Princess Luise zu Hohenlohe-Oehringen (1867-1945)

[Eutropius]

I am curious about Princess (Marie) Luise zu Hohenlohe-Oehringen (1867-1945).  She seems to have had an interesting life!

She was daughter of Prince Felix zu Hohenlohe-Oehringen (1818-1900) and his wife, Princess Alexandrine von Hanau (1830-1871), daughter of Friedrich Wilhelm, Elector of Hessen.  Luise was first married in 1886 to a much older widower, Prince Albrecht zu Waldeck und Pyrmont (1841-1897), who had children by his first marriage.  They had three children together, 2 of whom died in infancy, and one son, Prince Karl Alexander who met an untimely death at the age of 19 in 1910.  Based on her children and first husband's death birth and death information, I would imagine they lived primarily in Germany.  I wonder why her son Karl Alexander died?  Were there genetic issues involved with the deaths of their children? 

Somewhere around September (I'm guessing) of 1913 (at the age of 46!), she became pregnant again.  In December of 1913, she married the 33 year old George Granville Hope-Johnstone in Vierfontein, South Africa.  He was from an aristocratic Scottish noble family (who today are the Clan Chiefs of Clan Johnstone and the Earls of Annandale and Hartfell in the peerage of Scotland).  According to The Peerage website, he lived in Johannesburg, South Africa.  In June 1914, right as WWI was beginning, she gave birth to a son in Serfontein, South Africa, who was named William Augustus Ludwig Vernon Alexander Hope-Johnstone.  He was known as Vernon.  Sometime in 1915, Luise and George divorced.  I wonder where Luise and George met?  I wonder why they divorced?  Was it merely a marriage of temporary convenience or did WWI tear them apart?  I wonder where their son was raised and who had custody of him?

George died in 1938 in Nottingham, England.  Luise died in 1945 outside of Munich, Germany.  This means that they both left South Africa.  Their son Vernon Hope-Johnstone (1914-1993), went on to serve in the British military during WWII and was a Major-General in the Grenadier Guards.  He married the niece of the 10th Duke of Devonshire and has surviving issue.

I wonder what his relationship was like with his mother?  Were they estranged when she died in 1945?  It seems like Princess Luise had an interesting and often tragic life.  At 43, she had outlived her husband and all of her children.  She then moves to South Africa, marries again, and has another son, only to be torn from him by war....   I wonder how her family and her first husband's family reacted to her remarriage?

Here is an article from the New York Times, that mentions George Granville Hope-Johnstone....   I wonder if this is the same man?

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9B00E6DE153FE633A25756C2A9609C946296D6CF

I wonder if anyone has any other information about Luise and her life?  Does anyone else find this story intriguing?  Please correct any information that I've gotten wrong.

[Eutropius]

I'm a little bit paranoid about posting photographs, as I don't want to violate any copyright laws.  But if anyone is interested, there are photographs of Princess Luise and her son Prince Karl Alexander zu Waldeck und Pyrmont in:

Die souveränen Fürstenhäuser Europas: Porträtsammlung nebst genealogischen Notizen, Volume 2, by Frederik Ulrik Graf von Wrangel.  

You can search for the title of this book in google books and download it for free in PDF format!  It's a wonderful resource, full of small photographs of nineteenth century royals.

[Marc]

Very interesting life...now I am interested in her life also...could you post the link for downloading that book in pdf format?

[Eutropius]

Here is a link for Volume 1

http://books.google.com/books?id=UD8EAAAAIAAJ&dq=Die+Souver%C3%A4nen+F%C3%BCrstenh%C3%A4user+Europas:+Portr%C3%A4tsammlung&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Here is a link for Volume 2

http://books.google.com/books?id=1UIEAAAAIAAJ&dq=Die+souver%C3%A4nen+F%C3%BCrstenh%C3%A4user+Europas:+Portr%C3%A4tsammlung+nebst+genealogischen+Notizen&source=gbs_navlinks_s

Underneath the blue button saying "Read this book," you will see Download: PDF.  Click on PDF

The photos of Louise and her son are on pg. 507 of the PDF for Volume 2 (the image says Pg. 818 of the single book).

[Marc]

It seems I can't download this ;(

It gives me just an option to pay...I found online the first part of the book with just 362 pages,but I haven't found there Hohenlohe section with Princess Luise...

Anyway,thank you for this link..it seems it's a great book!

[Naslednik Norvezhskiy]

I am curious about Princess (Marie) Luise zu Hohenlohe-Oehringen (1867-1945).  She seems to have had an interesting life!

She was daughter of Prince Felix zu Hohenlohe-Oehringen (1818-1900) and his wife, Princess Alexandrine von Hanau (1830-1871), daughter of Friedrich Wilhelm, Elector of Hessen.

Cool, she was the daughter of one of the antithesis to the Battenbergs as examplary Hessian morganauts, the infamous Hanau-Horowitz morganauts, whom their father tried to marry into as high-standing houses as possible, in order to make them more respectable. The Grand Duke of Hesse objected to her sister's children with a Prince of Hesse-Philippsthal-Barchfeld being Hessian princes. The Danish Hesses objected to her styling herself Princess of Hesse after her divorced, so the German Emperor made her Princess of Ardeck. Another sister married a Count (later Prince) of Ysenburg-Büdingen-Wächtersbach who was a bit mad and attacked his father-in-law's prime minister, the hated Hassenpflug, with a cane, when a Hessian newspaper failed to style his wife Her Serene Highness! The brother's didn't seem to find much stable, equal relationships and produce legitimate offspring either. Were the Hanaus also victims of the Hessian curse...?
I've read that Prince Felix zu Hohenlohe-Öhringen was very poor, but that Alexandrine received an annual pension of 3000 Thaler from the Welfenfond by the Prussians who had annexed her father's electorate.

 

[Marc]

What is the Hessian curse?I am curious 'cause I don't know...

[Naslednik Norvezhskiy]

What is the Hessian curse?I am curious 'cause I don't know...

See this thread: http://forum.alexanderpalace.org/index.php?topic=3367.0

After searching I am surprised that there are no threads devoted to the splendidly and horribly morganatic Hanaus.

[Marc]

Thank you for the link...it could be interesting if the Hanau family members were included...

[Eutropius]

Thanks for sharing that information Tainyi Sevatnik.  The Hanaus were an interesting family.  It's interesting to compare them to the Battenbergs, who were certainly more prominent and successful.  I wonder if Queen Victoria ever mention the Hanaus in her letters?  I get the impression that the Hanaus were less respectable than the Battenbergs.  I believe the first Princess Hanau was a divorcee, which was frowned upon.  Count Ysenburg-Büdingen-Wächtersbach certainly sounds a bit disturbed.  But as you mentioned, the Elector seems to have been interested in marrying his daughters to the highest ranking princes he could find.  Princesses Auguste and Alexandrine must have posed a bit of challenge, having been born out of wedlock.

It's interesting how two of the Elector's granddaughters, Luise zu Hohenlohe-Oehringen and and Gerta zu Ysenburg-Büdingen-Wächtersbach, were accepted as marriage partners by German sovereign houses.  They could not provide the necessary noble quarterings that were demanded at many courts.  But maybe all that mattered was their membership in a mediatized house.  I suppose that money and/or good looks must have also helped.

[Naslednik Norvezhskiy]

Thanks for sharing that information Tainyi Sevatnik.  The Hanaus were an interesting family.  It's interesting to compare them to the Battenbergs, who were certainly more prominent and successful.  I wonder if Queen Victoria ever mention the Hanaus in her letters?

Indeed, that would be interesting to know!
Even though their children were married, QV never had much love for Queen Louise of Denmark, née Princess of Hesse-Kassel-Rumpenheim. In one of the Danish threads kmerov explained that was because QV thought her mother Princess Charlotte of Denmark was a meddlesome woman, allegedly because she had tried to get the Electorate of Hesse-Kassel elevated to a kingdom for her son in return for him renouncing his claim to Denmark. (He, Landgrave Friedrich, had a claim to Hesse-Kassel exactly because the Hanaus were barred from succession.) But I wonder if the many generations of morganatic shenanigans at the electoral court at Kassel somehow had given QV a prejudice against anything Hesse-Kassel-ish.
 

I get the impression that the Hanaus were less respectable than the Battenbergs.  I believe the first Princess Hanau was a divorcee, which was frowned upon.  But as you mentioned, the Elector seems to have been interested in marrying his daughters to the highest ranking princes he could find. Princesses Auguste and Alexandrine must have posed a bit of challenge, having been born out of wedlock.

God, I had quite forgotten that Gertrude Lehmann was not just a commoner, but less than respectable for moral reasons too! Apparantly her divorce wasn't an easy matter, as she was Catholic. For a while after her civil divorce and marriage to the Electoral Prince she was a bigamist in the eyes of the Catholic Church - until her conversion to the Reformed creed of Hesse-Kassel took care of that. Still, she had a living ex-husband and two sons by him, and as you say two new children by the Electoral Prince while she was married to Lehmann. (So technically speaking they were not illegitimate.) The only thing missing from the scandal would have been Friedrich Wilhelm I already having a wife himself!

But as you mentioned, the Elector seems to have been interested in marrying his daughters to the highest ranking princes he could find.

And the sons too, although he was less successful there: He managed to marry one of them, Wilhelm, to a Princess of Schaumburg-Lippe, but as this was a purely dynastical union, they divorced as soon as Hesse-Kassel was annexed by Prussia in 1866 and Wilhelm's father no longer was Elector. (And there was no prospect of Getrude becoming Electress and their children eligible for succession....?)

What I just LOVE about the Hanaus is that although being a scandalous morganatic house almost nobody would touch, they had Ebenbürtigkeit ideals themselves: Spouses had to be at least from comital houses, otherwise the union was morganatic and the offspring not Princes(ses) of Hanau, just Counts/Countesses of Schaumburg!

[Marc]

What about marriage of Prince Wilhelm von Hanau and Countess and later Princess Elisabeth von Lippe-Weissenfeld who was his second wife after Elisabeth von Schaumburg-Lippe?She was technically ebenbürtig,so was this marriage also dynastical or just a "love match"?

[Eutropius]

I tried to read through translated versions of the German wikipedia pages on the Hanau family.  From what Tainyi Soventik said, it does not sound like Prince William's first marriage was a love match.  I'm not sure about the second marriage....

It sounds like the Elector tried to establish ebenbuertigkeit for his Hanau offspring, but the experiment failed.  The rest of his sons married commoners.  It looks as if the Hanau family fell off the face of the earth once the Elector died.  The idea of establishing ebenbuertigkeit requirements for a morganatic dynasty does seem a bit comical, but I suppose there was a general attitude that princely titles come with certain expected behaviors (i.e. suitable marriages).  The morganatic princely houses seem to have been held to expectations similar to those of mediatized houses.  The Battenbergs had these expectations themselves (think Prince Alexander v. Battenberg and Johanna Loisinger). 

Interesting anecdote about the last Hanau daugher, Princess Marie.

From these interesting scholarly articles:
Velde, François. "Morganatic and Unequal Marriages in German Law." Heraldica. 06/07/2007. Web. 02/02/2009. <http://www.heraldica.org/topics/royalty/g_morganat.htm>.
Velde, François. "House Laws of Schaumburg-Lippe." Heraldica. 12/02/2005. Web. 02/02/2009. <http://www.heraldica.org/topics/royalty/HGLippe.htm>.

She married her distant cousin Prince Wilhelm of Hessen-Philippsthal-Barchfeld in 1857.  According to Mr. Velde's article: "Morganatic and Unequal Marriages in German Law," "This marriage was (at least initially) considered equal..." They had a number of children and then divorced.  Her father, the Elector, died and then relatives starting popping out of the woodwork to reject her children's status as dynastic Hessian princes.  She and her children then took the title Prince(ss) von Ardeck. 

Her daughter, Princess Luise von Ardeck married Count Rudolf von Lippe-Biesterfeld in 1889.  According to Mr. Velde's linked article "House Laws of Schaumburg-Lippe," during the Lippe succession dispute the equality of this marriage was questioned as well!  It was later accepted. 

The German sovereign houses were very strict on only allowing dynastic marriage to other Christian sovereign houses or to mediatized houses.  However, they generally had a very laissez faire attitude towards the marital behavior of the mediatized houses and foreign sovereign houses.  It's rather interesting. 

[Eutropius]

Here's an Obituary article for Gertude, Princess von Hanau

http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=CL18821006.2.7

Here's an Obituary article for Elector Friedrich Wilhelm

http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=nB01AAAAIBAJ&sjid=JyYDAAAAIBAJ&pg=4108,3611204&dq=princess+hanau&hl=en

[Naslednik Norvezhskiy]

The morganatic princely houses seem to have been held to expectations similar to those of mediatized houses.  The Battenbergs had these expectations themselves (think Prince Alexander v. Battenberg and Johanna Loisinger).

Quite right you are. The Battenbergs were just more discreet about it. Unlike the Hanaus, who set up snobbish ideals for their house and miserably failed to live up to them! Gotta love them for that.  

Interesting anecdote about the last Hanau daugher, Princess Marie.
[...]
She married her distant cousin Prince Wilhelm of Hessen-Philippsthal-Barchfeld in 1857.  According to Mr. Velde's article: "Morganatic and Unequal Marriages in German Law," "This marriage was (at least initially) considered equal..." They had a number of children and then divorced.  Her father, the Elector, died and then relatives starting popping out of the woodwork to reject her children's status as dynastic Hessian princes.  She and her children then took the title Prince(ss) von Ardeck.

When she petitioned the King of Prussia for a title, she was sent a list of castles in Nassau, which the authorities in Berlin most likely mistook for Hessian ones. (Hesse and Nassau by then forming a Prussian province). From the lists she chose Ardeck.

It's interesting to see that her daughter Princess Sophie Gertrude Auguste Bertha Elisabeth of Ardeck married Count Karl Ferdinand Ludwig Adolf Wolfgang Ernst Kasimir Georg Friedrich zu Ysenburg-Büdingen-Philippseich, who was not just a relative of her aunt's irritable Y-B-Wächtersbach count above,  but also had a sister who was married to a brother of the Albrecht of Waldeck the thread's original topic Marie Luise zu Hohenlohe-Oehringen was married to!

So it seems like they kept it in the family - because nobody else wanted them!

Here's an Obituary article for Gertude, Princess von Hanau

http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=CL18821006.2.7

Very interesting that Friedrich Wilhelm turned against his own mother or vice versa when he brought Gertrude to Kassel. He and his mother had been allies in their fight against his father Wilhelm I and his morganatic wife, the Countess of Reichenbach-Lessonitz.
BTW here is a Reichenbach-Lessonitz anecdote: Wilhelm I took bribes from railway companies who wanted to operate in Hesse-Kassel in order to secure the biggest possible fortune for his morganatic offspring! Lol, where there ever more dissolute and reactionary rulers - through four generations - than the Landgraves and Electors of Hesse-Kassel!? And how ironic that the guy Napoleon sent in to liberate the Hessians from their despotic rulers, his own brother King Jerome of Westphalia, was just as bad!