Happy 98th birthday to HRH The Duke of Edinburgh!

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Christian IX of Denmark, Happy Birthday, House of Battenberg, Kingdom of Denmark, Kingdom of Greece, Kingdom of the Hellenes, London Protocol 1852, Prince Philip, Prince Philip Duke of Edinburgh, Princess Alice of Battenberg, Queen Elizabeth II, Queen Victoria, The Duke of Edinburgh

In honor of the 98th birthday of HRH The Duke of Edinburgh I thought I would give some genealogical and biographical information on him.

Prince Philip of Greece and Denmark was born in Mon Repos on the Greek island of Corfu on June 10, 1921. He was the only son and fifth and final child of Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark and Princess Alice of Battenberg. Prince Philip had four elder sisters, Margarita (1905-1981), Theodora (1906-1969), Cecilie (1911-1937) and Sophie (1914-2001).

Prince Philip’s Father:

Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark (January 20 – 1882 – December 3, 1944) of the House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg, was the seventh child and fourth son of King George I of Greece and Olga Constantinovna of Russia. He was a grandson of Christian IX of Denmark and Prince Louise of Hesse-Cassel.

Prince Andrew (left), with his older brothers, the Crown Prince Constantine and Prince Nicholas.

Paternal Grandfather:

George I of the Hellenes was born December 24, 1845 at the Yellow Palace, an 18th-century town house at 18 Amaliegade, right next to the Amalienborg Palace complex in Copenhagen. He was the second son and third child of Prince Christian of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg and Princess Louise of Hesse-Kassel. Until his accession in Greece, he was known as Prince Vilhelm, the namesake of his grandfathers Wilhelm, Duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg, and Prince Wilhelm of Hesse-Cassel.

King George I of the Hellenes

Paternal Grandmother:

Olga Constantinovna of Russia was born on August 22, 1851 the daughter of Grand Duke Constantine Nikolaievich and his wife, Princess Alexandra of Saxe-Altenburg. Olga’s father was Grand Duke Constantine Nikolayevich of Russia (September 21, 1827 – January 25, 1892) was the second son of Czar Nicholas I of Russia and younger brother of Czar Alexander II. This gives the Duke of Edinburgh strong familial ties to the Imperial Russian royal family.

Grand Duchess Olga, Queen of the Hellenes

Prince Philip’s mother:

Alice of Battenberg was born on February 25, 1885 in the Tapestry Room at Windsor Castle in Berkshire in the presence of her great-grandmother, Queen Victoria. She was the eldest child of Prince Louis of Battenberg (after 1917: Louis Alexander Mountbatten, 1st Marquess of Milford Haven) and his wife Princess Victoria of Hesse and by Rhine. Her mother was the eldest daughter of Ludwig IV, Grand Duke of Hesse and Princess Alice of the United Kingdom, the Queen’s second daughter.

Princess Alice of Battenberg

Prince and Princess Andrew of Greece and Denmark

Royal House

The Duke of Edinburgh is a member of the Royal House of Glücksburg (also spelled Glücksborg), shortened from House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg, and is a Danish-German branch of the House of Oldenburg, whose members have reigned at various times in Denmark, Norway, Greece and several northern German states.

In 1460, Glücksburg came, as part of the conjoined Danish-German duchies of Schleswig and Holstein, to Count Christian VII of Oldenburg whom, in 1448, the Danes had elected their king as Christian I, the Norwegians likewise taking him as their hereditary king in 1450.

In 1564, Christian I’s great-grandson, King Frederik II, in re-distributing Schleswig and Holstein’s fiefs, allocated Glücksburg to his brother Duke Johann the Younger (1545-1622), along with Sonderburg, in appanage. Johann’s heirs further sub-divided their share and created, among other branches, a line of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg at Beck (an estate near Minden bought by the family in 1605), who remained vassals of Denmark’s kings.

The Danish line of Oldenburg kings died out in 1863 with the death of King Frederik VII of Denmark. Prince Christian of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg, the fourth son of Duke Friedrich of Glücksburg, was recognized in the London Protocol of 1852 as successor to the childless King Frederick VII of Denmark. He became King of Denmark as Christian IX as king of Denmark on November 15, 1863.

A few months prior to becoming King of Denmark, Christian IX’s second son, Prince Vilhelm, was elected King of the Hellenes on March 30, 1863, succeeding the ousted Wittelsbach Otto of Greece and reigning under the name George I. As stated above, the seventh child and fourth son of King George I of Greece was Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark, the father of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.

Highlights of the life the Duke of Edinburgh:

After being educated in France, Germany and the United Kingdom, he joined the British Royal Navy in 1939, aged 18. In 1939, King George VI and Queen Elizabeth toured the Royal Naval College, Dartmouth. During the visit, the Queen and Louis Mountbatten asked Philip to escort the King’s two daughters, Elizabeth and Margaret, who were Philip’s third cousinsthrough Queen Victoria, and second cousins once removed through King Christian IX of Denmark.

Elizabeth fell in love with Philip and they began to exchange letters when she was thirteen. Eventually, in the summer of 1946, Philip asked the King for his daughter’s hand in marriage. The King granted his request, provided that any formal engagement be delayed until Elizabeth’s twenty-first birthday the following April. By March 1947, Philip had abandoned his Greek and Danish royal titles, had adopted the surname Mountbatten from his mother’s family, and had become a naturalised British subject. However, this was unnecessary as Philip was a descendent of Sofia of Hanover and due to this he already was a British subject.

The day preceding his wedding, King George VI bestowed the style of Royal Highness on Philip and, on the morning of the wedding, November 20, 1947, he was made the Duke of Edinburgh, Earl of Merioneth, and Baron Greenwich of Greenwich in the County of London. Philip and Elizabeth were married in a ceremony at Westminster Abbey, recorded and broadcast by BBC radio to 200 million people around the world. However, in post-war Britain, it was not acceptable for any of the Duke of Edinburgh’s German relations to be invited to the wedding, including Philip’s three surviving sisters, all of whom had married German princes. After their marriage, the Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh took up residence at Clarence House.

On February 25, 1957, the Queen granted her husband the style and title of a Prince of the United Kingdom by Letters Patent, and it was gazetted that he was to be known as “His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh”.

New name of the Royal House?:

The accession of Elizabeth II to the throne brought up the question of the name of the royal house, as Elizabeth would typically have taken Philip’s last name on marriage. The Duke’s uncle, Earl Mountbatten of Burma, advocated the name House of Mountbatten. Philip suggested House of Edinburgh, after his ducal title. When Queen Mary, Elizabeth’s grandmother, heard of this, she informed the British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who himself later advised the Queen to issue a royal proclamation declaring that the royal house was to remain known as the House of Windsor. Prince Philip privately complained, “I am nothing but a bloody amoeba. I am the only man in the country not allowed to give his name to his own children.”

It’s interesting that the question of the name of the Royal House was raised. The name of the dynasty remains the same during the reign of a Queen Regnant. For example, Queen Mary I 1553-1558, remained a Tudor despite being married to a Habsburg. Queen Anne remained a Stuart despite being married to a Danish prince of the House of Oldenburg. The same with Queen Victoria, the name of the Royal House did not change from Hanover to Saxe-Coburg-Gotha until the accession of her son. King Edward VII, in 1901.

In times past this would not have been an issue and the name of the royal house would automatically change once the Crown passed through the female line to reflect the patrilineal line. I believe that Lord Mountbatten was eager to elevate the status of his family name.

On February 8, 1960, several years after the death of Queen Mary and the resignation of Churchill, the Queen issued an Order in Council declaring that Mountbatten-Windsor would be the surname of her and her husband’s male-line descendants who are not styled as Royal Highness or titled as Prince or Princess. The son of the Duke of Sussex, Archie Mountbatten-Windsor, is the first descendant of the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh that this order applies to.

Service as Consort to Her Majesty the Queen.

The Duke of Edinburgh has been an excellent support to Her Majesty the queen. However, he has not been without controversy. The prince is no wall flower and often speaks his mind. Sometimes he would make and off-the-cuff remark or joke that would be taken either out of context or was not meant to be offensive but people would at times be offended but what he has said.

The princes has always been a very active man. He played polo until 1971 and then took up the sport of carriage driving. I worked at a historical house and have seen competitive carriage driving myself. I really enjoyed watching that and was happy that the prince took up that sport. Philip was also a skilled yachtsman and pilot.

Philip is patron of some 800 organisations, particularly focused on the environment, industry, sport, and education. His first solo engagement as Duke of Edinburgh was in March 1948, presenting prizes at the boxing finals of the London Federation of Boys’ Clubs at the Royal Albert Hall. He was President of the National Playing Fields Association (now known as Fields in Trust) for 64 years, from 1947 until his grandson Prince William took over the role in 2013.

He served as UK President of the World Wildlife Fund from 1961 to 1982, International President from 1981, and President Emeritus from 1996. In 1952, he became patron of The Industrial Society (since renamed The Work Foundation). He was President of the International Equestrian Federation from 1964 to 1986, and has served as Chancellor of the Universities of Cambridge, Edinburgh, Salford, and Wales.

In 2017, the British Heart Foundation thanked Prince Philip for being its patron for 55 years, during which time, in addition to organising fundraisers, he “supported the creation of nine BHF-funded centres of excellence”. He is an Honorary Fellow of St Edmund’s College, Cambridge.

Prince Philip retired from his royal duties on 2 August 2017, meeting Royal Marines in his final solo public engagement, aged 96. Since 1952 he had completed 22,219 solo engagements. Prime Minister Theresa May thanked him for “a remarkable lifetime of service”. On November 20, 2017, he celebrated his 70th wedding anniversary with the Queen, which made her the first British monarch to celebrate a platinum wedding anniversary.

The Duke of Edinburgh is the longest-lived descendant of both Queen Victoria and King Christian IX of Denmark, he is the longest serving British royal consort and his marriage to HM The Queen is the longest in British royal history.

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200th Anniversary of the Birth of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom: May 24, 1819.

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Birthday, Duchess of Kent, Empress of India, George III, George IV, King William IV of the United Kingdom, Kingdom of the Belgians, kings and queens of the United Kingdom, Leopld of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, Leopold I, Prince Regent, Princess Charlotte of Wales, Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld., Queen Victoria, Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom of Great Britain, The Duke of Kent

Following the death of Princess Charlotte Augusta of Wales in November 1817, the only legitimate grandchild of George III at the time, the royal succession began to look uncertain. The Prince Regent and his younger brother Frederick, the Duke of York, though married, were estranged from their wives and had no surviving legitimate children. King George’s surviving daughters were all past likely childbearing age. The unmarried sons of King George III, the Duke of Clarence (later King William IV), the Duke of Kent, and the Duke of Cambridge, all rushed to contract lawful marriages and provide an heir to the throne. The fifth son of King George III, the Duke of Cumberland, was already married but had no living children at that time, whilst the marriage of the sixth son, the Duke of Sussex, was void because he had married in contravention of the Royal Marriages Act 1772.

However, it was not that simple. For the Duke of Kent providing for the succession was not his sole motivator in finding a wife. Even before he disposed of the amiable Madame de Saint Laurent, the Duke of Kent had been secretly looking for a legitimate wife for financial reasons rather than dynastic reasons. The Duke of Kent knew that once he contracted a legitimate marriage he would be granted a steady income by Parliament. Princess Charlotte was still alive at this time and he promised her, along with her consort, Prince Leopold of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, to furnish continuity for the throne of Hanover.

HRH The Duchess of Kent

The Duke of Kent also realized that in Hanover, where the Salic Law applied to the German kingdom, only male heirs could reign in Hanover, therefore, if Princess Charlotte became Queen of the United Kingdom this would separate the personal union of the two countries and a secession of her oldest surviving childless uncles would, one after another, become the King of Hanover. The Duke of Kent envisioned that he would one day be the King of Hanover. For that he would need a Queen and an heir.

The Duke of Kent’s idea of a suitable bride was a wealthy woman with proper Royal Ancestry for an approved royal marriage. Because the Duke of Kent had been helpful to his niece, Princess Charlotte of Wales, and her husband Prince Leopold, they were eager to match the Duke with Leopold’s younger sister the Dowager Princess of Leiningen. The Duke agreed to visit the widowed Princess Victoria in Darmstadt, one of the larger cities close to the borders of a Amorbach, after which he dispatched a lengthy letter expressing his affection and proposing marriage believing she would make an appropriate Queen of Hanover. With the death of Princess Charlotte of Wales, who died giving birth to a stillborn son in November 1817, the Duke of Kent realized that the succession to the British throne was now in jeopardy and this expediated his marriage to the Dowager Princess of Leiningen.

In Coburg Germany, on May 29, 1818 at 9:30 in the evening the Dowager Princess of Leiningen (aged 32) was married in the Lutheran rights to the Duke of Kent (aged 52) a man she had only met once before. The Duke was arrayed in his English field marshal’s uniform, while the Princess was resplendent in pale silk lace. Afterwards, the new Duchess of Kent wrote in her diary that she had hoped that in her second marriage she would find the happiness that she never found in the first.

Within four days after the wedding the Duke and Duchess of Kent left for England. And at Kew Palace on July 13, 1818 at four in the afternoon, they were married again this time in accordance to the Church of England. However, the ceremony was doubled for there was also two brides for the Prince Regent to give away. Not only was the Duke of Kent marrying Princess Victoria once again, Prince William, Duke of Clarence and the 25 year old Princess Adelaide of Saxe-Meiningen (August 13, 1792 – December 2, 1849) [the daughter of Georg I, Duke of Saxe-Meiningen, and Luise Eleonore of Hohenlohe-Langenburg] were united as well. The Archbishop Bishop of Canterbury officiated the ceremony assisted by the Bishop of London. Since King George III was blind and incapacitated, fragile old Queen Charlotte, mother of both of the Dukes, was the chief celebrant at the wedding banquet.

HRH The Duke of Kent

Because of the Duke of Kent’s financial situation the newlyweds moved back to Germany. By November 18, 1818 the Duke of Kent sent a letter to the Prince Regent’s private secretary, Sir Benjamin Bloomfield, indicating that the Duchess of Kent was pregnant and that the child was due in May the following year. The Duke of Kent believed it would be his duty to bring the Duchess back to England early in April so that the Royal birth could take place in England. The Duke also petitioned his brother the Prince Regent to allocate funds sufficient for the move and the care of his growing family.

The Duke and Duchess of Kent’s only child, Victoria, was born at 4.15 a.m. on May 24, 1819 at Kensington Palace in London. Victoria was christened privately by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Charles Manners-Sutton, on June 24, 1819 in the Cupola Room at Kensington Palace. She was baptised Alexandrina after one of her godparents, Emperor Alexander I of Russia, and Victoria, after her mother. Additional names proposed by her parents—Georgina (or Georgiana), Charlotte, and Augusta—were dropped on the instructions of Kent’s eldest brother, George, the Prince Regent.

At birth, Alexandria-Victoria was fifth in the line of succession after the four eldest sons of George III: George, the Prince Regent (later George IV); Frederick, the Duke of York; William, the Duke of Clarence (later William IV); and Victoria’s father, Edward, the Duke of Kent. The Prince Regent had no surviving children, and the Duke of York had no children; further, both were estranged from their wives, who were both past child-bearing age, so the two eldest brothers were unlikely to have any further legitimate children.

HM Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, Empress of India.

With Alexandrina-Victoria being fifth in line to the succession to the throne, her ascending the British throne was not assured. She could have been supplanted by a brother born to the Duke and Duchess of Kent, or any children from the union of the Duke and Duchess of Clarence. However, the Duke of Clarence’s legitimate daughters died as infants. The first of these was Princess Charlotte, who was born and died on March 27, 1819, two months before Victoria was born. Victoria’s father died in January 1820, when Victoria was less than a year old. A week later her grandfather, George III died and was succeeded by his eldest son as George IV. Victoria was then third in line to the throne after York and Clarence. The Duke Clarence’s second daughter was Princess Elizabeth of Clarence who lived for twelve weeks from December 10, 1820 to 4 March 1821 and, while Elizabeth lived, Victoria was fourth in line. The Childless Duke of York died in 1827 which paved the way for Victoria’s own succession after her uncles, George IV and William IV.

200th Anniversary of the Birth of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom: Prince Edward, Duke of Kent.

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Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz., Duke of Kent, King George III, King George III of Great Britain, Kings and Queens of Great Britain, Madame de Saint Laurent, Mistress, Prince Edward, Qubec, Queen Victoria

On Friday, May 24, is the 200th Anniversary of the birth of Queen Victoria. To honor this occasion I’ll feature some biographical info on her father Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn. Tomorrow (Thursday) I will feature Queen Victoria’s mother, Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, and Friday I’ll feature Queen Victoria’s Birth itself.

His Royal Highness The Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn and Earl of Dublin.

Prince Edward was born on November 2, 1767. He was the son of the the reigning British monarch, King George III of Great Britain and Imperial Elector of Hanover and Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. As a son of the British monarch, he was styled His Royal Highness The Prince Edward from birth, and was fourth in the line of succession to the throne. He was named after his paternal uncle, Prince Edward, Duke of York and Albany, who had died several weeks earlier and was buried at Westminster Abbey the day before his birth.

The Prince began his military training in Germany in 1785. King George III intended to send him to the University of Göttingen, but decided against it upon the advice of the Duke of York. Instead, Edward went to Lüneburg and later Hanover, accompanied by his tutor, Baron Wangenheim. On May 30, 1786, he was appointed a brevet colonel in the British Army. From 1788 to 1789, he completed his education in Geneva. On August 5, 1789, aged 22, he became a mason in the L’Union, the most important Genevan masonic lodge in the 19th century.

Quebec

Due to the extreme Mediterranean heat, Edward requested to be transferred to present-day Canada, specifically Quebec, in 1791. arrived in Canada in time to witness the proclamation of the Constitutional Act of 179, Edward became the first member of the Royal Family to tour Upper Canada and became a fixture of British North American society. Edward and his mistress, Julie St. Laurent, became close friends with the French Canadian family of Ignace-Michel-Louis-Antoine d’Irumberry de Salaberry; the Prince mentored all of the family’s sons throughout their military careers. Edward guided Charles de Salaberry throughout his career, and made sure that the famous commander was duly honoured after his leadership during the Battle of Chateauguay.

Madame de Saint-Laurent

Madame de Saint-Laurent was born September 30, 1760 in Besançon, France to Jean-Claude Mongenêt, a civil engineer, and Jeanne-Claude (Claudine) Pussot and later moved to Quebec.

On the formation of Lower Canada, in August, 1791, Prince Edward, arrived in Quebec City and shortly afterwards leased Judge Mabane’s house for £90 per annum. He lived at Prince Edward’s House in Quebec City for three years with Madame de Saint Laurent, before he was posted to Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1794.

History

While in Geneva, the Duke had been introduced to Madame de Saint-Laurent and her husband Baron de Fortissons and soon after Julie and Edward became lovers. The Duke’s father, King George III, enrolled Edward in the army In 1789, he was appointed colonel of the 7th Regiment of Foot (Royal Fusiliers). In 1790, he returned home without leave and, in disgrace, was sent off to Gibraltar as an ordinary officer, where Edward made arrangements for Madame de Saint-Laurent to be smuggled in from Marseilles so they could be together.

When George III later found out about the affair he sent the Duke to Quebec City as colonel of the 7th Fusiliers. Humiliated, at first he refused to go, but in August 1791 he arrived accompanied by his chatelaine, introduced as Julie de Saint-Laurent and reputed to be a widow. It has been claimed by several writers that she was morganatically married to the Duke of Kent at a Roman Catholic church in Quebec.

For twenty-eight years Madame de Saint-Laurent presided over the Duke’s household, as a local chronicler records, “with dignity and propriety.” She is described as having been beautiful, clever, witty and accomplished. Many of her letters will be found in Anderson’s ” Life of the Duke of Kent ” (Quebec: 1870).

On June 27, 1792, Edward is credited with the first use of the term “Canadian” to mean both French and English settlers in Upper and Lower Canada. The Prince used the term in an effort to quell a riot between the two groups at a polling station in Charlesbourg, Lower Canada. Recently he has been styled the “Father of the Canadian Crown” for his impact on the development of Canada.

After 1794, Prince Edward lived at the headquarters of the Royal Navy’s North American Station located in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He was instrumental in shaping that settlement’s military defences, protecting its important Royal Navy base, as well as influencing the city’s and colony’s socio-political and economic institutions. Edward was responsible for the construction of Halifax’s iconic Garrison Clock, as well as numerous other civic projects such as St. George’s Round Church. Lieutenant Governor Sir John Wentworth and Lady Francis Wentworth provided their country residence for the use of Prince Edward and Julie St. Laurent. Extensively renovated, the estate became known as “Prince’s Lodge” as the couple hosted numerous dignitaries, including Louis-Phillippe of Orléans (the future King of the French). All that remains of the residence is a small rotunda built by Edward for his regimental band to play music.

HRH The Duke of Kent and Strathearn

After suffering a fall from his horse in late 1798, he was allowed to return to England. On April 24, 1799, Prince Edward was created Duke of Kent and Strathearn and Earl of Dublin, received the thanks of parliament and an income of £12,000. In May that same year the Duke was promoted to the rank of general and appointed Commander-in-Chief of British forces in North America. He took leave of his parents 22 July 1799 and sailed to Halifax. Just over twelve months later he left Halifax and arrived in England on August 31, 1800 where it was confidently expected his next appointment would be Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.

In Geneva Switzerland Prince Edward had two more mistresses, Adelaide Dubus and Anne Moré. Adelaide Dubus died at the birth of their daughter, also named Adelaide Dubus (1789 – in or after 1832). Anne Moré was the mother of their son Edward Schenker Scheener (1789–1853). Scheener married but had no children and returned to Geneva, perhaps significantly in 1837, where he later died.

Mollie Gillen, who was granted access to the Royal Archive at Windsor Castle, established that no children were born of the 27-year relationship between Edward Augustus and Madame de Saint-Laurent; although many Canadian families and individuals (including the Nova Scotian soldier Sir William Fenwick Williams, 1st Baronet, have claimed descent from them. Such claims can now be discounted in light of this research.

After the Duke’s marriage in 1818 to the widow of the Prince of Leiningen, Madame de Saint-Laurent retreated to Paris where she lived out her days amongst her family and friends.

On this date: March 28, 1884 the death of Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany.

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Duchess of Albany, Freemason, Helena of Waldeck-Pyrmont, Hemophilia, Prince Leopold, Prince of Wales, Queen Victoria, Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom

HRH The Prince Leopold.

Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany, KG, KT, GCSI, GCMG,GCStJ (Leopold George Duncan Albert; April 7, 1853 – March 28, 1884) was the eighth child and youngest son of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Leopold was later created Duke of Albany, Earl of Clarence, and Baron Arklow. He had haemophilia, which led to his death at the age of 30.

HRH Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany

In 1872, Prince Leopold entered Christ Church, Oxford, where he studied a variety of subjects and became president of the Oxford University Chess Club. On coming of age in 1874, he had been made a privy councillor and granted an annuity of £15,000. He left the university with an honorary doctorate in civil law (DCL) in 1876, then travelled in Europe. In 1880, he toured Canada and the United States with his sister, Princess Louise, whose husband John Campbell, Marquess of Lorne, was Governor General of Canada. He was a prominent patron of chess, and the London 1883 chess tournament was held under his patronage.

HRH The Prince Leopold.

Incapable of pursuing a military career because of his haemophilia and the need to avoid even minor injuries, Leopold instead became a patron of the arts and literature and served as an unofficial secretary to his mother. “Leopold was the favourite son, and through him her relations with the Government of the day were usually kept up.” Later he pursued vice-regal appointments in Canada and the Colony of Victoria, but his mother refused to appoint him, to his great unhappiness.

Freemasonry

Prince Leopold was an active Freemason, being initiated in the Apollo University Lodge, Oxford, whilst resident at Christ Church. He was proposed for membership by his brother, Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, who was at the time the Worshipful Master of the Lodge, and was initiated in a joint ceremony with Robert Hawthorne Collins, his friend and tutor, who later became Comptroller of his Household. He served as Master of the Lodge from 1876-1877, and was later the Provincial Grand Master for Oxfordshire, still holding that office at the time of his death.

Duke of Albany

On May 24, 1881 Queen Victoria created Prince Leopold Duke of Albany, Earl of Clarence and Baron Arklow.

Her Serene Highness Princess Helena of Waldeck-Pyrmont.

Prince Leopold, stifled by the desire of his mother, Queen Victoria, to keep him at home, saw marriage as his only hope of independence. Due to his haemophilia, he had difficulty finding a wife. Heiress Daisy Maynard was one of the women he considered as a possible bride. He was acquainted with Alice Liddell, the daughter of the Vice-Chancellor of Oxford for whom Lewis Carroll wrote Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, and was godfather of Alice’s second son, who was named after him.

Leopold also considered his second cousin Princess Frederica of Hanover for a bride; they instead became lifelong friends and confidantes. Other aristocratic women he pursued included Victoria of Baden, Princess Stéphanie of Belgium, Princess Elisabeth of Hesse-Kassel, and Princess Karoline Mathilde of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Augustenbur. Leopold was very fond of Mary Baring, daughter of Lord Ashburton, but, though she was very fond of him too, at 19, she felt she was too young to marry.

THR The Duke and Duchess of Albany.

After rejection from these women, Victoria stepped in to bar what she saw as unsuitable possibilities. Insisting that the children of British monarchs should marry into other reigning Protestant families, Victoria suggested a meeting with Princess Helena Friederike, the daughter of Georg Viktor, reigning Prince of Waldeck-Pyrmont, one of whose daughters had already married King William III of the Netherlands. On April 27, 1882, Leopold and Helena were married, at St George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle, and his income was raised by parliament to £25,000. Leopold and Helena enjoyed a happy (although brief) marriage. In 1883, Leopold became a father when his wife gave birth to a daughter, Alice.

Illness and death

Prince Leopold had haemophilia, diagnosed in childhood and in early years had various physicians in permanent attendance, including Arnold Royle and John Wickham Legg. In February 1884, Leopold went to Cannes on doctor’s orders: joint pain is a common symptom of haemophilia and the winter climate in the United Kingdom was always difficult for him. His wife, pregnant at the time, stayed at home but urged him to go. On March 27, at his Cannes residence, the ‘Villa Nevada’, he slipped and fell, injuring his knee and hitting his head. He died in the early hours of the next morning, apparently from a cerebral haemorrhage. He was buried in the Albert Memorial Chapel at Windsor. The court observed official mourning from 30 March 30, 1884 to May 11, 1884. His posthumous son, Prince Charles Edward, succeeded him as 2nd Duke of Albany upon birth four months later.

HRH The Duke of Albany

Mausoleum Day: December 14th

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Death, Diptheria, German Empire, Louis IV of Hesse, Prince Albert, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, Prince Consort, Prince of Wales, Princess Alice, Queen Victoria, Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom, The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, Typhoid

Today in the history of the British Monarchy, at least through the reign of Queen Victoria, December 14 was known as Mausoleum Day due to the deaths of Prince Albert the Prince Consort and Princess Alice in 1861 and 1878 respectively.

Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (Franz Albrecht August Carl Emmanuel) (August 26, 1819 – December 14, 1861) was the second son of Ernest III, Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, and his first wife, Louise of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg. Albert’s future wife, Victoria, was born earlier in the same year with the assistance of the same midwife, Charlotte von Siebold.

He was born in the Saxon duchy of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld, to a family connected to many of Europe’s ruling monarchs. At the age of 20, he married his first cousin, Queen Victoria; (her mother Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg and his father, Duke Ernest III of Saxe-Coburg were siblings) together they had nine children. Initially he felt constrained by his role of consort, which did not afford him power or responsibilities. He gradually developed a reputation for supporting public causes, such as educational reform and the abolition of slavery worldwide, and was entrusted with running the Queen’s household, office and estates. He was heavily involved with the organisation of the Great Exhibition of 1851, which was a resounding success.

As the years wore on Queen Victoria came to depend more and more on his support and guidance. He aided the development of Britain’s constitutional monarchy by persuading his wife to be less partisan in her dealings with Parliament—although he actively disagreed with the interventionist foreign policy pursued during Lord Palmerston’s tenure as Foreign Secretary. Albert was not granted a peerage title and Queen Victoria wanted to grant him the title King Consort but Parliament said no. However, in 1857, Albert was given the formal title of Prince Consort.

In August 1859, Albert fell seriously ill with stomach cramps. In March 1861, Victoria’s mother and Albert’s aunt, the Duchess of Kent, died and Victoria was grief-stricken; Albert took on most of the Queen’s duties, despite continuing to suffer with chronic stomach troubles. The last public event he presided over was the opening of the Royal Horticultural Gardens on 5 June 1861. In August, Victoria and Albert visited the Curragh Camp, Ireland, where the Prince of Wales (future Edward VII) was doing army service. At the Curragh, the Prince of Wales was introduced, by his fellow officers, to Nellie Clifden, an Irish actress.

By November, Victoria and Albert had returned to Windsor, and the Prince of Wales had returned to Cambridge, where he was a student. Two of Albert’s young cousins, brothers King Pedro V of Portugal and Prince Ferdinand, died of typhoid fever within 5 days of each other in early November. On top of this news, Albert was informed that gossip was spreading in gentlemen’s clubs and the foreign press that the Prince of Wales was still involved with Nellie Clifden and Albert and Victoria were horrified by their son’s indiscretion, and feared blackmail, scandal or pregnancy. Although Albert was ill and at a low ebb, he travelled to Cambridge to see the Prince of Wales on November 25th to discuss his son’s indiscreet affair. Upon his return from Cambridge Albert began suffering from pains in his back and legs.

When the Trent Affair—the forcible removal of Confederate envoys from a British ship by Unionforces during the American Civil War—threatened war between the United States and Britain, Albert was gravely ill but intervened to soften the British diplomatic response, thus preventing War with the United States.

On December 9th, one of Albert’s doctors, William Jenner, diagnosed typhoid fever. Despite a temporary rally where it was believed the Prince was improving Albert died at 10:50 p.m. on December 14th, 1861 in the Blue Room at Windsor Castle, in the presence of the Queen and five of their nine children. The contemporary diagnosis was typhoid fever, but modern writers have pointed out that Albert’s ongoing stomach pain, leaving him ill for at least two years before his death, may indicate that a chronic disease, such as Crohn’s disease, renal failure, or abdominal cancer, was the cause of death.

Albert died at the relatively young age of 42. Victoria was so devastated at the loss of her husband that she entered into a deep state of mourning and wore black for the rest of her life. On her death in 1901, their eldest son succeeded as Edward VII, the first British monarch of the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, named after the ducal house to which Albert belonged.

Princess Alice of the United Kingdom (Alice Maud Mary; April 25, 1843 – December 14, 1878), Grand Duchess of Hesse and by Rhine, was the third child and second daughter of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Alice was the first of Queen Victoria’s nine children to die, and one of three to be outlived by their mother, who died in 1901.

Alice spent her early childhood in the company of her parents and siblings, travelling between the British royal residences. Her education was devised by Albert’s close friend and adviser, Baron Stockmar, and included practical activities like needlework and woodwork and languages like French and German. When her father, Prince Albert, became fatally ill in December 1861, Alice nursed him until his death.

Following his death, Queen Victoria entered a period of intense mourning and Alice spent the next six months acting as her mother’s unofficial secretary. On July 1, 1862, while the court was still at the height of mourning, Alice married the minor German Prince Louis of Hesse, heir to the Grand Duchy of Hesse. The ceremony—conducted privately and with unrelieved gloom at Osborne House—was described by the Queen as “more of a funeral than a wedding”. The Princess’s life in Darmstadt was unhappy as a result of impoverishment, family tragedy and worsening relations with her husband and mother.

Grand Duke Ludwig IV of Hesse and By Rhine

Alice was a prolific patron of women’s causes and showed an interest in nursing, especially the work of Florence Nightingale. When Hesse became involved in the Austro-Prussian War, Darmstadt filled with the injured; the heavily pregnant Alice devoted a lot of her time to the management of field hospitals. In 1877, Alice became Grand Duchess upon the accession of her husband as Grand Duke Louis IV (Ludwig) her increased duties putting further strains on her health.

Princess Alice was the mother of Tsaritsa Alexandra Feodorovna of Russia (wife of Tsar Nicholas II), maternal grandmother of Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma (the last Viceroy of India), and maternal great-grandmother of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh (consort of Queen Elizabeth II). Another daughter, Elisabeth, who married Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich of Russia, was, like the tsaritsa and her family, killed by the Bolsheviks in 1918.

Final illness and death

In November 1878, the Grand Ducal household fell ill with diphtheria. Alice’s eldest daughter Victoria was the first to fall ill, complaining of a stiff neck in the evening of 5 November 5th. Diphtheria was diagnosed the following morning, and soon the disease spread to Alice’s children Alix, Marie, Irene, and Ernest. Her husband Louis became infected shortly thereafter. Elisabeth was the only child to not fall ill, having been sent away by Alice to the palace of the Princess Charles, her mother-in-law.

Marie became seriously ill on November 15, and Alice was called to her bedside, but by the time she arrived, Marie had choked to death. A distraught Alice wrote to Queen Victoria that the “pain is beyond words.” Alice kept the news of Marie’s death secret from her children for several weeks, but she finally told Ernest in early December. His reaction was even worse than she had anticipated; at first he refused to believe it. As he sat up crying, Alice broke her rule about physical contact with the ill and gave him a kiss. This was the kiss of death.

At first, however, Alice did not fall ill. She met her sister Victoria (Crown Princess of Germany and Prussia) as the latter was passing through Darmstadt on the way to England, and wrote to her mother with “a hint of resumed cheerfulness” on the same day. However, by Saturday, December 14th the 17th anniversary of her father’s death, she became seriously ill with the diphtheria caught from her son. Her last words were “dear Papa”, and she fell unconscious at 2:30 am. Just after 8:30 am, she died. Alice was buried on 18 December 1878 at the Grand Ducal mausoleum at Rosenhöhe outside Darmstadt, with the Union Flag draped over her coffin. A special monument of Alice and her daughter Marie was erected there by Joseph Boehm.

She was the first child of Queen Victoria to die, with her mother outliving her by more than 20 years. Victoria noted the coincidence of the dates of Albert and Alice’s deaths as “almost incredible and most mysterious.” Writing in her journal on the day of Alice’s death, Queen Victoria referred to the recent sufferings of the family: “This terrible day come round again.” Shocked by grief, she wrote to her daughter Princess Victoria: “My precious child, who stood by me and upheld me seventeen years ago on the same day taken, and by such an awful and fearful disease…She had darling Papa’s nature, and much of his self-sacrificing character and fearless and entire devotion to duty!” The animosity that Victoria had towards Alice seemed no longer present. Princess Victoria expressed her grief to her mother in a 39-page letter, and deeply mourned Alice, the sister to whom she was closest. However, both she and her husband were forbidden from attending the funeral by the Emperor of Germany, who was worried about their safety.

Alice’s death was felt in both Britain and Hesse. The Times wrote: “The humblest of people felt that they had the kinship of nature with a Princess who was the model of family virtue as a daughter, a sister, a wife and a mother…Her abundant sympathies sought for objects of help in the great unknown waste of human distress.” The Illustrated London News wrote that the “lesson of the late Princess’s life is as noble as it is obvious. Moral worth is far more important than high position.”

The death was also heavily felt by the royal family, especially by Alice’s brother and sister-in-law, the Prince and Princess of Wales. The Princess of Wales, upon meeting the Queen after Alice’s death, exclaimed “I wish I had died instead of her.” The Prince, meanwhile, wrote to the Earl of Granville that Alice “was my favourite sister. So good, so kind, so clever! We had gone through so much together…”

Birth of Princess Mary Adelaide of Cambridge.

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Adolphus Duke of Cambridge, Duke of Clarence, Edward VII of the United Kingdom, Francis of Teck, George III of Great Britain, George V of the United Kingdom, Hesse-Cassel, Prince Albert Victor, Princess Mary Adelaide of Cambridge, Queen Victoria

Today is the 185th anniversary of the birth of the Duchess of Teck, born Princes Mary Adelaide of Cambridge on November 27, 1833.

Princess Mary Adelaide of Cambridge (Mary Adelaide Wilhelmina Elizabeth; November 27, 1833 – October 27, 1897) was a member of the British Royal family, a granddaughter of George III, and a first cousin of Queen Victoria. Her only daughter was Princess Mary of Teck the spouse of King George V, making Princess Mary Adelaide the grandmother of Edward VIII and George VI and great-grandmother of the current queen, Elizabeth II. She held the title of Duchess of Teck through marriage.

Mary Adelaide was born on November 27, 1833 in Hanover, Germany. Her father was Prince Adolphus, Duke of Cambridge, the youngest surviving son of George III and Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. Her mother was Princess Augusta of Hesse-Cassel, the daughter of Prince Friedrich of Hesse-Cassel and Princess Caroline of Nassau-Usingen. The young princess was baptized on January 9, 1834 at Cambridge House, Hanover, by Rev John Ryle Wood, Chaplain to the Duke of Cambridge. Her godmother and paternal aunt Princess Elizabeth, Landgravine of Hesse-Homburg, was the only godparent who was present. The others were King William IV and Queen Adelaide (her paternal uncle and aunt), Princess Mary, Duchess of Gloucester and Edinburgh (her paternal aunt), Princess Marie of Hesse-Cassel (her maternal aunt) and Princess Marie Luise Charlotte of Hesse-Kassel (her maternal first cousin). She was named Mary Adelaide Wilhelmina Elizabeth for her aunts and uncle.

By the age of 30, Mary Adelaide was still unmarried. Her large girth (earning her the disparaging and unkind epithet of “Fat Mary”) and lack of income were contributing factors, as was her advanced age. However, her royal rank prevented her from marrying someone not of royal blood. Her cousin, Queen Victoria, took pity on her and attempted to arrange pairings.

Eventually a suitable candidate was found in Württemberg, Prince Francis of Teck.

Francis was born as Franz Paul Karl Ludwig Alexander on August 28, 1837 in Esseg, Slavonia (now Osijek, Croatia). His father was Duke Alexander of Württemberg, the son of Duke Louis of Württemberg. His mother was Countess Claudine Rhédey von Kis-Rhéde. The marriage was morganatic, meaning that Francis had no succession rights to the Kingdom of Württemberg. His title at birth was Count Francis von Hohenstein, after his mother was created Countess von Hohenstein in her own right by Emperor Ferdinand I of Austria. In 1863, Francis was created Prince of Teck, with the style of Serene Highness, in the Kingdom of Württemberg by Emperor Frank-Josef of Austria.

Although the Prince of Teck was of a lower rank than Mary Adelaide, as the product of a morganatic marriage, but was at least of princely title and of royal blood. With no other options available, Mary Adelaide decided to marry him. The couple were married on June 12, 1866 at St. Anne’s Church, Kew, Surrey.

The 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 to the rank of Highness in 1887 in celebration of her Golden Jubilee.

Despite their modest income, Mary Adelaide had expensive tastes and lived an extravagant life of parties, expensive food and clothes and holidays abroad. In 1883 they were forced to live more cheaply abroad to reduce their debts. They travelled to Florence, Italy, and also stayed with relatives in Germany and Austria. Initially, they travelled under the names of the Count and Countess von Hohenstein. However, Mary Adelaide wished to travel in more style and reverted to her royal style, which commanded significantly more attention and better service.

The Tecks returned from their self-imposed exile in 1885 and continued to live at Kensington Palace and White Lodge in Richmond Park. Mary Adelaide began devoting her life to charity, serving as patron to Barnardo’s and other children’s charities.

In 1891, Mary Adelaide was keen for her daughter, Princess Victoria Mary of Teck (known as “May”) to marry one of the sons of the Prince of Wales, the future Edward VII.

At the same time, Queen Victoria wanted a British-born bride for the future king, though of course one of royal rank and ancestry, and Mary Adelaide’s daughter fulfilled the rank criteria. After Queen Victoria’s approval, May became engaged to Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence and Avondale, second in line to the British throne. He died suddenly six weeks later. Queen Victoria was fond of Princess Mary and persuaded the Duke of Clarence’s brother and next in the line of succession, Prince George, Duke of York, to marry her instead. After a short morning period they married in the Chapel Royal, St. James’s Palace, on July 6, 1893.

Mary Adelaide never lived to see her daughter become Princess of Wales or Queen, as she died on 27 October 1897 at White Lodge, following an emergency operationShe was buried in the royal vault at St. George’s Chapel, Windsor.

When the Duchess of Teck died, leaving Francis a widower, He continued to live at White Lodge, Richmond, but did not carry out any Royal duties. The Duke of Teck died on 21 January 1900 at White Lodge. He was buried next to his wife in the Royal Vault at St. George’s Chapel, Windsor.

History of the Prince of Wales titles. Part II

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Font of All Honours, House of Hanover, King George I of Great Britain, King George II of Great Britain, King George III of Great Britain, Kings and Queens of Great Britain, kings and queens of the United Kingdom, Prince, Princess, Princess of Wales, Queen Victoria, titles

Since the time of the House of Tudor and through the times of the House of Stuart, when sons of the Sovereign were granted the courtesy title of Prince, questions of how far in the male line to extend the title was not an issue for grand children of the Sovereign in the male line hadn’t yet occurred. With the accession of King George I in 1714 and the Hanoverians, new situations arose.

First issue that George I faced in the need to regulate titles was with his siblings. Since they were not the sons of a British sovereign, they were German princes and sons of the Elector of Hanover, were they entitled to be prince or princess of Great Britain? King George I, as the “Font of All Honours” was able to grant peerage titles to his youngest brother, Ernest-Augustus. In 1716, Ernest-Augustus visited England where, on June 29, 1716, he was created Duke of York, Albany and Earl of Ulster. On April 30, 1718 (OS), he was created a Knight of the Garter together with his grand-nephew Frederick-Louis, later Prince of Wales. Another brother of George I, Prince Maximilian-William, converted to Catholicism, losing his place in the line of succession to the British throne and therefore didn’t receive any peerage titles. However, neither Ernest-Augustus or Maximilian-William were created Princes of Great Britain and remained Princes of Hanover and Dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg.

George I came to the throne a grandfather, his eldest son, future George II, had several children. The children of the Prince of Wales were given the title of Princes and Princesses, and the style of “Highness”.  This arrangement was changed in 1737 when George II granted his grandchildren, all children of his eldest son, Frederick-Louis, Prince of Wales the title Prince and Princess and their style was raised to “Royal Highness.” This occurrence was an exception and wouldn’t become formalized by letters patent until 1864 by Queen Victoria with the birth of Prince Albert-Victor, Duke of Clarence and Avondale, the eldest son of the future King Edward VII. 


George III’s reign also saw the first great-grandchildren of a sovereign in male line, Prince William-Frederick, 2nd duke of Gloucester and his sister, Sophia, were also nephew and niece of a sovereign. They were titled “Prince” and “Princess”, but were only styled “Highness. It is not absolutely clear, however, whether the title of Prince was due to being great-grandson of George II or nephew of George III. On July 22, 1816, Sophia’s brother Prince William-Frederick, Duke of Gloucester, married their cousin, Princess Mary, a daughter of George III. On their wedding day, the Prince Regent bestowed the style of Royal Highness on the Duke of Gloucester, Princess Mary was a Royal Highness by birth. The next day, the Duke of Gloucester’s sister Princess Sophia was also bestowed with this style, giving her equal rank with her brother.

Despite raising the Gloucesters to the style of Royal Highness, a tradition was emerging: all male-line descendants from the Sovereign were styled Prince/ss; children of the sovereign and the sovereign’s eldest son were Royal Highnesses, all others were Highnesses. The Letters Patent of 1864, which only deal directly with the style of Royal Highness, state the custom in the preamble: “Princes and Princesses of [the] Royal Family descended from and in lineal succession to the Crown as now established by law all bear the style and title of Highness”.

The statement does not say exactly who is a prince or princess.  But an opinion of the Lord Chancellor in July 1878 states that “there is not, in my opinion, any limit among those in Succession to the Throne within which the use of the style of Prince is to be confined, until some such limit is imposed by the Will of the Sovereign as the Fountain of all Honour”.  Queen Victoria cared enough about this opinion that, to put an end to controversies, she sent a copy to Garter King of Arms.


It is interesting to note that the Letters Patent of 1864 say “descended from and in lineal succession to the Crown”  It is impossible to state what the custom might have been for female-line descendants, since the habit of marrying daughters into foreign royal houses meant that no such descendants lived in Britain.  As of 1864, the first and only marriage of a prince or princess in Great Britain, had been that of the duke of Gloucester (great-grandson of George II) to the daughter of George III, in 1816. That marriage remained childless and if they had had children, those children would have been great-great grandchildren in the male line from the Sovereign and it would have been interesting to see what these children would have been styled.

It wouldn’t be until the early part of the 20th Century would the need once again arise to address what to call the great-grandchildren of a sovereign in male line. This time the results would be different. More on that in my next post.

The Name Louis and the British Royal Family: Conclusion

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British Monarchy, Emperor Alexander II of Russia, Grand Duke Louis IV of Hesse, Grand Dukes of Hesse and By Rhine, Holy Roman Empire, Kings and Queens of Great Britain, Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt, Lous Mountbatten, Philip I of Hesse, Prince Louis of Battenberg, Prince Louis of Cambridge, Queen Victoria, Viceroy of India

For the final and largest connection to the name Louis to the British Royal Family we turn to the Mountbatten family, also known as the House of Battenberg, the maternal side of the Duke of Edinburgh’s family which originates in the Landgraviate of Hesse-Darmstadt in the Holy Roman Empire. Here is a little background on the German Hessian dynasty.

Royal Standard of the Grand Dukes of Hesse and By Rhine

The House of Hesse is a European dynasty, directly descended from the House of Reginar that were a family of magnates in Lower Lotharingia during the Carolingianand Ottonian period. They were the ancestors of the House of Brabant, Landgraves and later Dukes of Brabant, Dukes of Lothier and Dukes of Limburg. The Reginarid Brabant dynasty ended in 1355, leaving its duchies to the House of Luxembourg which in turn left them to the House of Valois-Burgundy in 1383. Junior branches of the male line include the medieval male line of the English House of Percy, Earls of Northumberland, and the German House of Hesse which ruled Hesse from 1264 until 1918 and still exist. Louis, or the German derivation, Ludwig, was a frequently used name within the dynasty.

In the early Middle Ages the territory of Hessengau, named after the Germanic Chatti tribes, formed the northern part of the German stem duchy of Franconia, along with the adjacent Lahngau. Upon the extinction of the ducal Conradines, these Rhenish Franconian counties were gradually acquired by Landgrave Louis I of Thuringia and his successors. The origins of the House of Hesse begin with the marriage of Sophie of Thuringia to Heinrich II, Duke of Brabant from the House of Reginar. Sophia of Thuringia was daughter of Louis IV, Landgrave of Thuringia and Elizabeth of Hungary. Sophie was the heiress of Hesse which she passed on to her son, Heinrich I, Landgrave of Hesse upon her retention of the territory following her partial victory in the War of the Thuringian Succession in which she was one of the belligerents.

From the late 16th century, after the reign of Philip I, Landgrave of Hesse (1509-1567) it was generally divided into several branches, the most important of which were those of Hesse-Kassel (or Hesse-Cassel) and Hesse-Darmstadt. In the early 19th century the Landgrave of Hesse-Kassel was elevated to Elector of Hesse (1803), while the Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt became the Grand Duke of Hesse (1806), later Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine. The Electorate of Hesse (Hesse-Kassel) was annexed by Prussia in 1866, while Grand Ducal Hesse (Hesse-Darmstadt) remained a sovereign realm until the end of the German monarchies in 1918.

Landgrave Louis X of Hesse-Darmstadt was the son of Louis IX, Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt, and succeeded his father in 1790. He presided over a significant increase in territory for Hesse-Darmstadt during the imperial reorganizations of 1801-1803, most notably the Duchy of Westphalia, hitherto subject to the Archbishop of Cologne. Allied to Napoleon, Louis in 1806 was elevated to the title of a Grand Duke of Hesse and joined the Confederation of the Rhine, leading to the dissolution of the Empire. At the Congress of Vienna in 1814/15, Louis had to give up his Westphalian territories, but was compensated with the district of Rheinhessen, with his capital Mainz on the left bank of the Rhine. Because of this addition, he amended his title to Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine.

Louis II (December 26, 1777 – June 16, 1848) was Grand Duke of Hesse and by Rhine from April 6 1830 until March 5, 1848 (He resigned in the German Revolution of 1848). He was the son of Louis I, Grand Duke of Hesse and Princess Louise of Hesse-Darmstadt. He was married to Wilhelmine of Baden who was his first cousin. Through her, Louis had four surviving children – Grand Duke Louis III of Hesse and By Rhine (June 9, 1806, Darmstadt – June 13, 1877,), Prince Charles, Prince Alexander, and Princess Marie, the wife of Emperor Alexander II of Russia. The last two, however, are speculated to have been fathered by Baron August von Senarclens de Grancy, the longtime lover of Wilhelmine of Baden.

It is Louis II’s second son Prince Charles of Hesse and by Rhine (April 23, 1809 – March 20, 1877) to where we turn our focus. Prince Charles was married to Princess Elisabeth of Prussia (June 18, 1815 – March 21, 1885), the second daughter of Prince Wilhelm of Prussia and Landgravine Marie Anna of Hesse-Homburg and a granddaughter of King Friedrich-Wilhelm II of Prussia. She is the great-great grandmother of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.

Grand Duke Louis IV of Hesse and By Rhine

Prince Charles and Princess Elisabeth’s eldest son was Prince Louis (September 1837 – March 13, 1892) and he was born at the Prinz-Karl-Palais in Darmstadt, the capital of the Grand Duchy of Hesse and by Rhine in the German Confederation. Prince Louis was from birth, second-in-line to the grand ducal throne, after his father. On July 1, 1862, Louis married Princess Alice, the third child of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom, at Osborne House on the Isle of Wight. On the day of the wedding, the Queen issued a royal warrant granting her new son-in-law the style of Royal Highness in the United Kingdom. The Queen also subsequently made Prince Louis a knight of the Order of the Garter. Louis became Grand Duke Louis IV of Hesse and By Rhine on June 13, 1877. Their eldest daughter, Princess Victoria, born 1863, will feature again in our story.

Prince Alexander of Hesse and By Rhine

The next important Prince in our story is Prince Alexander Ludwig Georg Friedrich Emil of Hesse and By Rhine GCB (July 15, 1823 – December 18, 1888). Prince Alexander was the third son and fourth child of Louis II, Grand Duke of Hesse and Wilhelmina of Baden. He was a brother of Tsarina Maria Alexandrovna. The Battenberg/Mountbatten family descends from Alexander and his wife Countess Julia von Hauke, a former lady-in-waiting to his sister.

Alexander fell in love with Countess Julia Hauke, lady-in-waiting to his sister, future Tasrina Maria Alexandrovna. Countess Hauke, was an orphaned German-Polish ward of the Russian Emperor, and daughter of the Emperor’s former minister of war. At that time, the Emperor Nicholas I was considering Alexander as a possible husband for his niece and, when he heard of Alexander’s romance, he forbade the couple to marry.

Alexander left Russia for England to contemplate his future, but then returned to Russia and eloped with Julia from St. Petersburg, resulting in exile and being stricken by the Emperor’s orders from the roll of the Russian imperial army for insubordination. The two were married in Breslau in 1851. Alexander’s older brother Louis III, Grand Duke of Hesse, allowed him to re-patriate to Hesse with his bride, although he did not recognize their marriage as dynastic. He granted her the new, hereditary title of Countess von Battenberg with the style Illustrious Highness (H.Ill.H.). (Battenberg was a small town and ruined castle in the north of the grand duchy which, according to the memoirs of their eldest child Marie, the family visited once during her youth, although it never became their residence).

In 1858 Grand Duke Louis III elevated Countess von Battenberg’s title to that of Princess of Battenberg with the style Serene Highness (HSH). The children of Alexander and Julia thus bore the title of Prince (German: Prinz) or Princess (German: Prinzessin) and the style Serene Highness (German: Durchlaucht). Battenberg thus became the name of a morganatic cadet branch of the Grand Ducal family of Hesse, without right of succession.

The name Battenberg was last used by her youngest son, Prince Francis Joseph of Battenberg, who died childless in 1924. Most members of the family, residing in the United Kingdom, had renounced their German titles in 1917, due to rising anti-German sentiment among the British public during World War I, and changed their name to Mountbatten, an anglicised version of Battenberg.

The eldest son of Prince Alexander of Hesse and By Rhine and Princess Julia of Battenberg was Prince Louis Alexander of Battenberg (May 24, 1854 – September 11, 1921), born six months after their elopement. Although born in Austria, and brought up in Italy and Germany, he enrolled in the United Kingdom’s Royal Navy at the age of fourteen. Queen Victoria and her son King Edward VII, then Prince of Wales, occasionally intervened in his career.

Prince Louis of Battenberg (Louis Mountbatten the 1st Marquess of Milford Haven)

Prince Louis of Battenberg married his father’s first cousin, the aforementioned Princess Victoria of Hesse and Rhine, the daughter of Grand Duke Louis IV of Hesse and By Rhine and Princess Alice of the United Kingdom and a granddaughter of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom and Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.

In 1912, after a naval career lasting more than forty years, Prince Louis of Battenberg was appointed First Sea Lord, the professional head of the British naval service. With World War I looming, he took steps to ready the British fleet for combat, but his background as a German prince forced his retirement once the war began, when anti-German sentiment was running high. In 1917 when anti-German sentiment had reached its zenith, Prince Louis changed his name to Mountbatten, the Anglicized name for Battenberg and relinquished his German titles, at the behest of King George V. In return for giving up his German titles, and for his many years of service in the British Navy, King George V created Louis Mountbatten the 1st Marquess of Milford Haven.

The Marquess of Milford Haven and Princess Victoria of Hesse and By Rhine (Marchioness of Milford Haven) were the parents of four children.

1. George Mountbatten, 2nd Marquess of Milford Haven.
2. Louise Mountbatten, second wife of King Gustaf VI Adolph of Sweden.
3. Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma.
4. Princess Alice of Battenberg who married Prince Andreas of Greece and Denmark (prior to the relinquishment of her German title) and were the parents of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, consort of Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom.

Admiral of the Fleet Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma

This brings us to the person with the name of Louis who had a great influence on today’s British Royal Family. Admiral of the Fleet, Louis Francis Albert Victor Nicholas Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma, KG, GCB, OM, GCSI, GCIE, GCVO, DSO, PC, FRS (June 25, 1900 – August 27, 1979) second son of Prince Louis of Battenberg and Princess Victoria of Hesse and by Rhine (Marquess and Marchioness of Milford Haven). Since Lord Mountbatten was born 17 years prior to his family relinquishing their German titles, Lord Louis was born HSH Prince Louis of Battenberg.

Lord Louis was a British Royal Navy officer and statesman, a maternal uncle of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, and second cousin once removed of Queen Elizabeth II. Despite his family’s Hessian foreign origins, he was born in the United Kingdom, and was considered a member of the Royal Family both due to his descent from Queen Victoria and his close blood relation to Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh. During the Second World War, he was Supreme Allied Commander, South East Asia Command (1943–1946). He was the last Viceroy of India (1947) and the first Governor-General of independent India (1947–1948).

From 1954 to 1959, Mountbatten was First Sea Lord, a position that had been held by his father, Prince Louis of Battenberg, some forty years earlier. Thereafter he served as Chief of the Defence Staff until 1965, making him the longest serving professional head of the British Armed Forces to date. During this period Mountbatten also served as Chairman of the NATO Military Committee for a year.

In 1979, Lord Mountbatten, his grandson Nicholas, and two others were murdered by a bomb set by members of the Provisional Irish Republican Army, hidden aboard his fishing boat in Mullaghmore, County Sligo, Ireland.

Lord Mountbatten was close to the British Royal Family and had a profound affect on the current Prince of Wales who considered his great-uncle to be his honorary grandfather. His influence is felt in many ways, one of them being his name lives on in members of the Royal Family.

Here is a list of the current members of the Royal Family that have the name Louis among their names.

1. Lord Frederick Windsor (Frederick Michael George David Louis; born April 6, 1979), also nicknamed Freddie Windsor, is a British financial analyst, and the only son of Prince and Princess Michael of Kent.

He is a first cousin once removed of Queen Elizabeth II and a first cousin twice removed of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. He is 47th in the line of succession to the British throne. Lord Frederick and his sister, Lady Gabriella, were brought up in the Church of England. I do not believe his name of Louis is after Lord Mountbatten.

2. HRH. Prince Edward, Earl of Wessex, KG, GCVO, CD, ADC(P) (Edward Antony Richard Louis; born March 10, 1964) is the youngest of four children and the third son of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh. At the time of his birth, he was third in line of succession to the British throne; he is now tenth.

HRH The Duke of Cambridge

3. HRH. Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, KG, KT, PC, ADC(P) (William Arthur Philip Louis; born June 21, 1982) is a member of the British royal family. He is the elder son of Charles, Prince of Wales, and Diana, Princess of Wales, and since birth has been second in the line of succession to the British throne, after his father.

4. HRH. Prince George of Cambridge (George Alexander Louis; born July 22, 2013) is a member of the British royal family. He is the eldest child and elder son of Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, and third in the line of succession to the British throne. As he is expected to become king, his birth was widely celebrated across the Commonwealth realms.

HRH Prince Louis of Cambridge

5. Prince Louis of Cambridge (Louis Arthur Charles; born April 23, 2018) is a member of the British royal family. He is the third and youngest child and second son of Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge. He is fifth in the line of succession to the British throne.

Death of Kaiser Wilhelm II: June 4, 1941.

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Friedrich III of Germany, German Emperor, German Empire, Huis Doorn, Kaiser Wilhelm II, Kingdom of Prussia, Kingdom of the Netherlands, Queen Victoria, Wilhelm II of Germany

On this date in History: June 4, 1941. Death of former German Emperor and King of Prussia Wilhelm II at his home in exile, Huis Doorn, the Netherlands.

Wilhelm II (Friedrich Wilhelm Viktor Albert von Hohenzollern; January 27, 1859 – June 4, 1941) was the last German Emperor (Kaiser) and King of Prussia, ruling the German Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia from June 15, 1888 to his abdication November 9, 1918. He was the eldest grandchild of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and related to many monarchs and princes of Europe, most notably King George V of the United Kingdom and Emperor Nicholas II of Russia.

Wilhelm was born on January 27, 1859 at the Crown Prince’s Palace, Berlin, to Prince Friedrich-Wilhelm of Prussia (the future Friedrich III) and his wife, Victoria, Princess Royal, the eldest daughter of Britain’s Queen Victoria. At the time of his birth, his great-uncle Friedrich-Wilhelm IV was king of Prussia, and his grandfather and namesake Wilhelm was acting as Regent. He was the first grandchild of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, but more important, as the first son of the Crown Prince of Prussia, Wilhelm was second in the line of succession to Prussia, from 1861 onwards and also, after 1871, to the newly created German Empire, which, according to the constitution of the German Empire, was ruled by the King of Prussia.

Wilhelm died of a pulmonary embolus in Doorn, Netherlands, on June 4, 1941, at the age of 82, just weeks before the Axis invasion of the Soviet Union. German soldiers had been guarding his house. Hitler, however, was angered that the former monarch had an honor guard of German troops and nearly fired the general who ordered them when he found out. Despite his personal animosity toward Wilhelm, Hitler wanted to bring his body back to Berlin for a state funeral, as he regarded Wilhelm a symbol of Germany and Germans during World War I. Hitler felt that such a funeral would demonstrate to the Germans the direct descent of the Third Reich from the old German Empire, thereby giving his regime a sense of continuity.

However, Wilhelm’s wished to return to Germany only after the restoration of the monarchy. The Nazi occupational authorities granted him a small military funeral, with a few hundred people present. The mourners included August von Mackensen, fully dressed in his old imperial Life Hussars uniform, Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, and Reichskommissar for the Netherlands Arthur Seyss-Inquart, along with a few other military advisers. However, Wilhelm’s request that the swastika and other Nazi regalia be not displayed at his funeral was ignored, and they are featured in the photographs of the event taken by a Dutch photographer.

Wilhelm was buried in a mausoleum in the grounds of Huis Doorn, which has since become a place of pilgrimage for German monarchists. Small but enthusiastic and faithful numbers of them gather there every year on the anniversary of his death to pay their homage to the last German Emperor.

Election of the King of the Hellenes.

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Alfred Duke of Edinburgh, Christian IX, Christian IX of Denmark, Election, Ernest II Duke of Save-Coburg-Gotha, George I of Greece, King George I of the Hellenes, Kingdom of Greece, Kingdom of the Hellenes, Ludwig I of Bavaria, Otto of Greece, Plebiscite, Queen Victoria

On this date in History: March 30, 1863. Prince Wilhelm of Denmark was elected as King of the Hellenes (Greece).

George I (born Prince Wilhelm of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg; 24 December 24, 1845 – March 18, 1913) was King of the Hellenes (Greece) from 1863 until his assassination in 1913.

George was born at the Yellow Palace, an 18th-century town house at 18 Amaliegade, right next to the Amalienborg Palace complex in Copenhagen. He was the second son of Prince Christian of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg (Christian IX of Denmark) and Princess Louise of Hesse-Cassel. Although his full name was Prince Christian Wilhelm Ferdinand Adolf Georg of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg, until his accession in Greece, he was known as Prince Wilhelm the namesake of his paternal and maternal grandfathers, Wilhelm, Duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg, and Prince Wilhelm of Hesse-Cassel.

Although he was of royal blood, his family was relatively obscure and lived a comparatively normal life by royal standards. In 1853, however, George’s father was designated the heir presumptive to the childless King Frederik VII of Denmark, and the family became princes and princesses of Denmark. George’s siblings were Frederik (who succeeded their father as King of Denmark), Alexandra (who became wife of King Edward VII of the United Kingdom and the mother of King George V), Dagmar (who, as Empress Maria Feodorovna, was consort of Emperor Alexander III of Russiaand the mother of Emperor Nicholas II), Thyra (who married Prince Ernest Augustus, 3rd Duke of Cumberland and Teviotdale) and Valdemar.

King of the Hellenes

Following the overthrow of the Bavarian-born King Otto of Greece (son of King Ludwig I of Bavaria and Therese of Saxe-Hildburghausen) in October 1862, the Greek people had rejected Otto’s brother and designated successor Leopold, although they still favored a monarchy rather than a republic. Many Greeks, seeking closer ties to the pre-eminent world power, Great Britain, rallied around Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh, second son of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. British prime minister Lord Palmerston believed that the Greeks were “panting for increase in territory”, hoping for a gift of the Ionian Islands, which were then a British protectorate.

The London Conference of 1832, however, prohibited any of the Great Powers’ ruling families from accepting the crown, and in any event, Queen Victoria was adamantly opposed to the idea. The Greeks nevertheless insisted on holding a plebiscite in which Prince Alfred received over 95% of the 240,000 votes. There were 93 votes for a Republic and 6 for a Greek.King Otto received one vote. Prince Alfred was also the designated heir to his uncle, Ernst II, Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha should the Duke remain childless.

With Prince Alfred’s exclusion, the search began for an alternative candidate. The French favored Henri d’Orléans, duc d’Aumale, while the British proposed Queen Victoria’s brother-in-law Ernst II, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, her nephew Prince Leiningen, and Archduke Maximilian of Austria, among others. Eventually, the Greeks and Great Powers winnowed their choice to Prince William of Denmark, who had received 6 votes in the plebiscite.

Aged only 17, he was elected King of the Hellenes on March 30, 1863 by the Greek National Assembly under the regnal name of George I. Paradoxically, he ascended a royal throne before his father, who became King Christian IX of Denmark on November 15 of the same year. There were two significant differences between George’s elevation and that of his predecessor, Otto. First, he was acclaimed unanimously by the Greek Assembly, rather than imposed on the people by foreign powers. Second, he was proclaimed “King of the Hellenes” instead of “King of Greece”, which had been Otto’s style.

His ceremonial enthronement in Copenhagen on 6 June was attended by a delegation of Greeks led by First Admiral and Prime Minister Constantine Kanaris. Frederick VII awarded George the Order of the Elephant, and it was announced that the British government would cede the Ionian Islands to Greece in honor of the new monarch.

King George I is the paternal grandfather of HRH The Duke of Edinburgh, husband of HM Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom and born Prince Philip of Greece and Denmark.