Shooting Victoria ~ Paul Thomas Murphy

It’s astonishing to learn that during her long reign Queen Victoria endured no less than seven incidents where she was menaced with a pistol (and in one case, struck by a cane). Shooting Victoria is a fascinating, if long, book concerned with these seven incidents and how they shaped Victoria’s reign, her attitude to her people, and theirs to her.

Of these seven men who threatened the Queen’s life (on the face of it, acts of High Treason), not a single one was executed, an extraordinary circumstance in itself. Most were deemed to be insane and several subsequently spent time in asylums like Bedlam or Broadmoor, though none ended up staying there. Three of them were transported to Australia, or went there voluntarily, and made reasonable lives for themselves. For example her first assailant, Edward Oxford, travelled to Melbourne, changed his name to John Freeman, and became a pillar of the local art and literary scene, writing for The Argus newspaper, and later publishing a well-regarded book called Lights and Shadows of Melbourne Life in 1888.

Murphy uses these incidents to give a detailed description of the life and times of these assailants, and in particular, to tell the story of Queen Victoria’s reign, and how these violent assaults affected her. In many respects, these threats strengthened the love of the people for their sovereign and her consort Prince Albert, something that certainly wasn’t a foregone conclusion.

As a say, a long book, but a really interesting and well-researched one.