Princess Mary Adelaide of Cambridge Duke and Duchess of Teck chose to reside in London rather than abroad, mainly because Mary Adelaide received £5,000 per annum as a Parliamentary annuity and carried out royal duties. Her mother, the Duchess of Cambridge, also provided her with supplementary income. Requests to Queen Victoria for extra funds were generally refused; however, the queen did provide the Tecks with apartments at Kensington Palace and White Lodge in Richmond Park as a country house. Mary Adelaide requested that her new husband be granted the style "Royal Highness", but this was refused by Queen Victoria. The queen did, however, promote Francis
Duchess of Marlborough (Fabergé egg) Spencer-Churchill, 9th Duke of Marlborough. In 1902, the Duchess and her husband travelled to Russia, where they dined with Tsar Nicholas II of Russia and visited his mother, the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna at the Anichkov Palace. During this visit, the Duchess would have almost certainly seen the Dowager Empress' large collection of Fabergé items, which perhaps inspired her to order this egg. The egg is believed to have cost over 5,000 rubles. After her divorce from the Duke of Marlborough, she donated the Duchess of Marlborough Egg to a charity auction in 1926. The egg was bought by Ganna