Queen Victoria had all died, leaving no surviving legitimate children. The United Kingdom was already an established constitutional monarchy, in which the sovereign held relatively little direct political power. Privately, Victoria attempted to influence government policy and ministerial appointments; publicly, she became a national icon who was identified with strict standards of personal morality. Victoria married her first cousin Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha in 1840. Their nine children married into royal and noble families across the continent, tying them together and earning her the sobriquet "the grandmother of Europe". After Albert's death in 1861, Victoria plunged into deep mourning and
Prince Albert Mountains Prince Albert Mountains The Prince Albert Mountains () are a major mountain group in Antarctica over 320 km (200 mi) long. Located in Victoria Land, they run north-south between the Priestley and Ferrar glaicers. They were named for Prince Albert, the consort of the British Queen Victoria. Although they were discovered by Sir James Clark Ross on February 17, 1841, they were not first explored until the early 1900s, when British cartographers came. They were mapped and surveyed carefully by explorers from the United States and New Zealand in the 1950s and 1960s. This range include the following mountains: Other