Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence and Avondale - Tour of India

Tour of India

The foreign press suggested that Albert Victor was sent on a seven-month tour to British India from October 1889 to avoid the gossip which swept London society in the wake of the scandal. This is not true; the trip had actually been planned since the spring. Travelling via Athens, Port Said, Cairo and Aden, Albert Victor arrived in Bombay on 9 November 1889. He was entertained sumptuously in Hyderabad by the Nizam, and elsewhere by many other maharajahs. He spent Christmas at Mandalay and the New Year at Calcutta. Most of the extensive travelling was done by train, although elephants were ridden as part of ceremonies. In the style of the time, a great many animals were shot for sport.

During the trip, Albert Victor met Mrs. Margery Haddon, the wife of a civil engineer, Henry Haddon. After several failed marriages and Albert Victor's death, Margery came to England and claimed the Prince was the father of her son, Clarence Haddon. There was no evidence and her claims were dismissed. She had become an alcoholic and seemed deranged. The allegations were reported to Buckingham Palace and the head of the police Special Branch investigated. Papers in the National Archives show that neither courtiers nor Margery had any proof of the allegation. In a statement to police Albert Victor's lawyers admitted that there had been "some relations" between him and Mrs. Haddon, but denied the claim of fatherhood.

However, in the 1920s, the son, Clarence, repeated the story and published a book in the United States, My Uncle George V, in which he claimed he was born in London in September 1890, about nine months after Albert Victor's meeting with Mrs. Haddon. In 1933, he was charged with demanding money with menace and attempted extortion after writing to the King asking for hush money. At his trial the following January, the prosecution produced documents showing that Haddon's enlistment papers, marriage certificate, officer's commission, demobilisation papers and employment records all showed he was born in or before 1887, at least two years before Albert Victor met Mrs. Haddon. Haddon was found guilty and the judge, believing Haddon to be suffering from delusions, did not jail him but bound him over for three years on the condition that he made no claim that he was Albert Victor's son. Haddon breached the conditions and was jailed for a year. Dismissed as a crank, he died a broken man. Even if Haddon's claim had been true, as with other royal illegitimacies, it would have made no difference to the royal line of succession. On his return from India, on 24 May 1890, Albert Victor was created Duke of Clarence and Avondale and Earl of Athlone.