Kaiser Wilhelm II portraits

I've only just noticed that Kaiser Wilhelm II had a cleft chin.  Does anyone know which of his ancestors and/or descendants had this feature? It's difficult to see in many of their pictures, as most of his male ancestors (at least) were bearded.

Looking at pictures of Fritz pre-beard in Hannah Pakula's "An Uncommon Woman," it looks as though he has a cleft chin, too.

Come to think of it, did Wilhelm get any of his looks from Vicky's side?

Thanks to all for the posts! 

Lets see...of Willie s kids, Viktoria had a soft cleft chin, Joachim, Adalbert and Oskar had it too ;-)

From the NY Times feature story upon his becoming Kaiser in June 1888.

Better size of previous photo post. William is looking grand, thoughtful, and visionary. His fur drape is reminiscent of Ludwig II.

Katenka_Fyodorovna wrote:

Lets see...of Willie s kids, Viktoria had a soft cleft chin, Joachim, Adalbert and Oskar had it too ;-)

Thanks for that.

Of Willie's other children, I don't think Prince Frederick William had a cleft, and can't see well enough in pictures of the others. In later descendants, Prince Alexander Ferdinand (son of Prince August Wilhelm) has a dimple in his chin.  Prince Louis Ferdinand might have a dimpled chin, but it doesn't always show up. His son Joachim has a pronounced cleft. Of Joachim's sons, Joachim and Georg don't have cleft chins but Frederick W does have it.

Willie's father Frederick certainly had a cleft chin, but his father, Kaiser Wilhelm I, didn't.  I don't think Friedrich Wilhelm III or FW IV had it, but there's a suggestion way, way back up the tree that Elector Friedrich Wilhelm of Brandenburg had one, as shown in one of his portraits.

According to older genetics texts, cleft chin is inherited as a simple dominant character which means that if a child has it, one at least of his parents must have had it too.  However more recent work says the character shows incomplete penetrance, and can be modified by another gene, or by environmental factors, and I think this is the case in the Prussian royal family.

http://pro.corbis.com/Enlargement/Enlargement.aspx?id=42-21390285&caller=search

http://pro.corbis.com/Enlargement/Enlargement.aspx?id=AG001414&caller=search

http://pro.corbis.com/Enlargement/Enlargement.aspx?id=AG001415&caller=search

I should be most grateful to anyone if they can shed light on the whereabouts of the 1909 portrait of Kaiser Wilhelm II by the Swiss-born American artist ADOLFO MULLER-URY (1862-1947). I published my research into this picture in 2003:  

‘Re-Introducing Adolfo Müller-Ury (1862-1947): The Artist, two Dealers, four Counts and the Kaiser: A Hitherto Unknown Episode in International Art History’, in The British Art Journal, Volume IV, No. 2, Summer  2003, pp.57-65.

In this article I stated that the portrait, a gift of the proprietor of a German language newspaper in New York, which was at Columbia University's German School in New York until the 1960s (kept in the basement after April 1917) had been deaccessioned and found its way into the possession of a San Marinese restorer called Carlo Wilson Reffi, at that time, but has now disappeared.

I also stated that the oil sketch, which was sold from the artist's studio in November 1947, the whereabouts of which in 2003 was unknown to me, had at some time been acquired by the Max Planck Institute in Berlin (the Institute originally being called the Kaiser Wilhelm II Scientific Institute), apparently from a New York dealer.

I should be most grateful to anyone who can shed light on the whereabouts of the larger picture, and emails me here or at stephenjconrad2@aol.co.uk.

Thank you
Stephen Conrad MA FRSA

an early early illustration Friedrich showing his baby son Wilhelm

Posing seems to have come naturally to the Kaiser!

'Come to think of it, did Wilhelm get any of his looks from Vicky's side?'

I think so. Visiting the Royal Archives at Windsor a few years ago (how's that for oneupmanship!) I spotted a painting of a young man whom I initially assumed to have been Wilhelm. It turned out to be his uncle Leopold of Albany.

Ann

They are way different. How did you confused them? 0_o