Princess Amelia of The United Kingdom - Early Life

Early Life

Princess Amelia was born on 7 August 1783, at the Royal Lodge, Windsor, the youngest of George III and Queen Charlotte's fifteen children as well as the only of her siblings born at Windsor Castle. It is often said that she was her father's favorite, and accordingly, he affectionately called her, "Emily". She was born after the early deaths of her two elder brothers: Octavius (23 February 1779 - 3 May 1783) and Alfred (22 September 1780 - 20 August 1782). The death of these two princes left a gap of almost six years between Amelia and her nearest surviving sibling, Princess Sophia. She was twenty-one years younger than her eldest sibling George and nearly seventeen years younger than her eldest sister Charlotte. As the daughter of the monarch, she was styled HRH The Princess Amelia from birth.

Amelia was christened at the Chapel Royal, St James's Palace by John Moore, The Archbishop of Canterbury, on 17 September 1783. Her godparents were The Prince of Wales (Amelia's eldest brother), The Princess Royal (her eldest sister), and The Princess Augusta Sophia (her second eldest sister). She was the fifteenth sibling christened there.

Coming so soon after the death of Octavius and shortly before the end of the war between Great Britain and the United States, Amelia's birth was felt to be a beginning of a new period of hope, and much was expected of her, even from birth. "Our littlest sister is without exception one of the prettiest children I have ever seen," her oldest sister wrote to Prince William when Amelia was only a month old. She was expected to be as beautiful, charming, and winning as Octavius, her father's previous favorite child, had been. As a result of her two brothers' deaths, Amelia was considered as her father's favourite.

From an early age, Amelia was conscious of her rank. A popular tale relates that when the famous tragedian, Sarah Siddons, expressed a desire to kiss the beautiful baby, Amelia "...instantly held her little hand out to be kissed, so early had she learnt the lessons of Royalty." When Amelia was three, Fanny Burney, the Queen's Keeper of the Robes, commented that the princess could be "decorous and dignified when called upon to act en princess to any strangers, as if conscious of her high rank, and the importance of condescendingly sustaining it." As the youngest of the thirteen surviving children, Amelia was grouped with her sisters Mary and Sophia, and spent most of her time with them, living in various royal residences. From the beginning, the three younger princesses did not receive as much parental attention as their elder sisters had, and spent a good deal of time away from the King and Queen, communicating with them mostly by letter.

It seems that the three youngest princesses were much more wild than their elder sisters, as evidenced by their behavior when they sat for a portrait in 1785. In 1770, Zoffany had been able to paint the King, the Queen, and all six eldest children with little difficulty. In 1785, however, Copley had so much difficulty getting the dogs, birds, and especially the three royal children to sit still, he never painted another portrait. Compared to the carefully planned education that Charlotte, Augusta, and Elizabeth had been given, the education given to Mary, Sophia, and Amelia was based solely on what had come before. Amelia was only five years old when her father suffered his first bout of madness. As a consequence of her father's declining health, she never experienced the closeness and affection that had characterized the family during her eldest sisters' early years.