Gerald Wellesley

Gerald Valerian Wellesley was a Church of England cleric who became the Dean of Windsor. More importantly, he was domestic chaplain to Queen Victoria and played a major advisory role regarding the royal family's personal affairs. He was one of the Queen's chief confidants and often served as an intermediary in her problems and conflicts. In Church appointments he was sensitive to the Queen's preferences: he avoided recommending the appointment of either High Churchmen or teetotallers. He tried to identify and place clergymen who were also high status gentlemen in key parish churches. He was politically nonpartisan, but was a friend of William Gladstone. He played a prominent advisory role in the ministerial crisis of 1880.