Ward's Book of Days.
Pages of interesting anniversaries.
What happened on this day in history.
MARCH 4th
On this day in history in 1821, died Princess Elizabeth of Clarence.
Elizabeth was a princess who would have succeeded to the throne instead of Queen Victoria, had it not been for her sudden and untimely death.
Elizabeth was born on December 10th 1820, at St James Palace, the daughter of Prince William, Duke of Clarence, later William IV. The king at the time of her birth, George IV, had no legitimate children alive, neither had his younger brother Prince Frederick, Duke of York. The birth of Elizabeth was a significant event as the young princess was the heir presumptive, being third in line for the throne after her uncle and father. Her mother, Adelaide, Duchess of Clarence, had had several difficult pregnancies with no other surviving children and unlikely to produce a son to displace Princess Elizabeth, who it was assumed would became, in due course, Elizabeth II.
Sad to relate, the young princess, at the age of only three months suffered a fit of convulsions and died on 4th March 1821. The Princess Victoria kept a bust of her young cousin in her private apartments in Kensington Palace. Victoria became queen in 1837, bringing in the Victorian Age and not the second Elizabethan Age.
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