The British Monarchy Miscellany
Page 22
(1766 – 1828)
Daughter of George III
Married to Frederick I, King of Wurttemberg
Reigned 1805-1816
When Charlotte married Frederick in 1797 he was only Duke of Wurttemberg, in south Germany. Her wedding
was the object of great satire in the London press on account of the groom’s enormous weight, however they had a happy marriage. In 1805 Frederick allied himself with Napoleon in exchange for the right of being raised from Duke to King of Wurttemberg. This provoked the anger of Napoleon’s greatest foe and Charlotte’s father, King George III, who refused to address her daughter as Queen. After Napoleon’s defeat however their titles were recognized by all European nations, and by the British royal family.
Victoria, Empress of Germany
(1840 – 1901)
Daughter of Queen Victoria
Married to Emperor Frederick III of Germany
Reigned March to June 1888
Victoria married Crown Prince Frederick of Prussia in 1858, and after the German Empire was proclaimed in 1871 they became Crown Prince and Princess of
Germany. Their plans to establish a liberal democracy in Germany as Emperor and Empress were thwarted when
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Frederick developed throat cancer, and they reigned for only three months in 1888. Although a great patron of the arts and supporter of many charitable causes, she was referred to disparagingly as ‘Die Englanderin’, because of her foreign English origin. Because of her liberal views she had a difficult relationship with her son, Emperor Wilhelm II, who adopted militaristic,
conservative policies instead.
Maud, Queen of Norway
(1869 – 1938)
Daughter of Edward VII
Married to Haakon VII, King of Norway
Reigned 1905 to 1938
In 1896 Maud married Prince Carl of Denmark, her first cousin on her mother’s side, who was later elected the first King of modern Norway in 1905. Maud embraced her new role by learning Norwegian and practicing national pastimes like skiing. She broke social conventions by supporting causes like the welfare of unwed mothers and organised charity drives during World War I. She never lost her attachment for Britain however, returning to the country every year to stay in a house she kept at
Sandringham where she eventually died.
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Victoria Eugenie, Queen of Spain
(1887 – 1969)
Daughter of Princess Beatrice, granddaughter of Queen
Victoria
Married Alfonso XIII, King of Spain
Reigned 1906 to 1931
Victoria Eugenie’s queenship was full of tribulations, beginning with her wedding in 1906 when her bridal
carriage procession was hit by an anarchist’s bomb which left 15 dead. More strain came later when it was
discovered that she had passed haemophilia to her first son and heir to the throne. Her relationship with Alfonso deteriorated so she dedicated herself into charity work instead and was instrumental in reorganising the Spanish Red Cross. Her troubled queenship ended in 1931 when the monarchy was abolished and she was forced to go into exile with her family. She worked tirelessly on behalf of the exiled monarchy however and her grandson was eventually restored to the Spanish throne 6 years after her death.
Marie, Queen of Romania
(1875 – 1938)
Daughter of Prince Alfred, granddaughter of Queen
Victoria
Married Ferdinand I, King of Romania
Reigned 1914 to 1927
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Marie married Ferdinand in 1893 when he was Crown
Prince of Romania. A very intelligent woman, she later proved to be a remarkable Queen, often assuming
leadership roles in place of her weak husband. She played a key part in her country’s conduct during the First World War and at the end she represented Romania at the
victors’ table, ensuring that the country’s territory was doubled. Her political skills and popularity made her an early feminist icon, especially in America where she travelled to great acclaim in 1926.
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Queen Victoria’s
Forty Grandchildren
Queen Victoria had nine children, and through them she became a grandmother forty times over a period of 32
years. Her grandchildren became part of the royal
families of Germany, Spain, Russia, Sweden, Norway, Greece, Romania, as well as minor German principalities and British noble families. Listed below is basic
information about each of her grandchildren, preceded by the identities of their parents, Queen Victoria’s own children.
QUEEN VICTORIA (1819-1901), married in 1840 PRINCE
ALBERT OF SAXE-COBURG-GOTHA (1819-1861): 9
children, as described below.
Queen Victoria’s Children
Victoria, Princess Royal (1840-1901), married in 1858
Frederick, Crown Prince of Prussia, later Emperor
Frederick III of Germany (1831-1888): 8 children 376
Albert, Prince of Wales later King Edward VII (1841-1910), married in 1863 Princess Alexandra of Denmark (1844-1925): 6 children
Princess Alice (1843-1878), married in 1862 Prince Louis of Hesse, later Grand Duke of Hesse-Darmstadt and the Rhine (1837-1892): 7 children
Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh (1844-1900), married in 1874 Grand Duchess Maria Alexandrovna of Russia (1853-1920): 5 children
Princess Helena (1846-1923), married in 1866 Prince Christian of Schleswig-Holstein (1831-1917): 5 children Princess Louise (1848-1939), married in 1871 John Campbell, Marquis of Lorne, later Duke of Argyll (1845-1914): no children
Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught (1850-1942), married in 1879 Princess Louise Margaret of Prussia (1860-1917): 3 children
Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany (1853-1884), married in 1882 Princess Helena of Waldeck-Pyrmont (1861-1922): 2
children
Princess Beatrice (1857-1944), married in 1885 Prince Henry of Battenberg (1858-1896): 4 children
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The Forty Grandchildren:
The grandchildren are listed in order of birth. The title used in the identification is that given to the child at birth or soon thereafter, other titles gained later in life are noted in the information that follows when relevant.
Where known, the nickname used for the grandchild
within the Royal Family has been included. Most names have been anglicised. Note that the list does not include two stillborn children: one born to Princess Helena in 1877 and one to Prince Alfred’s wife in 1879.
1. Prince Wilhelm of Prussia
(27 Jan 1859-3 Jun 1941)
Born to Victoria, Princess Royal
Became Emperor Wilhelm II of Germany in 1888, and
later led his country against Britain in the First World War. He was forced to abdicate his throne in 1918 when the German Empire was abolished and lived the rest of his life in exile in the Netherlands.
Nickname: Willy
2. Princess Charlotte of Prussia
(24 Jul 1860-1 Oct 1919)
Born to Victoria, Princess Royal
Known for her difficult personality, she married the Hereditary Prince of Saxe-Meiningen in 1878. She served as Duchess of Saxe-Meiningen, in Thuringia, from 1914
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until the Duchy was abolished by the German Republic in 1918.
Nickname: Ditta
3. Prince Henry of Prussia
(14 Aug 1862-20 Apr 1929)
Born to Victoria, Princess Royal
A career naval officer in the German Navy, he rose to the rank of Grand Admiral and commanded the German
Baltic Fleet during the First World War. He was happily married to his cousin Princess Irene of Hesse (see 10.
below).
Nickname: Harry
4. Princess Victoria of Hesse
(5 Apr 1863-24 Sep 1950)
Born to Princess Alice
Reputed as the most intel
ligent of Queen Victoria’s granddaughters, in 1884 she married Prince Louise of Battenberg, an officer in the British Royal Navy who rose to the rank of First Sea Lord in 1912. In 1917, during the First World War, they changed their family name from Battenberg to Mountbatten. She became the mother of Louis Mountbatten, Earl of Burma, and the grandmother of Prince Philip. Her daughter Louise became Queen of Sweden in 1950.
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5. Prince Albert Victor of Wales
(8 Jan 1864-14 Jan 1892)
Born to Albert, Prince of Wales
Second in line to the British throne during Queen
Victoria’s reign, he died of influenza at the age of 28
before his father became king. His fiancée, Mary of Teck, subsequently married his brother George (see 8. below).
Nickname: Eddy
6. Prince Sigismund of Prussia
(15 Sep 1864-18 Jun 1866)
Born to Victoria, Princess Royal
He died of meningitis when only 21 months old. He was the first of Queen Victoria’s grandchildren to die.
7. Princess Elizabeth of Hesse
(1 Nov 1864-18 Jul 1918)
Born to Princess Alice
She married Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich of Russia in 1884. A popular figure in Russia because for her charitable works, following her husband’s assassination in 1905 she became a Russian Orthodox nun. She was
murdered by the Bolsheviks in 1918 during the Russian Revolution, and in 1992 she was proclaimed a saint in the Russian Orthodox Church.
Nickname: Ella
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8. Prince George of Wales
(3 Jun 1865-20 Jan 1936)
Born to Albert, Prince of Wales
Initially marked for a career in the navy, he became heir to the British throne at the age of 27 after the death of his brother Victor Albert (see 5. above). He ascended the throne as King George V in 1910.
Nickname: Georgie
9. Princess Victoria of Prussia
(12 Apr 1866-13 Nov 1929)
Born to Victoria, Princess Royal
She married Prince Adolf of Schaumburg-Lippe, from the Principality of Lippe in modern Westphalia, in 1890. After his death in 1927 she controversially married a second time to Alexander Zoubkoff, a Russian playboy 35 years her junior who squandered much of her wealth.
Nickname: Moretta
10. Princess Irene of Hesse
(11 Jul 1866-11 Nov 1953)
Born to Princess Alice
She married her first cousin Prince Henry of Prussia (see 3. above) in 1888, the two becoming known in the family as ‘The Very Amiables’ because of their pleasant natures and happy marriage. She inherited the haemophilia gene from her mother and two of her sons died of the disease.
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11. Princess Louise of Wales
(20 Feb 1867-4 Jan 1931)
Born to Albert, Prince of Wales
She married Alexander Duff, Earl of Fife, in 1889 who was later created Duke of Fife by Queen Victoria. In 1905 she was created the fifth Princess Royal by her father King Edward VII. Her husband died from medical problems
contracted when the entire family was shipwrecked off the coast of Morocco in 1911.
12. Prince Christian Victor of Schleswig-Holstein (14 Aug 1867-29 Oct 1900)
Born to Princess Helena
Said to be Queen Victoria’s favourite grandson, he
entered the British Army as a career officer and served mostly in Africa. He fought in the Third Ashanti War in Ghana in 1895-96, and in the Sudan campaign of 1898.
He died in South Africa of malaria whilst serving in the Second Boer War, to the great grief of his family.
Nickname: Christle
13. Prince Waldemar of Prussia
(10 Feb 1868-27 Mar 1879)
Born to Victoria, Princess Royal
He died of diphtheria at the age of 11, four months after the death of his cousin Princess Marie of Hesse of the same disease (see 25. below).
Nickname: Waldy
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14. Princess Victoria of Wales
(6 Jul 1868-3 Dec 1935)
Born to Albert, Prince of Wales
Despite having several suitors she never married, and served instead as her mother’s companion and assistant until her mother’s death in 1925. She was very close to her brother George (see 8. above) who died only 7 weeks after her.
Nickname: Toria
15. Prince Ernest Louis of Hesse
(25 Nov 1868-9 Oct 1937)
Born to Princess Alice
He succeeded his father as Grand Duke of Hesse in 1892
and reigned until the Grand Duchy was abolished by the German Republic in 1918. His first unhappy marriage to his cousin Victoria Melita (see 29. below) was dissolved in 1901. He later remarried to Princess Eleonore of Solms-Hohensolms-Lich, who died tragically a month after him in a plane crash along with one of their sons and a grandson.
Nickname: Ernie
16. Prince Albert of Schleswig-Holstein
(28 Feb 1869-13 Mar 1931)
Born to Princess Helena
Despite receiving a British military education like his brother Christian (see 12. above), he chose to enrol in the German Army instead where he rose to the rank of
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Lieutenant Colonel. During the First World War he asked to be excused from fighting against the British and served instead on domestic military duties in Berlin. He never married but fathered an illegitimate daughter who was later acknowledged as his offspring by his two sisters.
17. Princess Maud of Wales
(26 Nov 1869-20 Nov 1938)
Born to Albert, Prince of Wales
She married her Danish cousin Prince Carl of Denmark in 1896, who in 1905 was elected the first modern King of Norway, taking the name of Haakon VII. Maud served as a popular and conscientious Queen Consort of Norway
until her death.
Nickname: Harry, because of her tomboy behaviour as a child.
18. Princess Helena Victoria of Schleswig-Holstein (3 May 1870-13 Mar 1948)
Born to Princess Helena
She never married, serving instead as her mother’s
companion until her mother’s death in 1923. Afterwards she became involved in many charitable organisations including the YMCA, the YWCA and a nursing home
founded by her mother at Windsor. She was also,
together with her sister Marie Louise (see 24. below), an enthusiastic supporter of the arts, especially music.
Nickname: Thora
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19. Princess Sophie of Prussia
(14 Jun 1870-13 Jan 1932)
Born to Victoria, Princess Royal
She married Crown Prince Constantine of Greece in 1889, and later served as Queen Consort of Greece from 1913
to 1917, and from 1920 to 1922. Each of her three sons in turn became King of Greece.
Nickname: Sossy
20. Prince Frederick of Hesse
(7 Oct 1870-29 May 1873)
Born to Princess Alice
A sufferer of haemophilia inherited from his mother, he died at the age of 2 when he fell 20 feet down a window and suffered a fatal bleed.
Nickname: Frittie.
21. Prince Alexander John of Wales
(6 Apr 1871-7 Apr 1871)
Born to Albert, Prince of Wales
He died when he was only a day old after being born prematurely. His death greatly affected his mother.
22. Princess Margaret of Prussia
(22 Apr 1872-22 Jan 1954)
Born to Victoria, Princess Royal
She married Prince Frederick Charles, Landgrave of Hesse in Germany, in 1893 who was briefly nominated as King 385
of Finland in 1918 before turning down the honour. The mother of six children, including two sets of twins, two of her sons died in action during the First World War; a third son and two daughters-in-law died during the Second World War. She survived many other tribulations to die of old age at 81.
Nick
name: Mossy
23. Princess Alix of Hesse
(6 Jun 1872-17 Jul 1918)
Born to Princess Alice
She married Tsar Nicholas II of Russia in 1894 and reigned as Empress Consort of Russia until the Russian revolution in 1917. She was murdered in 1918 by the Bolsheviks along with her husband and children. She was a carrier of haemophilia, inherited from her mother, which she
transmitted to her son Alexei.
Nickname: Sunny
24. Princess Marie Louise of Schleswig-Holstein
(12 Aug 1872-8 Dec 1956)
Born to Princess Helena
She married Prince Aribert of Anhalt, in Germany, in 1891
but the marriage was childless and unhappy, and it was dissolved in 1900. She never remarried and settled
instead in England where she devoted herself to charities and the arts, living together in later years with her sister Helena Victoria (see 18. above).
Nickname: Louie.
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25. Princess Marie of Hesse
(24 May 1874-16 Nov 1878)
Born to Princess Alice
She died at the age of 4 of a diphtheria infection that struck most of her family. Her mother died of the same infection a month afterwards.
Nickname: May
26. Prince Alfred of Edinburgh
(15 Oct 1874-6 Feb 1899)
Born to Prince Alfred
He died at the age of 24 in mysterious circumstances after he supposedly shot himself. It is claimed that he suffered from syphilis, had a history of depression, and had contracted a secret marriage against his parents’