Her father, Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn (1767-1820), the fourth son of George III., was a man of decided character, kindly, pious, punctual, with a strict sense of duty and enlightened ideas. He was a devoted soldier, and, as Queen Victoria once said, "was proud of his profession, and I was always taught to consider myself a soldier's child." He had a wide military experience, having served at Gibraltar, in Canada, and in the West Indies. He had been mentioned in despatches, but was said to be over-strict in matters of unimportant detail. His active career was brought to an end in 1802, when he had been sent to Gibraltar to restore order in a mutinous garrison. Order had been restored, but the Duke was recalled under allegations of having exercised undue severity, and the investigation which he demanded was refused him, though he was afterwards made a Field-Marshal. He was a man of advanced Liberal ideas. He had spoken in the House of Lords in favour of Catholic Emancipation, and had shown himself interested in the abolition of slavery and in popular education. His tastes were literary, and towards the end of his life he had even manifested a strong sympathy for socialistic theories. At the time of the death of the Princess Charlotte, 6th November 1817, the married sons of King George III. were without legitimate children, and the surviving daughters were either unmarried or childless. Alliances were accordingly arranged for the three unmarried Royal Dukes, and in the course of the year 1818 the Dukes of Cambridge, Kent, and Clarence led their brides to the altar. [Pageheading: THE DUKE AND DUCHESS OF KENT] The Duchess of Kent (1786-1861), Victoria Mary Louisa, was a daughter of Francis, Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. She was the widow of Emich Charles, Prince of Leiningen,[1] whom she had married in 1803, and who had died in 1814, leaving a son and a daughter by her. [Footnote 1: _Leiningen_, a mediatised princely House of Germany, dating back to 1096. In 1779 the head of one of the branches into which it had become divided, the Count of Leiningen-Dachsburg-Hardenburg, was raised to the rank of a prince of the Empire, but the Peace of Lunéville (1801) deprived him of his ancient possessions, extending about 232 miles on the left bank of the Rhine. Though no longer an independent Prince, the head of the House retains his rank and wealth, and owns extensive estates in Bavaria and Hesse.] The Duke of Kent died prematurely--though he had always been a conspicuously healthy man--at Sidmouth, on the 23rd of January 1820, only a week before his father.