Was Eleanor's gift a dainty dish to set before the Queen?

She lived at Stanwick for the last 50 years of her life, enjoying the homegrown bananas, peaches, grapes, figs and, of course, nectarines.

But, as en exhibition this weekend and a newly-published booklet show, the dish she set before Queen Victoria came from another of her stately homes.

The exhibition is in the church at Stanwick St John - get lost in the higgledy-piggledy lanes around Aldborough St John and you'll eventually stumble upon Stanwick - and will tell Eleanor's life story, which has marked similarities to that of her Queen.

Eleanor was born in 1820, only a year after Victoria. She married in 1842, only two years after Victoria.

Her husband was Algernon, Lord Prudhoe, and they lived at his family's secondary house at Stanwick Hall until 1845 when he inherited the title Duke of Northumberland. They then moved to Alnwick Castle, and the new Duke created much of the building that Harry Potter would today recognise.

But in 1865, four years after Victoria's Albert had died, Eleanor's Algernon also passed away. Like the Queen, the Duchess hunkered down for a long period of mourning, dressed in black.

She lived out the next five decades in widowhood at Stanwick, dying in 1911 - ten years after Victoria.

Quite how well the two ladies knew each other is unknown. It has been said that Eleanor was a bridesmaid at Victoria's wedding, but research by Pat Anderson for his booklet, which is launched at the exhibition, shows this not to be the case.

Before she married, Eleanor was a member of the fabulously wealthy Grosvenor family and she attended George III's children's parties at St James' Palace in the 1820s. During the 1850s she spent her summers at the Northumberlands' grand London residence, Syon House.

Syon, like its neighbour Kew Gardens, was renowned for its botanical pursuits. For the Great Exhibition of 1851, held at Crystal Palace, Syon propagated a giant waterlily which Algernon and Eleanor named in the Queen's honour: Victoria amazonica .

So, at the very least, we can guess that Eleanor was on nodding terms with Victoria.

On May 7, 1855, Eleanor wrote to Victoria, a wonderfully gracious - some might say fawning - letter, which has just been uncovered in time for the exhibition. It tempts the Queen with a new taste.

Madam,

As Your Majesty was pleased, in a conversation about the curious fruits from Syon, to give me permission to offer for Your Majesty's acceptance, any which were very rare, I now venture to ask to be allowed to send to Your Majesty a fruit of the Mangosteen, which has never been known to fruit out of its own country, and this is therefore an object of very great curiosity and interest among botanists.

I have the honor to be, Madam, with the greatest respect, Your Majesty's most humble and devoted servant.

E Northumberland

The slow-growing mangosteen tree probably came from the remote provinces of Thailand or the Philippines in the late 1840s. It was particularly fussy about where it grew. It didn't like tropical Africa and, apart from Honduras, didn't really take to the Americas. It wasn't a great success in Australia or India, but it clearly liked Syon, in England.

Unfortunately, we don't know if the mangosteen tickled Victoria's curiosity or if its succulent, juicy flesh passed her lips. But a Stanwick nectarine, first grown in 1843 in North Yorkshire, would surely have been better because, in terms of nectarines, it was "the largest and finest in flavour" then known.

* The exhibition, Duchess Eleanor: the Stanwick Years, is on Saturday and Sunday at the church of Stanwick St John from 10am to 4pm. All are welcome. Pat Anderson's booklet, The Lost Stanwick Hall, will be on sale for £2.50.

Published: ??/??/2004

Echo Memories, The Northern Echo, Priestgate, Darlington DL1 1NF, e-mail chris.lloyd@nne.co.uk or telephone (01325) 505062.