Princess Alexandra's Own Band March

Historical Notes

Alexandra of Denmark (Alexandra Caroline Marie Charlotte Louise Julia; 1844-1925) was Queen of the United Kingdom and Empress of India as the wife of King-Emperor Edward VII. At the age of sixteen, she was chosen as the future wife of Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, the heir apparent of Queen Victoria. They married eighteen months later in 1863, the same year her father became king of Denmark as Christian IX and her brother was appointed to the vacant Greek throne as George I. She was Princess of Wales from 1863 to 1901, the longest anyone has ever held that title, and became generally popular; her style of dress and bearing were copied by fashion-conscious women. Largely excluded from wielding any political power, she unsuccessfully attempted to sway the opinion of British ministers and her husband's family to favour Greek and Danish interests. Her public duties were restricted to uncontroversial involvement in charitable work. On the death of Queen Victoria in 1901, Albert Edward became king-emperor as Edward VII, with Alexandra as queen-empress consort. From Edward's death in 1910 until her own in 1925 she was the queen mother, being a dowager queen and the mother of the reigning monarch, George V, although she was more generally styled Her Majesty Queen Alexandra. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexandra_of_Denmark John Blockley (1800-82) was one of a number of composer publishers who set the best poems (Tennyson, Longfellow, Norton, etc.) to their music and in so doing made a huge amount of money. His work was initially published from the 1820's and, by 1856, he had set up his own publishing business. On his death in 1882, his son John Thomas took over and continued the family firm until it was bought by Ascherberg, Hopwood & Crew. http://gerald-massey.org.uk/craig/c_miscellaneous_1.htm