Benjamin Disraeli died on April 19th, 1881.
Protocol did not permit Queen Victoria to
attend his funeral, but she sent two wreaths of primroses with a simple message
attached: “His favourite flowers.”
She used to dispatch many bunches of
primroses from Osborne House, her holiday home on the Isle of Wight, to
Disraeli, for which he always thanked her effusively. Perhaps he was just being
polite; perhaps he really did like primroses more than any other flower.
Queen Victoria sent primroses to Disraeli’s
grave at his home in High Wycombe on each anniversary of his death until 1901,
when she herself died.
Some people allege that by ‘his’, Queen
Victoria meant Prince Albert’s!
Either way, because of what she wrote and
sent, primroses became associated with Disraeli’s name and were featured in two
legacies, Primrose Day and The Primrose League.
Primrose Day
On the first anniversary of Disraeli’s death,
many people in London wore primroses in their hats and buttonholes as a tribute
to the great statesman who had done so much for his country and the British Empire.
This established a tradition; for decades
to come April 19th was Primrose Day, which became an unofficial national
holiday until the First World War.
On the day, people made pilgrimages to
Disraeli’s grave and to his statue near the Parliament that was his Mecca.
As late as 1916, Pathé News filmed the laying
of a wreath of primroses at Disraeli’s statue outside the Palace of
Westminster.
No other Prime Minister’s death has been
honoured in this way.
