, she was buried with Prince Albert’s dressing-gown and a plaster-cast of his hand, a lock of John Brown’s hair, a photograph of Brown clasped in her hand, several of his letters and a ring belonging to his mother.There is a pathos and a poignancy about Victoria’s desperate dependence on the burly and bullying Brown. According to Spiritualist theory, the shade of the deceased takes over the body — or at least the hand — of the medium long enough to pen a message. On Victoria’s own death in 1901, at the age of 81, she was buried with Prince Albert’s dressing-gown and a plaster-cast of his hand, a lock of John Brown’s hair, a photograph of Brown clasped in her hand, several of his letters and a ring belonging to his mother. Oct 28, 2014 - Explore Royal Genealogy's board "Queen Victoria & John Brown", followed by 992 people on Pinterest. 11, 2017 10:17PM ET / … She instructed two courtiers to attend the next Lees séance, but warned them they were not to use their own names, nor reveal their standing as emissaries from the Court. The family would grow to include 11 children – 9 boys and … He read it with great interest and mentioned the fact to his speech therapist, Lionel Logue.
But the massive cover-up operation was not as thorough as it might have been. Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email. His published account of the séance was subsequently brought to Victoria’s attention.“Despite her earlier interest in Spiritualism, the Queen was by no means credulous. I have to confess that I do not.Burning documents was not in the Queen Mother’s nature. Lees refused the offer, apparently on the advice of his spirit guides, but did not leave the Queen without solace. This letter was an example of automatic writing.
It seemed that when she wished to find out how Albert would have viewed a particular issue, she did not, as historians suppose, have to use her imagination. The 38-year-old Queen was devastated. And a second ‘daughter’, Louise Brown, was also ‘sent to live in Paris’, where, according to John Stuart, who was formerly employed by the royal bankers, Coutts & Co., she was sent £250, ‘paid once a quarter’.Stuart added: ‘The money was debited in the account marked “His Royal Highness Prince Albert Edward, Prince of Wales”.‘At the time I thought she must have been one of King Edward VII’s children from the wrong side of the blanket,’ he said — and indeed, she well may have been.

On 8 December 1826, John Brown, who would become Queen Victoria’s close confidante after Prince Albert’s death, was born at Crathienaird as the second son of John Brown, a tenant farmer, and Margaret Leys.

Begg’s Best was their preferred tipple. More surprising still, the spirit addressed the courtiers by their real names.