Portrait of H.R.H. The Duchess of Kent, mother of Queen Victoria, an engraaving after the portrait by Winterhalter. Formerly Victoria of Saxe-Coburg, she was the widowed sister of Leopold of Saxe-Coburg who had himself been widowed in 1817 when Princess Charlotte, George IV's heir, had died in childbirth. The event led to the infamous 'race for wives' among George III's sons and it was Victoria, following her marriage to the Duke of Kent who was the first to produce a female heir to the British throne in 1819.