Prince William Frederick, Duke of Gloucester and Edinburgh, was born in 1776; his father, Prince William Henry, was George III’s younger brother. From birth the Prince’s title was ‘His Highness’ until the Prince Regent granted him the style ‘His Royal Highness’ on his marriage in July, 1816 to Princess Mary, his cousin (and the already Royal sister of both the Prince Regent and Adolphus, 1st Duke of Cambridge). Having been appointed Field Marshal on 24 May 1816, the Duke of Gloucester, like Adolphus, received one of the first Field Marshal’s batons made to be carried at George IV’s Coronation in 1821; he died in 1834.

 

His widow Princess Mary, Duchess of Gloucester (1776-1857) became the last-surviving and longest-lived of the children of George III, and is believed to have become the only one to be photographed. Having no children of her own she and her nephew George, 2nd Duke of Cambridge became extremely close and were deeply fond of one another, as the Duke’s personal diaries clearly demonstrate.  The Duchess bequeathed to him her home, Gloucester House, as well as many of her possessions, and whether George was given the baton by his aunt during her lifetime or whether he inherited it, it has formed part of the Cambridge Collection ever since George’s death in 1904.  The whereabouts of his own baton, however, which was presumably presented to him following his appointment as Field Marshal on 9 November 1862, are unknown (as mentioned above; see also the preceding lot).