**The Isle of Wight County Press is partnering with Christ the King College in Newport to give young reporters the chance to find out what journalism is all about. We hope you enjoy their stories.

Recently, it was the 122nd anniversary of the death of Queen Victoria on the Isle of Wight.

The Osborne estate was bought by Queen Victoria and Prince Albert in 1845, from Lady Isabella Blachford, so that they could not only have somewhere to escape from their hectic court life in London but also somewhere for their children to have a more normal childhood.

The royal family loved spending as much time as they possibly could at their seaside estate, along with Balmoral.

Osborne House is a constant reminder of Victoria’s love of the Island and her family.

It’s a site where she chose to raise her children and escape the stress of court life.

Overall her legacy lives on as a tourist site, as said by Tom Fergueson. 

When the couple visited Osborne in 1844, Queen Victoria said: "It is impossible to imagine a prettier spot."

When they bought the estate, in 1845, they were aged in their mid 20s and already had four children under the age of five.

The family would usually spend March, May, part of July and August and late November to just before Christmas here.

In the summer they would never usually spend much of their time inside of the house.

The Queen and the Prince would spend their time going on walks and riding their horses.

The Queen also wrote about how she spent her time reading and writing under trees in the garden or with her children in the swiss cottage.

They hosted many important visitors at the estate. 

Prince Albert was the true creator of Osborne and as he said he was ‘partly forrester, partly builder, partly farmer and partly gardener’.

Even though he was extremely busy with public duties, watching over alterations that were happening at Balmoral as well as improvements that were going on at the home farm in Frogmore, he still had a very energetic attitude to the work towards the Osborne Estate and this is definitely remembered in its history.

Albert had a very big interest in technology and environmentally friendly estate management. He used this interest to create a brick-lined gravity tank that could turn sewage into farm manure by filtering it through clay, sand and charcoal.

When Prince Albert died in 1861, the estate lost a part of his creative force with him, however Osborne is highly his creation and he is remembered as a big part of its history.

After the death of the Queen's beloved husband, she instantly came to Osborne for an escape, where she had the support of most of her children.

She stayed there until early March 1862 but, after this, her normal routine of when she would normally go to Osborne changed as she would now miss her earlier visits and she would usually come back in mid December and stay over Christmas.

On 22 January 1901, surrounded by her family at Osborne House, Queen Victoria died. 

She used Osborne House for over 50 years and loved it dearly.