George III's Children

by John van der Kiste

The eldest of King George III's children, who became Prince Regent and King George IV, is less remembered for his patronage of the arts than for his extravagance and maltreatment of his wife. This objective portrayal of the royal family draws upon sources to lay to rest the gossip and exaggeration.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Royalty, Biography

192 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1980

About the author

John Van der Kiste, British author, was born in Wendover, Buckinghamshire, on September 15, 1954, son of Wing Commander Guy Van der Kiste (1912–99). He was educated at Blundell's School, Tiverton, where he briefly formed a rock band Cobweb with fellow pupil Miles Tredinnick, later vocalist with new wave band London and subsequently playwright and scriptwriter, and read Librarianship at Ealing Technical College, where he edited the librarians’ student magazine.
He has worked for several years in public and academic libraries, but is best known as a writer. His first book, Frederick III, appeared in 1981, and since then he has published over twenty historical biographies, as well as books on local history, true crime, rock music, a novel and a play. He is also a contributor to Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Guinness Rockopaedia, and has produced articles on historical, musical and art subjects in national and local journals, including Illustrated London News, Royalty Digest, European Royal History Journal, Best of British, BBC History Magazine, Record Collector, Antique Collector, This England, The Independent, and Gibbons Stamp Monthly. He has reviewed books and records for the press, written CD booklet notes, and between 1991 and 1996 edited the 70s rock fanzine Keep on Rockin.
In 2002 he was a consultant for the BBC TV documentary 'The King, the Kaiser and the Tsar', first screened in January 2003.
He married professional musician and teacher Kim Graham (née Geldard) in 2003 and lives in Devon.

Reviews

[Dina · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting. I recommend this book to anyone interested in British history

The only problem was that it was challenging to read as the constant changes in names used to identify the characters was confusing. I recommend you have a genealogy chart with you. All in all though it was a good read.

[Colleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

A joint biography of the children of King George III and Queen Charlotte, van der Kiste once again demonstrates his interest in lesser known royals, focused on all 15 as equally as possible. Obviously, the kings have the most information available and those that dies young leave the story early, but he follows them from the first birth to the last death.

The last Hanovers tend to get short shift, as Queen Victoria's wicked, immoral relatives she must break free from. Van der Kiste turns the focus, centering his subjects and looking past the gossip to form a more balanced view. While he acknowledges gossip and its effect on history, he also shows its shortcomings and reasons. I particularly enjoyed the more balanced view of Ernest and how his reputation flucuated over the years.

This is an older book and more research has been done recently on the family, but most focuses on the whole family or just the princesses. This is the first work I've read that actually put the younger brothers back in the story, granting them as much attention as their elder brothers. Van der Kiste does a very good job balancing positives with negatives, showing good qualities without excusing excess and investigating why the family relationships cycled through such a rollercoaster.

There are some formatting issues - van der Kiste will switch from one to next with a new paragraph instead of a line break, which did confuse me several times, but that could be just a ebook problem.

[Jodi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although I can admire the work done by John van der Kiste in this work, my first praise must be for Queen Charlotte who gave birth to 15 children in 21 years. The author provides as much primary source material as possible for the coverage of many of the children. Arranging the text by theme rather than by individual children, was a pleasant surprise and shows the thorough understanding and research of each child mastered by van der Kiste. To illustrate, within the chapter, "Fatherly Admonitions" van der Kiste relays predominate instances in which children were called to the carpet by their father.

One caveat, the reader has to be well-versed in the children (can get tricky with the sons' titles and what names they go by in the family) to make full sense out of the chapters --make good use of the genealogical charts and the black & white reproduction pictures, (although not of the best quality, at least give an opportunity to picture the subjects). Ironically, the book cover of the edition I read, had the best pictures of the 15 off-spring.

[Rvchua · Rating 4 out of 5]

Noticed some errors...

[Annm · Rating 4 out of 5]

Useful for my NaNoWriMo research.

[Beth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Four stars for quality of information - an absolutely fascinating subject. Three and a half stars for presentation - I kept having to flip to the back to keep everyone straight. George II had a lot of children haha

[Michael Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

George III and Queen Charlotte had fifteen children in twenty-one years, all but two of whom survived to adulthood. They included George IV, William IV, and a collection of royal dukes (some of whom produced large families of illegitimate children) and princesses (most of whom married late or never). Until the middle of the 20th century, the family had a poor collective reputation, largely the product of propaganda by Whig politicians and historians. The publication of previously unseen correspondence and diaries has led to a degree of rehabilitation, but the Hanoverians probably will never rate highly with later generations. This isn’t just a collection of brief biographies but an informative study of the interrelationships among the siblings, their extra-familial connections within and outside the court. Van der Kiste has produced a number of mini-dynastic studies of this sort, of which this volume is perhaps the most useful because of the earlier period it covers.

[Nate · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was not particularly interested in the book until the death of Charlotte. The sisters were all quite dull, doing nothing and seeing nothing. Their affairs were really quite dull. The marriages produced no children and had no stories within them. The brothers were only interesting after their father's madness. The race to marry, have kids, produce an heir, really made the book interesting.

[Sally · Rating 4 out of 5]

A large brood, with strange lives. Learn all about the children of the King whi lost the colonies.

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good overview of and introduction to his children