Albert and Victoria in 1846 with five of their eventual nine children
(Left to right: Alfred, Edward, Queen Victoria, Prince Albert, Alice, Helena and Victoria)
Throughout her sixty-four-year reign, Victoria oversaw great imperial expansion till, by 1913, a dozen years after her death, Britain ruled over 412 million people (23% of the world’s population) and more than thirteen million square miles. Britain also became the “workshop of the world” throughout the Industrial Revolution. In order to hold all of that together, “Victoria’s little wars” using both her naval dominance of the oceans and her well-trained regiments of the army, fought wars against the Abyssinians, Ashanti, Maoris, Boers (twice), Chinese (twice), Sudanese, Egyptians, and European powers in the Crimea.