Overview: How did an unassuming little girl become the most powerful woman in the world? At her birth, few believed Princess Victoria would one day be crowned Queen, but following a number of untimely deaths and the failure of her uncles to father any children, she became heir to the throne. But the battle between the princess and her mother, the Duchess of Kent, was to become one of the fiercest mother-versus-daughter struggles of all time, as the Duchess schemed to share in the power and riches that would one day be Victoria's. 4/6.