By Michel Rossignol
Lowertown is the oldest residential area of our city, and when it was surveyed in the early 1800s, many of its street names reflected the strong commitment to the British royal family of the Royal Engineers, who laid out the early Bytown grid.
Thus, from Augusta to Wurtemburg, the streets refer to the mother, daughter and sisters of George IV, King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 1820 to 1830. The King’s mother was Queen Charlotte and his only child was Princess Charlotte Augusta of Wales. She married Prince Leopold of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld.
The name Wurtemburg came into the family when Charlotte, the King’s oldest sister, married King Frederick of Württemberg. This area is now part of the Federal Republic of Germany. Other spellings appeared over the years, for example, Wirtemberg on a 1832 Bytown map, but by 1842 it was recorded as Wurtemburg.
As the British royal family continued to strengthen its European royal ties, Wurtemburg to Augusta streets took on a renewed connection to this early history. In 1840, Queen Victoria married Prince Albert of Saxe-Cobourg and Gotha. In 1893, Princess Mary of Teck, whose father was a member of the Württemberg Royal House, married Prince George, who became King George V.
Perhaps it was the association with royalty that led Wurtemburg to be part of a route for royalty during visits to the capital. Thus, in 1927, Edward, then Prince of Wales, travelled along Wurtemburg to Laurier House for dinner with Prime Minister Mackenzie King. So when you walk on Wurtemburg and other Lowertown streets named for royalty, think of the links to Queen Elizabeth II, the longest reigning British monarch, and her many ancestors.