Source:
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Above: Mary of Teck, Queen of the United Kingdom, photographed by Hay Wrightson.
(images courtesy of royaltyhistory)
Mary of Teck (born Victoria Mary Augusta Louise Olga Pauline Claudine Agnes on May 26, 1867, died March 24, 1953) was Queen of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions from 1910 until 1936 as the wife of King George V. She was concurrently Empress of India.
Although technically a princess of Teck, in the Kingdom of Württemberg, she was born and raised in the United Kingdom. Her parents were Francis, Duke of Teck, who was of German extraction, and Princess Mary Adelaide of Cambridge, who was a granddaughter of King George III. She was informally known as "May", after the month of her birth.
At the age of 24, she was betrothed to her second cousin once removed Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence and Avondale, the eldest son of the Prince of Wales, but six weeks after the announcement of their engagement, he died unexpectedly during an influenza pandemic. The following year, she became engaged to Albert Victor's only surviving brother, George, who subsequently became king. Before her husband's accession, Mary was successively Duchess of York, Duchess of Cornwall, and Princess of Wales.
As queen consort from 1910, she supported her husband through the First World War, his ill health, and major political changes arising from the aftermath of the war. After George's death in 1936, she became queen mother when her eldest son, King Edward VIII, ascended the throne; but to her dismay, he abdicated later that same year in order to marry twice-divorced American socialite Wallis Simpson. Mary supported her second son, King George VI, until his death in 1952. She died the following year during the reign of her granddaughter, the current Queen Elizabeth II, who had not yet been crowned. Among much else, an ocean liner, a battlecruiser, and a university were named in Mary's honour.
The letter:
BUCKINGHAM PALACE.
June 1936 —
To those who have so kindly united in giving us the Silver Jubilee Tapestry, it falls to me alone to return the thanks in which I know that the late King would have joined so warmly; and this I do with a very full sense of gratitude for so beautiful a token of many long and precious friendships. My dear Husband took a great interest in the preparatory sketches and designs, and I feel sure that others will share the happiness that I feel in remembering that it was he who chose the position in which it was to hang at Windsor. Both this noble tapestry and the two handsome painted vases which accompanied it will continue to earn the admiration of posterity.,
To [illegible] the enjoyment of these splendid objects; to me the realisation of that personal devotion towards us both of which they are the lovely expression. I thank you with all my heart.
Mary R.
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