Queen Victoria's billiards table on sale
Local Democracy Reporting ServiceA billiards table once owned by Queen Victoria at Buckingham Palace is on sale in Kent for £150,000.
Sarah and Michael Hudson bought the antique from a West London social club 15 years ago.
The couple run John Bennett Billiards Ltd in Queen St, Paddock Wood, where they restore and build billiards and snooker tables.
The 12ft by 6ft (3.6m by 1.8m) mahogany table has an ornate badge which states it was installed at Buckingham Palace in 1842 and removed in 1897.
As well as the ornate badge, the table boasts a unique serial number and a ledger relating to its sale.
Local Democracy Reporting Service The table in the Hudsons’ possession appears to be ordered from one of the era’s leading makers, Messrs Thurston and Co, of Catherine Street, The Strand, in about1839.
According to the Local Democracy Reporting Service, after purchasing the table it was dismantled and remained in storage at the firm’s Paddock Wood headquarters.
Mrs Hudson said: “It’s a very, very beautifully made table, reflecting the craftsmanship of its time. It was made for a queen, after all.
“We have spent a lot of years researching the provenance of the table to make sure it is the same one.”
Whilst there is no direct evidence Queen Victoria played on the table, documentary proof provides detail of how the monarch enjoyed billiards as a girl and into adulthood.
As early as 1832, her diaries noted in the afternoon of 17 September she “played at billiards with Victoire (daughter of Sir John Conray, Comptroller to the Duchess of Kent) and then went out walking.”
Mrs Hudson said: “There isn’t another like it in the world and there are people out there who collect antique snooker tables and royal artefacts."
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