Maud of Wales

The tomboyish Maud was known as "Harry" to the royal family, after Edward VII's friend Admiral Henry Keppel, whose conduct in the Crimean War was considered particularly courageous at the time.

[1][2] Maud took part in almost all the annual visits to the Princess of Wales's family gatherings in Denmark and later accompanied her mother and sisters on cruises to Norway and the Mediterranean.

[2] On 22 July 1896, Princess Maud married her first cousin, Prince Carl of Denmark, in the private chapel at Buckingham Palace.

The bride's father gave them Appleton House on the Sandringham Estate as a country residence for her frequent visits to England.

In June 1905 the Norwegian Storting dissolved Norway's 91-year-old union with Sweden and voted to offer the throne to Prince Carl of Denmark.

Following a plebiscite in November, Prince Carl accepted the Norwegian throne as King Haakon VII, while his young son was renamed Olav.

King Haakon VII and Queen Maud were crowned at Nidaros Cathedral in Trondheim on 22 June 1906; there has not been a coronation in Scandinavia since.

[6] She disliked representation but performed her role as a queen with great care, and used clothes and jewellery to make a regal impression.

She supported the feminist Katti Anker Møller's home for unwed mothers (1906), which was regarded as radical, designed furniture for the benefit of the Barnets utstilling (Children's Exhibition) 1921, and sold photographs for charitable purposes.

She learned to ski and arranged for English gardens at Kongsseteren, the royal lodge overlooking Oslo, and at the summer residence at Bygdøy.

She became ill and was taken to a nursing home at 18 Bentinck Street, Marylebone, London, where an abdominal operation was performed on 16 November 1938, where modern-day information suggests that she suffered from advanced cancer.

Although she survived the surgery, Maud died unexpectedly of heart failure on 20 November 1938,[8] six days before her 69th birthday and on the 13th anniversary of her mother's death.

Princess Maud of Wales (centre) as a teenager, together with her sisters Victoria (left) and Louise (right)
Photograph by Alice Hughes , c. 1895
Wedding of Princess Maud of Wales and Prince Carl of Denmark
Princess Maud, 1897
Maud following her coronation, wearing the Queen's Crown , and holding a sceptre and orb
Queen Maud with her husband and their son in July 1921
Statue of Maud at the Royal Palace, Oslo