H.M. Yacht Victoria and Albert (II) at anchor in the Mediterranean

The second British royal yacht to be name Victoria & Albert was built at Pembroke Dock and launched on 16th January 1855. Displacing 2,470 tons and measuring 300 feet in length with a 40 foot beam, she was the largest royal yacht of the Victorian era and remained in service until the very end of the Queen's long life. So successful was the yacht that, almost immediately, she became a much-loved floating home to Queen Victoria and Prince Albert with the result that, after the Prince Consort's untimely death in 1861, the Queen would neither allow anything on baord to be changed nor contemplate the idea of a modern screw-powered replacement. The old paddle yacht's last official voyage was to carry the Queen to and from her visit to Ireland in April 1900, by which time a new yacht was fitting out to replace her. In the event, Queen Victoria died before the third Victoria & Albert could be commissioned and thus the Queen was spared the sadness of watching her favourite yacht going to the breakers in 1904.

Despite her long service life, Victoria & Albert (II) only sailed into the Mediterranean on one occasion when she was loaned to the Empress of Austria for a brief cruise from Madeira to Trieste, via Gibraltar, in the spring of 1861. Several ports were visited and this charming work must have been executed during one of these calls.