A Visual (Partial) Genealogy of the Three Royal Cousins, Ruling Monarchs During World War I

I have very much been enjoying the book "King, Kaiser, Tsar" by Catrine Clay. The book describes the three royal cousins who ruled during World War I: King George V of England, Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany and Czar Nicholas II of Russia. The book does more than describe political situations but gives many details about the upbringing, education, courtship and lifestyle of all three monarchs, taking many excerpts from personal letters and diaries.

As the royal relationships between the three are somewhat complicated, I thought it would help me to visualize it, so I collected some historical photographs.

All three cousins are descended from Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Queen Victoria reigned in England from 1837 to 1901.

Queen Victoria and Prince Albert

Queen Victoria, Prince Albert and children

Unfortunately, I do not know precisely who is who among the royal children in the above photo. I do know that Princess Vicky was the oldest daughter, Princess Alice was the second daughter and Bertie (who became King Edward VII) was the oldest son, so that may give us some idea while trying to interpret this photo.

King Edward VII and Queen Consort Alexandra

King Edward VII reigned in England from 1901 to 1910.

King Edward VII's wife Alexandra was a sister to Russian Empress Maria Federovna, who became the mother to Czar Nicholas II. The two sisters were Danish princesses, children to King Christian IX of Denmark and Princess Louise of Hesse-Kassel.

Queen Consort Alexandra of England and Empress Maria Federovna of Russia, sisters

King George V, son of King Edward VII and Queen Consort Alexandra

King George V reigned in England from 1910 to 1936.

Princess Vicky, daughter to Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, married Kaiser Frederick III, Kaiser of Germany, King of Prussia. She became Empress of Germany and Queen of Prussia. Kaiser Frederick III reigned in Germany from March 9 to June 15, 1888.


Kaiser Frederick III of Germany and Princess Victoria

Kaiser Wilhem II, son to Kaiser Frederick III and Princess Victoria

Kaiser Wilhelm II reigned in Germany from 1888 to 1918.

Princess Alice, daughter of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, married Grand Duke Louis IV of Germany and became the Grand Duchess of Hesse.

Princess Alice (Grand Duchess of Hesse)and Grand Duke Louis IV of Hesse, of Germany

Empress Alexandra Federovna of Russia, daughter of Princess Alice (Grand Duchess of Hesse)and Grand Duke Louis IV of Hesse, granddaughter of Queen Victoria and wife of Czar Nicholas II

Just a reminder -- Czar Nicholas II was also related to King George V by their mothers who were sisters, Empress Maria Federovna of Russia and Queen Consort Alexandra of England, Danish princesses. Czar Nicholas II reigned from 1894 to 1917.

Czar Nicholas II of Russia and Empress Alexandra Federovna

Photo of King Edward VII of England and Czar Nicholas II of Russia with families

The photo above was taken during Cowes Week on the Isle of Wight in 1909. From left to right: David (future Duke of Windsor, his mother Princess of Wales Mary (later Queen), Grandmother Queen Alexandra, her granddaughter Princess Mary, Czar Nicholas II,Princess Victoria(daughter Alexandra, King Edward VII, Grandduchess Olga of Russia, her Mother the Empress of Russia Alexandra, her daughter Grandduchess Tatiana,Prince George of Wales (later King George V) next to him Grandduchess Maria and in the front, Grandduchess Anastasia and Czarevitch Alexis.

The children of Czar Nicholas II: Maria, Tatiana, Anastasia, Olga, Alexei

King George V and Czar Nicholas II

In the above photo, first cousins Tsar Nicholas II and King George V exchange uniforms since they looked so much alike.

So, hopefully, this collection of photographs and captions helps to visualize the succession of royalty and their various relationships. In review, all three cousins were related to Queen Victoria (one through marriage). King George V, son to King Edward VII and Queen Consort Alexandra, and Kaiser Wilhelm II, son of Kaiser Frederick III and Princess (Empress and Queen of Prussia)Victoria, were grandsons to Queen Victoria. The wife of Czar Nicholas II, Alexandra Federovna, was a daughter of Princess Alice and granddaughter of Queen Victoria. Czar Nicholas II was also a first cousin to King George V through their mothers who were sisters and Danish princesses.

Books That Captivated Me at Barnes & Noble

Today, I thought I would be blogging about the play Damn Yankees. Friday night, I drove down to the Menlo Park Mall in Edison, New Jersey to meet my friend, Sharon. Our plan was to eat dinner in the food court there and then go on to the nearby Roosevelt Park for Plays in the Park, the play of the evening being Damn Yankees. But, alas, we arrived at the park just in time to hear that it was cancelled due to rain. It had, by that time, already begun to drizzle. So, deciding to come back for another try in better weather, Sharon, my fellow bibliophile, and I headed back to the mall for our favorite hang-out, Barnes & Noble. After a few moments of browsing, Sharon had found a book that intrigued her and began to peruse it. My attitude at a bookstore, or with reading in general, is like a sumo wrestler at an all-you-can-eat buffet, so I found a pile of five, a fairly versatile selection, which I carried to our table in the cafe section.

I can not give full recommendations for the books I picked, because I did not read all five books while sitting in the Barnes & Noble cafe over an iced caramel macchiato, but I can give a little description of each and tell you why they intrigued me. Each of them initially caught my attention either by the title or cover picture or both which compelled me to read the back covers. Sitting down with them, I read a few opening pages.

First...

Sharon's pick -- Runaway Girl: Escaping Life on the Streets, One Helping Hand at a Time by Carissa Phelps

This is the one Sharon picked up, but I quickly agreed with her that it was an interesting book. It is an inspirational autobiography. The author ran away at twelve and got connected with a brutal pimp. Eventually, she ran away from that life, feeling abused and neglected. By age 30, thanks to a teacher and counselor, she graduated UCLA with a law degree and an MBA. Now, she works with the homeless and with at-risk teens.

I wish it was more widely understood, especially by men, that women who get into the prostitution business aren't necessarily in love with what they do. For some, it's a desperate attempt at survival, and many are entrapped. They may be abused and may be compelled to do things distasteful to themselves. In the current trends of human trafficking, many girls are ensnared into it by deceitful means. No wonder Jesus was a friend of prostitutes. He understood their pain and believed them to be totally redeemable.

I really appreciate this organization, Nightlight Bangkok. This organization helps the intervention and rescue of victims of commercial sexual exploitation. Women are given vocational training in jewelry making. Purchasing jewelry from the website will support these women in their new lifestyle.

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

This first caught my eye by its dramatic cover in red, black and white and the words #1 National Bestseller, which is no indication that it will be a favorite of mine, but it is an indication that it is a favorite of many other people. One reviewer called it "a literary fantasy," and the author herself stated that all her books are "fairy tales in one way or another." The story is of two fiercely competing magicians, Marco and Celia, at Le Cirque des Reves, who, in spite of everything, fall in love. After perusing it very shortly, one thing I noticed was that its format and organization seemed creative, the style was engaging, and I immediately felt like I was expecting something exciting to happen.

The Thread by Victoria Hislop

I will need to tell my Greek American writer friend Stephanie -- check out her blog -- that this novel set in Greece caught my eye. She and I had just been commenting on a photo she posted to facebook. The photo showed a man climbing a hill, leading a flock of sheep which seemed to occupy the whole span of a public road. Stephanie posted that this was a common scene near her home in Greece.

The sentence on the back cover that caught my attention was this, "Thessaloniki, 1917: As Dimitri Komninos is born, a fire sweeps through the thriving multicultural city where Christians, Jews and Muslims live side by side." The story seems to be some historical saga spanning 80 years of "Nazi occupation, civil war, persecution and economic collapse."

Although, I identify with the first group mentioned, Christians, I have a great interest in Jews and Muslims and in stories where the three religious and cultural groups have lived in close proximity, such as in Bosnia. One fictional book I read recently along this line is People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks. The story traces the history of a mysterious illuminated Haggadah that is found in Sarajevo. The book, although fictional, is somewhat based on an actual find.

I liked Hislop's descriptive style, giving you the feeling that you are in the setting she describes, as in this sample, "With the lifting haze, Mount Olympus gradually emerged far away from the Thermaic Gulf and the restful blues of sea and sky shrugged off their pale shroud." I did not, as with reading The Night Circus, feel like I was being set up for something exciting to happen. That may have been misleading as one reviewer called this book "a page turner," which to me suggests fast-paced. But even if it does not read like a thriller, that is not a deterrent to me. I enjoy books which show some lulls between the action and takes the time to make you deeply acquainted with the characters.

Mistress of Mourning by Karen Harper

A fan of the costume drama, the medieval gowns on the cover caught my attention at first. From the back cover, "London, 1501. In a time of political unrest, Varina Westcott, a young widow and candle maker for court and church, agrees to perform a clandestine service for Queen Elizabeth of York, wife of Henry VII--carve wax figures of four dead children, two of her offspring lost in infancy and her two brothers, the Princes of the Tower, whose mysterious disappearance years ago has never been solved."

This hooked me. I remember the story of the "Princes of the Tower" as told in one of my favorite Shakespeare plays, Richard III. Why I like this play is a mystery even to myself, because it is a tragedy and full of bloodshed. In college days, I saw it performed when the college hosted a series of Shakespeare film nights, and it has been a favorite ever since. I think I like the banter between Richard III and Queen Elizabeth (Woodville), queen consort of England as the wife of King Edward IV. I remember these lines. The murderous Richard III wants permission to woo her daughter, Elizabeth of York.

"Richard III: Then in plain terms, tell her my loving tale.

Queen Elizabeth: Plain and not honest is too harsh a style.

Richard III: Your reasons are too shallow and too quick.

Queen Elizabeth: Oh no, my reasons are too deep and too dead, too deep and dead, poor infants in their graves.[A reference to the "Princes of the Tower."]"

Lately too, I am very interested in learning about the history of British royalty, both through film and books. Watching The Young Victoria, which I loved, inspired me to read Queen Victoria's biography by Lytton Strachey. After I saw The King's Speech, I was inspired to read The King's Speech: A Lesson in Perseverance (What George VI Can Teach Us) by Susan Crimp.

The Fatal Gift of Beauty: The Trials of Amanda Knox by Nina Burleigh

I don't have a very definite opinion on the guilt or innocence of Amanda Knox, the American girl who, while studying Italian abroad in Perugia, found herself accused of the murder of her housemate, Meredith Kercher. I am a little interested to see what the author's conclusions are. The book appears to be well-researched. The opening pages featured a detailed diagram of the house where Amanda and Meredith lived, a map pointing out key places in Perugia and their relationships to one another, and a listing and description of all the people pertinent to this story. The book's title is taken from a Lord Byron quote which is given its own page, "Oh Italia, Italia! Thou who hast the fatal gift of beauty." I wonder though if the author has given that phrase more than one meaning.

The Girl in the Blue Beret by Bobbie Ann Mason

The book I saw in Barnes & Noble had a different front cover than the one shown. That cover picture featured a girl with a bicycle, but the head of the girl was past the picture's frame of the picture. It is odd, and perhaps purposefully mysterious, that the girl in the picture, whom we could assume is the title character, does not show her head, never mind a blue beret.

This historical novel, set in World War II, starts in an exciting way, with a fiery plane crash. I was thinking at the time that I was reading that this bit of writing was quite an accomplishment for a woman since I know very few who are knowledgeable about planes or have first-hand experience as pilots. The story is based on the real war experiences of the author's father-in-law. I can see that she likely interviewed him extensively to give you the feeling that she did have that first-hand experience.

The story is of Marshall Stone, a U.S. flyboy stationed in England, who is forced to crash land his B-17 in Belgium near the French border. Ordinary citizens, members of the Resistance, help him find an escape route back to England. Decades later, he returns to the crash site, wanting to find the people who helped him and especially one girl who risked her life for him, the girl in the blue beret. Lovely thought, right?

What Would Charles Dickens Do About the Toy Sweatshops in China?

I love Charles Dickens as a writer for a variety of reasons. I own the full collection of all his books, have read nine of his novels so far and jump at the chance to watch every BBC "Masterpiece Theater" special based on his books. This sounds like I am about to recite poetry to him, "How do I love Charles Dickens, let me count the ways," or stand on my desk like those students in "Dead Poets' Society," reciting, "Oh Captain, My Captain."

I know worship belongs only to God, but I admire Dickens very much, perhaps because some of Dickens' thoughts and feelings seem akin to the thoughts and feelings of God.

Dickens had a pronounced sense of social injustice. He wrote with much sympathy about the hardships of the poor and downtrodden, pointing out some of the flaws of his society, and even inspiring change. In "Nicholas Nickleby," the cruel schoolmaster of Dotheby's Hall, Wackford Squeers, is based on William Shaw of Bowes Academy in Yorkshire, a school Dickens had visited. Shaw's school is said to have gone bankrupt as a result of the novel's publication. Shaw was prosecuted in 1823 when two of his students went blind, allegedly because of the poor conditions in the school.

Below, Jim Broadbent as Wackford Squeers in the 2002 movie, "Nicholas Nickleby"

Dickens knew some of the hardships that inspired his writing firsthand. Dickens' father was imprisoned for debt in the Marshalsea Prison just like the father of his character Little (Amy) Dorrit.

Photo from the 2008 "Masterpiece Theater" version of "Little Dorrit"

At twelve years old, with his father in prison, Dickens was put to work in Warren's Blacking Factory. It was a shoe polish factory. Young Dickens would stand in a little window, pasting labels onto bottles, where the passersby could watch him. Dickens wrote of this part of his life, "My whole nature was so penetrated with the grief and humiliation of [the experience] that even now, famous and caressed and happy, I often forget in my dreams that I am a man; and wander desolately back to that time in my life."

Warren's Blacking Factory

Similarly, some of the boy characters in Dickens' novels were also introduced to oppressive work conditions in childhood. Oliver is almost apprenticed to a cruel chimney sweep called Gamfield. Gamfield "happened to labor under the slight imputation of having bruised three or four boys to their death already." A board member of the workhouse where Oliver Twist lives tells Gamfield that boys have been smothered in chimneys.

From "Oliver Twist:"

"'That's acause they damped the straw afore they lit it in the chimbley to make 'em come down again,' said Gamfield; 'that's all smoke, and no blaze; vereas smoke ain't o' no use at all in making a boy come down, for it only sinds him to sleep, and that's wot he likes. Boys is wery obstinit, and wery lazy gen'l'men, and there's nothink like a good hot blaze to make 'em come down with a run. It's humane too, gen'l'men, acause, even if they've stuck in the chimbley, roasting their feet makes 'em struggle to hextricate themselves.'"

What a different picture this presents than the jolly dancing chimney sweeps in a favorite movie of mine, "Mary Poppins."

I prefer the idea of the jolly chimney sweep with the roofs of London as his playground, but you wonder how jolly you could be breathing in soot and crawling into tight spaces, with or without a cruel Gamfield to give you additional grief. The poet, William Blake, also wrote with sympathy about the child as chimney sweep.

In Oliver's case, his fate was saved from chimney sweeping. The magistrate, seeing Oliver's terrified face, does not sign the indentures. Oliver is later sold into service with an undertaker.

"Boy For Sale" from the 1969 musical "Oliver!"



In "David Copperfield," life changes for the title character when his mother remarries, a Mr. Murdstone.

David's stepfather, who has no affection for him, eventually sends him out to make his own way in the world.

"Murdstone and Grinby's Warehouse was at the waterside. It was down in Blackfriars. Modern improvements have altered the place: but it was the last house at the bottom of a narrow street, curving down hill to the river, with some stairs at the end, where people took boat. It was a crazy old house with a wharf of its own, abutting on the water when the tide was in, and on the mud when the tide was out, and literally overrun with rats. Its panelled rooms, discoloured with the dirt and smoke of a hundred years, I dare say; its decaying floors and staircase; the squeaking and shuffling of the old grey rats down in the cellars; and the dirt and rottenness of the place; are things, not of many years ago, in my mind, but at the present instant. They are all before me, just as they were in the evil hour when I went among them for the first time, with my trembling hand in Mr. Quinion's.

Murdstone and Grinby's trade was among a good many kinds of people, but an important branch of it was the supply of wines and spirits to certain packet ships. I forget now where they chiefly went, but I think there were some among them that made voyages both to the East and West Indies. I know that a great many empty bottles were one of the consequences of this traffic, and that certain men and boys were employed to examine them against the light, and reject those that were flawed, and rinse and wash them. When the empty bottles ran short, there were labels to be pasted on full ones, or corks to be fitted to them, or seals to be put upon the corks, or finished bottles to be put in casks. All this work was my work, and of the boys employed to it, I was one."

Dickens novels may be fiction, but some real people lived a life that resembled that fiction. David Cody, associate professor of English at Hartwick College, writes on www.Victorianweb.org,

"Many children worked 16 hour days under atrocious conditions, as their elders did. Ineffective parliamentary acts to regulate the work of workhouse children in factories and cotton mills to 12 hours per day had been passed as early as 1802 and 1819. After radical agitation, notably in 1831, when "Short Time Committees" organized largely by Evangelicals began to demand a ten hour day, a royal commission established by the Whig government recommended in 1833 that children aged 11-18 be permitted to work a maximum of twelve hours per day; children 9-11 were allowed to work 8 hour days; and children under 9 were no longer permitted to work at all (children as young as 3 had been put to work previously). This act applied only to the textile industry, where children were put to work at the age of 5, and not to a host of other industries and occupations."

Cody added that both boys and girls started work in coal and iron mines at age five and generally died by age 25.

Children working in a 19th century textile mill

But sweatshop labor did not die out with the 19th century or the making of Dickens novels. I have been vaguely aware of this for some time, hearing, at times, that we should boycott certain products made in China. The issue became more real to me recently when I delved into research, with my fictional mystery story in mind, on the toy industry. (My main character is a toy inventor.) I learned a lot from reading "The Real Toy Story" by Eric Clark, (who is, as far as I know, no relation to me.)

A staggering 80 percent of America's toys are made in Chinese factories. There are 8000 toy factories, employing 3 million workers, in China. These include Barbie dolls, Bratz dolls, G.I. Joe, Etch a Sketch and many others.

China does have labor laws in place, but they are routinely violated. The China Business Journal states, "Labor rights violations are so widespread in China that violations can be presumed to exist in every factory until proven otherwise."

In 1997, Mattel, the maker of Barbie, announced that all plants would have to comply with a code of conduct regarding hours, wages, conditions and minimum age of workers. Mattel, to their credit, has run routine inspections on their Chinese plants, but the situation is almost impossible to police. The plants will put on a good front for the sake of inspection while operating differently the majority of the time.

Chinese workers in a Mattel plant

Clark describes the conditions in these Chinese toy plants, the unbearable work conditions and living conditions for workers in the dormitories, unbelievably low wages, as well as the unfair contracts in which workers are essentially held in slavery, by systems of fines and deductions, with no options to go elsewhere. Most moving to me personally is the testimony of a particular individual, gained from clandestine interviews away from the factory.

From "The Real Toy Story" by Eric Clark:

"Li Mei is worn out, so she looks older than her 18 years. Her hair is in a smooth black ponytail, but her skin is bad from too little daylight, and she has many healing and still-open cuts on her hands. Her neck, chest and forearms are heavily mottled with the raised red patches of allergy caused by toxic chemicals, which she scratches as she speaks. She coughs a lot and has chronic aches and pains, frequent headaches and sometimes blurred vision. All these ailments appeared during the last two years: Li Mei works in a Dongguan toy factory.

She is a rural migrant from Xiaoshan, a remote mountain hamlet in the rural province of western Sichuan. Li Mei was thrilled to be one of the dagongmei, the working girls, to quit the hamlet where there are no roads, one telephone, and only limited electricity. She was also frightened because she knew that Dongguan has a reputation as a sweatshop. Many young people returned from the factories with disfigurements and strange illnesses. And then there was the fate of Li Chunmei, who was born in her village. She had been a runner in the Hainan Toy Factory in Songgang near Shenzhen, rushing stuffed animals swiftly from one worker to the next for each step in production. They said in the village that she ran all the time, 16 hours a day, seven days a week, for two solid months, without a day off. She was paid the equivalent of 12 cents an hour. She collapsed one night, bleeding from the nose and mouth on the bathroom floor, and was found hours later. She died before the ambulance arrived; she was just 19."

Bratz dolls in Chinese plant

Later, I read about Li Mei's own experience in the factory.

"The air in the coloring and spraying department was filled with paint dust and smelled sourly of chemicals -- acetone, ethylene, trichloride, benzene -- and hurt her throat. The windows were filled with heavy wire mesh, the exits locked to prevent pilfering. Noisy ventilators added to the din of the spraying machines, so the team leader had to shout at Li Mei to be heard. She was given a blue chef's apron to wear and shown how to paint eyes of the dolls with four pens of different sizes: fussy work, she thought, easy enough. But she had to paint one every 7.2 seconds -- 4000 a day. She was warned to check the chemical labels on the tins of paint and thinner she was to use but not asked if she could read. One of the girls -- some were only 12 o 13 -- told her no one understood the labels or even if they were correct, and some were labeled in English anyway. Li Mei's cotton mask and gloves were thin, and by the end of the second day, they were thick with paint particles and useless. She asked for new ones but was refused; they were replaced just once a week. Her hands were stained with the chemical paint, which plain water would not remove. The girls would show her how to clean them with solvents that irritated the skin and whose hazards they are ignorant of. During the first few days, she found the overpowering heat, combined with the smell of chemicals, repulsive. She felt she was going to throw up and she had stomachaches and felt dizzy. Once she fainted; her section leader told her to have a rest, rub on some herbal ointment, and go back to work."

I am not a parent. My niece and nephews are grown. I don't have great need to buy toys for the people in my family, with the exception, perhaps, of some more sophisticated toys such as board games, computer and video games. I buy toys once a year to benefit poor children around the world, through Operation Christmas Child, an aspect of Franklin Graham's organization, Samaritan's Purse. Many, many others also get involved with this organization as well as other organizations such as Toys for Tots that do toy drives around Christmas time. I now have mixed feelings about giving toys to benefit one poor child when another (perhaps) child was exploited in the making of that toy.

And the particulars of the suffering is much more than I can share in so few words. So, what do we do? What would Charles Dickens do about the toy sweatshops in China? Charles Kernaghan, executive director of the Institute for Global Labour and Human Rights, stated, "You can't call for boycotts. It is true that in this global economy, it is better to be exploited than to have no job at all." But a team of faculty and students at MIT said, "While accepting that a bad job may be better than nothing, we should continue to fight the abuse of human lives...If we justify abuse under the premise that is better than the worst alternative, we create a slippery slope, leading down to the complete devaluation of human life."

Would Charles Dickens boycott? Would he buy from only the 20 percent of toys not made in China? Perhaps. I'm sure that, even if he felt he could do very little else for such a complex problem, he would pick up his pen and write. And, so I hope I have begun to do my part by sharing information.