XPost: alt.talk.royalty, soc.culture.british, alt.society.monarchy   
   From: le@top.put.com   
      
   A revision for the 70th birthday of the Prince of Wales.   
      
   I recall posting to alt.politics.british in 1995 marking the   
   69th birthday of the Queen,and Mike Dickson of Black Cat Software   
   responding "I sincerely hope she never sees 70"...so my Queen's   
   birthday post the next year was headed "Mike Dickson Frustrated!".   
      
   Now it is her son who turns 70,with living parents,   
   and with grandchildren George and Charlotte respectively   
   years older than the young Charles and Anne were at the   
   commencement of the present reign.   
      
   Milestones for the Prince in the coming year include surpassing   
   the age at which King George V died,and the 50th anniversary of   
   his investiture in Wales (which I remember watching on television,   
   I expect most who did thought he would be King by now!).   
      
   The midpoint of the current reign has reached past the third   
   birthday of the Duke of Cambridge,and is nearly at his mother's   
   24th birthday (she died the month after turning 36,so about two   
   thirds of her life already belong to the first half of the present   
   reign and only the last year remains in its currently-final third).   
      
   As for my reference file updated below,   
   this should be the final appearance for Admirals   
   Keppel and Milne as they will be consigned to the   
   junior officers' mess on the imminent arrival of a   
   far more senior admiral.   
      
   			-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-   
      
   Consider,if you would,the United Kingdom and Empire   
   as they were on May 2nd 1885.   
      
   Queen Victoria,over 3 weeks from 66,was on the throne;   
   her Golden Jubilee would be in the second year following,her   
   Diamond Jubilee ten years after that.The future Edward VII was over   
   6 months from 44 (the current Prince of Wales is now 70),   
   the future George V was over a month from 20(the Duke of Cambridge is   
   over 4 months past 36--George V was Duke of Cornwall at his age),not yet   
   Duke of York,and not yet heir apparent to his father;nor was his elder   
   brother yet the Duke of Clarence.   
   The future Archbishops of Canterbury who would crown these Kings were   
   Bishop of London and Dean of Windsor respectively.The oldest British   
   royal was George III's daughter-in-law the Duchess of Cambridge   
   (Augusta of Hesse-Cassel),born 1797.   
      
   The Church of England dioceses of Birmingham,Coventry,Chelmsford,Derby,   
   Guildford,Portsmouth,St. Edmundsbury and Ipswich,Sheffield,and Southwark   
   did not yet exist...nor did those of Bradford and Wakefield (now   
   abolished).That of Southwell was less than 3 months over a year old.   
      
   Macdonald,Baldwin,and Chamberlain were teenagers,Churchill was ten,   
   Attlee was two,and no later Prime Minister had yet been born   
   (nor had any person in the world alive after 1999).   
   Keir Hardie,who years later would found the original Scottish   
   Labour Party,then the Independent Labour Party,and then the Labour   
   Party proper,was still in his twenties and had never been an MP.   
      
   William Gladstone (born 1809) was the only living person who had been   
   Prime Minister (years younger than his predecessors).His government   
   had passed the Representation of the People Act 1884(which would for the   
   first time enable most men to vote) and was pursuing passage of the   
   Redistribution of Seats Act 1885 (which established the norm of   
   single-member constituencies) but these had yet to actually come into   
   effect with the following election.   
   Women would not vote in a General Election for thirty-three years.   
   Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot(born 1803),Father of the House of Commons,   
   had been a member since 1830...before any of the Reform Bills.   
   (Charles Mahon,born 1800,had been a member discontinuously since then).   
   Lord Coleridge (born 1820) was Lord Chief Justice,and had been   
   the last Chief Justice of the Common Pleas (a position abolished   
   by the Judicature Act of 1873).The 1st Lord Esher(born 1815 or 1817,   
   sources disagree) was Master of the Rolls.   
      
   Many of the Colonies had yet to be colonized,Hong Kong was over a   
   decade from adding the New Territories.   
      
   Battleships that would be scrapped as obsolete years before World War I   
   had yet to be laid down,nor had HMS Victoria,which would sink in an   
   1893 collision with the ironclad HMS Camperdown(at this point not yet   
   launched).Ships built with sailing rigs were still in the active fleet,   
   and it was years before HMS Temeraire would make port under sail alone   
   for the final time.   
      
   Sir Henry Keppel (born 1809,a lieutenant 1829),Sir Alexander   
   Milne(born 1806,a lieutenant 1827,commander 1830),and even   
   Sir Provo Wallis (born 1791,a lieutenant 1808,and commander 1813)   
   were among the Admirals of the Fleet.   
   The 1st Baron Strathnairn(born 1801) and Sir Patrick Grant(born 1804)   
   were Field Marshals,while Sir Richard Dacres(born 1799) and the 3rd   
   Earl of Lucan(born 1800,a lieutenant colonel 1826),who had ordered the   
   Charge of the Light Brigade,had yet to receive promotion to that rank.   
      
   The eldest Dukes included the 6th of Northumberland(b. 1810,   
   great-great-great-grandfather of the 11th and the current 12th Duke)   
   the 7th of Devonshire(b. 1808,great-great-great-grandfather of the   
   present 12th duke born 1944,he had first become an MP in 1829 and   
   a peer in 1834),the 12th of Somerset(b. 1804,second cousin of the   
   great-great-great-grandfather of the current 19th Duke),and the 4th   
   (and last) of Cleveland (born 1803).   
   The 1st Duke of Abercorn,so created in 1868,had succeeded to the   
   Marquessate thereof in 1818 and been a Knight of the Garter since 1844.   
   The 4th Marquess of Donegall (born 1799) was alive and had succeeded   
   his elder brother less than two years before(the present   
   peer is the great-great-great-grandson of his first cousin).   
   The 7th Earl of Shaftesbury(born 1801,an MP from 1826,great-   
   great-great-grandfather of the present peer and his predecessor) and   
   3rd Earl Grey (born 1802,elder brother of the great-great-grandfather   
   of the septuagenarian present peer and of his predecessor) were among   
   the Knights of the Garter.   
   The 1st Earl of Lovelace (born 1805) was still alive,a Lord-Lieutenant   
   since 1840.   
   The 3rd and 4th Earl of Mansfield and Mansfield(born 1806)   
   had been a Knight of the Thistle since 1843,and had been an MP   
   from 1830 to 1840,with a spell in Government 1834-5.   
   Also among the Earls were the 6th Earl of Essex(born 1803),   
   and the 6th of Albemarle,born 1799,a veteran of the Battle of Waterloo.   
   The eldest of Earls were the 6th Earl of Buckinghamshire,   
   born 1793,and the 2nd of Stradbroke,born 1794,   
   commissioned in the Army in 1810,a Lieutenant 1814,   
   who missed Waterloo on account of a wound.   
   The 9th Viscount of Arbuthnott(born 1806) was alive,the   
   current peer is the 17th.   
   The 1st Viscount Portman (born 1799,first elected MP in 1823) was   
   alive,the present peer is the 10th.   
   The oldest Viscount,however,was the 1st and last of Eversley,born in 1794   
   and Speaker of the House of Commons 1839-57.   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
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    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)