Princess Helena of The United Kingdom - Legacy

Legacy

British Royalty
House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha
Descendants of Victoria & Albert
Victoria, Princess Royal Edward VII Princess Alice Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg & Gotha Princess Helena Princess Louise Arthur, Duke of Connaught Leopold, Duke of Albany Princess Beatrice

Helena was devoted to nursing, and took the lead at the charitable organisations she represented. She was also an active campaigner, and wrote letters to newspapers and magazines promoting the interests of nurse registration. Her royal status helped to promote the publicity and society interest that surrounded organisations such as the Royal British Nurses' Association. The RBNA still survives today with Baroness Cox as president.

In appearance, Helena was described by John Van der Kiste as plump and dowdy; and in temperament, as placid, and business-like, with an authoritarian spirit. On one occasion, during a National Dock Strike, the Archbishop of Canterbury composed a prayer hoping for its prompt end. Helena arrived at the church, examined her service sheet, and in a voice described by her daughter as "the penetrating royal family whisper, which carried farther than any megaphone", remarked: "That prayer won't settle any strike." Her appearance and personality was criticised in the letters and journals of Queen Victoria, and biographers followed her example. However, Helena's daughter, Princess Marie Louise, described her as:

very lovely, with wavy brown hair, a beautiful little straight nose, and lovely amber-coloured eyes...She was very talented: played the piano exquisitively, had a distinct gift for drawing and painting in water-colours...Her outstanding gift was loyalty to her friends...She was brilliantly clever, had a wonderful head for business...

Music was one of her passions; in her youth she played the piano with Charles Hallé, and Jenny Lind and Clara Butt were among her personal friends. Her determination to carry out a wide range of public duties won her widespread popularity. She twice represented her mother at Drawing Rooms, where guests were instructed to present themselves to Helena as if they were presenting themselves to the Queen.

Helena was closest to her brother, Prince Alfred, who considered her his favourite sister. Though described by contemporaries as fearfully devoted to the Queen, to the point that she did not have a mind of her own, she actively campaigned for women's rights, a field the Queen abhorred. Nevertheless, both she and Beatrice remained closest to the Queen, and Helena remained close to her mother's side until the latter's death. Her name was the last to be written in the Queen's seventy-year-old journal.