Knowing of Prince Albert's love for his old home, Queen Victoria commissioned Francis Bedford to take a series of photographs of Coburg to be given to him as a birthday present on 26 August 1857. They show the favourite views Prince Albert had often described and which the Queen herself had seen when they travelled there together in 1845. The Court Gardener arranged for several Coburg peasants to pose for Bedford at Prince Albert's father's country residence, the Rosenau. The sitters wanted a memento, rather than payment, so the women received silk kerchiefs and the men received waistcoats.