Etching of Victoria, Princess Royal and Empress of Germany as princess. Two whole length portraits as an infant with nurse. Vignette with English inscription below.

Another impression of RCIN 816215. An etching showing three studies of Victoria, Princess Royal as a small child. After RCIN 980024.w. In the study to the right, she is shown seated on her nurse's lap draped in a towel. She is shown in the bath in the central study and seated on a chair, dressed in a nightdress and cap, in the study to the left. Inscribed upper centre: Pussy
Inscribed lower centre: Before going to bed.
Inscribed lower left: VR del & scult 9/4 1843.

Queen Victoria's first etching was made on 28 August 1840, under the guidance of Sir George Hayter who was working on his oil painting of the marriage of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert (RCIN 407165) at the time.

Hayter was responsible for the acid-biting of all of the early plates but was soon replaced in this task by Queen Victoria's dresser, Marianne Skerrett. The London dealers and publishers Colnaghi & Co were also used for some of the more complicated plates. A printing press was set up at Buckingham Palace in 1840 by the firm of Holdgate but some of the royal couple's plates were also printed by a Mr Brown of Castle-Street, Windsor, in the autumn of that year

Queen Victoria's first child Victoria, Princess Royal was born on 21 November 1840 and nicknamed Pussy by her parents. The nursery life of the growing brood of royal children offered the young queen a wealth of inspiration for her own painting, drawing and etching.

Scott-Elliott no. 56