Princess Louise, Duchess of Argyll survived thanks to long periods of separation; the couple reconciled in 1911 and she was devastated by her husband's death in 1914. After the end of the First World War in 1918, at the age of 70, she began to retire from public life, undertaking few public duties outside Kensington Palace, where she died at age 91. Louise was born on 18 March 1848 at Buckingham Palace, London. She was the fourth daughter and sixth child of the reigning British monarch, Queen Victoria, and her husband, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. Her birth coincided with revolutions which swept across
Buckingham Palace 1847, the couple had found the palace too small for court life and their growing family, and consequently the new wing, designed by Edward Blore, was built by Thomas Cubitt, enclosing the central quadrangle. The large East Front, facing The Mall, is today the "public face" of Buckingham Palace, and contains the balcony from which the royal family acknowledge the crowds on momentous occasions and after the annual Trooping the Colour. The ballroom wing and a further suite of state rooms were also built in this period, designed by Nash's student Sir James Pennethorne. Before Prince Albert's death, the palace