Ask Sir James - Life of Sir James Reid, Personal Physician to Queen Victoria

1987 first edition hardcover with 315 pages in very good condition.

Sir James Reid was the most important of Queen Victoria's doctors during her middle and old age, and his grand-daughter publishes a great deal of fascinating material in her biography, giving a vivid picture of the court - and most notably of Victoria herself, though even on her death-bed he was never permitted to approach her near enough to use a stethoscope. Her relationship to her family, her courtiers, her protectiveness towards her Indian servants, her close friendship with the Scottish gillie John Brown are newly explored - and here is an account of just what was placed in her dead majesty's coffin, by the man who put it there. And yes, it did include a photograph of Brown, together with a lock of his hair, placed in her right hand - then disguised by flowers lest her family should see it!