[FRIEDRICH

Photographed after a Sandringham shoot by the Royal photographers. It is unusual to find an image of the Crown Prince with his gun. The velvet suit was a gift from Queen Victoria and this was a private family photograph, coming from the album of Princess Louise. Any material relating to Friedrich III is uncommon due to his early death from throat cancer. He only survived his father Wilhelm I by three months. As Crown Prince his position was made very difficult by his opposition to Bismarck and also as his wife Victoria, Empress Frederick antagonised the Prussian people with her aggressive & tactless Englishness. Hills & Saunders was one of the leading Victorian photographic firms, started as a partnership between Robert Hills & John Henry Saunders. They were social photographers with studios at different times in London, Harrow & Eton & Rugby, Oxford & Cambridge and Aldershot & Sandhurst. They were successful photographers to the royal family.