Frogmore

Frogmore Gardens comprise 33 acres of private gardens within the grounds of the Home Park,Windsor Castle, England. It is the location of Frogmore House, a former royal residence. It is also the site of the Frogmore Mausoleum containing the grave of Victoria and Albert and of the Duchess of Kent's Mausoleum, burial place of Queen Victoria's Mother Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. Also within the Grounds lie various garden buildings and monuments including a Gothic Temple and "Queen Victoria's Tea House", a nineteenth century brick pavilion building.

The gardens are open to the public on a few days each year.

Frogmore House

Frogmore House was purchased by King George III for Queen Charlotte in 1792 for use as a country retreat. Earl Mountbatten of Burma was born here.

The Duchess of Kent's Mausoleum

This beautiful mausoleum within the Frogmore Gardens is the burial place of Queen Victoria's Mother, the Duchess of Kent [[Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld]]. The Mausoleum was designed by the architect Albert Jenkins Humbert to a concept design by Prince Albert's favourite artist, Professor Ludwig Grunner.

In the latter years of her life the Duchess lived in Frogmore House and in the 1850s, construction began on a "temple" in the grounds of the estate. The top portion of the finished building was intended to serve as a summer house for the Duchess during her lifetime, while the lower level was destined as her final resting place. The Duchess died at Frogmore House on March 16, 1861 before the summer house was completed so the upper chamber became part of the Mausoleum and now contains a statue of the Duchess.

The beautiful domed roof of the mausoleum can be seen from the grounds at Frogmore, but it is not open to the public.

Royal Mausoleum (or 'Frogmore Mausoleum')

The second mausolea in the grounds of Frogmore, just a short distance from the Duchess of Kent's Mausoleum is the very much larger Royal Mausoleum, the burial place of Queen Victoria and her consort Prince Albert.

Queen Victoria and her husband had long intended to construct a special resting place for them both, instead of the two of them being buried in one of the traditional resting places of British royalty, such as Westminster Abbey or St. George's Chapel, Windsor. A Mausoleum for the Queen's mother, the Duchess of Kent, was being constructed at Frogmore in 1861 when Prince Albert died in December of the same year. Within a few days of his premature death proposals for the Mausoleum were being drawn up by the same designers involved in the Duchess of Kent's Mausoleum: Professor Grunner and A.J.Humbert.

The building is in the form of a Greek cross. Work commenced in March 1862 and the building was consecrated in December 1862. The external walls are of granite and Portland stone and the roof is covered with Australian copper.

The interior decorations, an example of Victoriana at its most opulent, were not finished until 1871. The interior walls are predominantly in Portuguese red marble, a gift from the King Luis of Portugal, a cousin of both Victoria and Albert, and are inlaid with other marbles from around the world. The tomb itself was designed by Baron Carlo Marochetti. It features recumbent marble effigies of the Queen and Prince Albert. The sarcophagus was made from a single piece of grey Aberdeen granite.

Except for sovereigns, since 1928, most members of the royal family have been interred in the royal burial ground around Queen Victoria's mausoleum, although the former King Edward VIII (The Duke of Windsor) is buried at Frogmore, as is his wife, Wallis, Duchess of Windsor.

The Royal Mausoleum is open to the public on the same days as the Gardens.

See also

• Frogmore House
• Windsor Castle
• Windsor Great Park

External links

• Frogmore section of the official Royal Residences website — includes opening dates.
• Fuller unofficial information.