John Conroy
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Sir John Conroy, 1st Baronet, KH (21 October 1786 – 2 March 1854) was a British army officer who became the chief attendant of the Duke of Kent and Princess Victoria, the parents of Queen Victoria.
He was born in Wales to Irish parents, John Ponsonby Conroy Esq. and Margaret Wilson. His father, a barrister, had emigrated to Britain] to practice law.
He was privately educated until enrolled in the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich. In 1803, he was commissioned in the Royal Artillery.
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[edit] Family
On December 12, 1808, he married Elizabeth Fisher (1791–April 9, 1861), daughter of Major-General Benjamin Fisher, in Dublin.
They had five children:
- Elizabeth Jane Conroy (13 May 1811 – 1 May 1855).
- Sir Edward Conroy (1812 – d. 03 November 1869) m Alicia Parsons (1815 - 21 January 1885).
- Arthur Benjamin Conroy (07 May 1813 – 24 May 1817).
- Stephen Rowley Conroy (15 August 1815 – 09 September 1841).
- Victoria Maria Louisa Conroy (12 August 1819 – 09 February 1866) m Sir Wyndham Edward Hanmer, 4th Bt.
[edit] Equerry to the Duke of Kent
Through the connection with his father-in-law, Conroy came to the attention of the Duke of Kent. He was appointed as an equerry in 1817, shortly before the Duke's marriage to Princess Victoria. An efficient organiser, he soon became of favorite of both the Duke and Duchess. When the Duke died in 1820, Conroy offered his services as comptroller to the Duchess of Kent and her infant daughter, the future Queen.
Conroy's relationship to the Duchess was very close. He served as her comptroller and private secretary for the next 19 years. By 1830, it became clear that Victoria would succeed to the throne. Conroy supported the Duchess in her feud with King William IV. It was also probable that William would die while Victoria was a minor. If so, under the Regency Act of 1831 the Duchess would be Regent, and Conroy would be the "power behind the throne".
Victoria believed that Conroy saw himself as in loco parentis to her.
However, William lived until 1837, when Victoria became queen at age 18. Conroy had not cultivated Victoria as he had her mother. With the help of the Duchess, he tried to get Victoria to appoint him as her private secretary. But Victoria refused. One of her first acts was to dismiss Conroy from her own household. Unfortunately, she could not dismiss him from her mother's household. On the advice of the Prime Minister, Lord Melbourne, Victoria granted Conroy a baronetcy and a pension. This did not satisfy Conroy, who felt that he deserved at least an earldom.
Victoria also relegated the Duchess (and Conroy) to separate quarters, cutting off personal contact with them.
In 1839, Conroy left the Duchess's household and went to the Continent. The Duchess remained in Britain, and was reconciled to Victoria.
[edit] Suspected embezzlement
Conroy also had some control of the finances of Princess Sophia of Gloucester (1773-1844), a spinster grand-daughter of George II. Sophia had a substantial income from the civil list and lived very modestly, but at her death, she left only £1,607 19s 7d in her bank accounts.
In 1848, the Duke of Cambridge and the Duchess of Gloucester had a lawyer write to Conroy demanding that he account for the rest of Sophia's funds, but Conroy simply ignored it.
Soon after this, the Duchess of Kent's new comptroller, Sir George Couper, had need to go through the old accounts. He discovered huge discrepancies. No records for her household or personal expenses had been kept after 1829. There was also no record of nearly £50,000 the Duchess had received from her brother, Leopold, nor of an additional £10,000 from William IV.
However, as with the estate of Princess Sophia, there was no concrete evidence that Conroy had taken any of the missing funds, and he was never charged.
[edit] Suspected lover of the Duchess
Conroy's relationship with the Duchess was the subject of much speculation in his lifetime. When the Duke of Wellington was asked if the Duchess and Conroy were lovers, the he replied that he "supposed so".
Victoria was reported to have caught Conroy and her mother "engaged in familiarities". It was not recorded whether the familiarities were of a physical sexual nature, but she interpreted them as indicating that they were lovers rather than mistress and servant. Victoria told her governess, Baroness Lehzen, who in turn told Madame de Spath, one of the Duchess's ladies-in-waiting. De Spath confronted the Duchess about the relationship and was immediately dismissed by the Duchess. Lehzen became an enemy of the Duchess and Conroy.
[edit] Rumor that Conroy was Queen Victoria's father
During Victoria's lifetime, there were rumors that Conroy, and not the Duke of Kent, was her biological father. But physical evidence is against this. Victoria bore no physical similarities to Conroy, but did look like the royal family. In addition, the Duchess and Conroy had not yet met at the time of Victoria's conception.
Some have suggested that genetic evidence shows that she was not actually descended from George III (the Duke of Kent's father). For instance, George III suffered from porphyria, which was not present in her descendants. Also, several of her descendants had hemophilia, which was unknown among her recognized ancestors.
However, there is evidence that some of Victoria's descendants did have mild porphyria. Hemophilia is carried in the female line, except in the rare case where a male sufferer lives long enough to beget children. Conroy showed no signs of hemophilia, and lived to be 68 years old.
