Author Topic: The Non-Hetero Royals  (Read 138263 times)

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Offline CountessKate

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #330 on: September 17, 2007, 05:38:14 AM »
It wasn't necessary to go to a local Coburg historian to learn that Prince Alfred of Saxe Coburg attempted suicide by shooting himself but failed, although he died shortly thereafter of his wounds - it is pretty well known.  He is generally considered to have done so because of depression caused by his syphillitic condition, again well known, but also because he tried and failed to marry a non-royal woman, Mabel Fitzgerald.  Again, this is not exactly a secret, but obviously doesn't go with him being homosexual. 

Ernest Duke of Cumberland, later King of Hanover, gay?  There are a lot of sensational stories about him, but the rumours that he murdered his valet and had a son by his sister don't suggest he was a homosexual.

Offline Grace

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #331 on: September 17, 2007, 05:42:47 AM »
I agree there seems to be no evidence that 'Young Alfred' was homosexual but the true circumstances surrounding his death are somewhat mysterious, i.e. his true medical condition/s etc.  Marlene Eilers Koenig has refuted the Mabel Fitzgerald story as not true.  There is surprisingly little information available about Young Affie...

dmitri

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #332 on: September 17, 2007, 05:45:28 AM »
What is the interest in royal sexuality? It seems bizarre.

Offline Victor

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #333 on: September 17, 2007, 06:26:20 AM »
What is the interest in royal sexuality? It seems bizarre.
No more bizarre than our[the Forums] intense interest in royalty in general.There's a thread on the love lives of the Wales princes.Dolgoruky-the Cary Grant movie was Bringing up Baby with Katherine Hepburn.Grant played a palaeontologist.Grace-what a lovely,sweet,innocent thing to say that owning casts of male genitals doesn't imply the owners non-heterosexuality.Dolgoruky-I wonder if Noel Coward would have liked the use of the modern vernacular[celebrity].He was a wit,a playwright,an actor,a director and,as his window at Westminster Abbey,says"had a talent to amuse"but celebrity,well it sounds like you're lumping him in with the current crop of those people who really are not known for their talent at all.
'The world breaks all of us but some of us are stronger in the broken places.'Ernest Hemingway.

Alixz

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #334 on: September 17, 2007, 07:29:33 AM »
Now I know why I was confused about the "Edward - Duke of Kent".

The one I immediately thought of was a Hanover and the father of Victoria.

Because dolgoruky18 had said" Windsor",  I immediately thought of Wessex.

The Windsors have only been Windsors since George V changed the name in the late 1910s.  So It must have been George - Duke of Kent.

Children of George V (from RoyaList Online - Royal Genealogy Database)

  King Edward VIII (Duke of Windsor)  23 Jun 1894 - 28 May 1972 
  King George VI  14 Dec 1895 - 6 Feb 1952 
  Mary Windsor, Princess Royal (daughter of King George V)  25 Apr 1897 - 28 Mar 1965 
  Henry Windsor, 1st Duke of Gloucester  31 Mar 1900 - 10 Jun 1974 
  George Windsor, 1st Duke of Kent  20 Dec 1902 - 25 Aug 1942 
  John Windsor (son of King George V)   (The "Lost Prince")

And as to our fascination with royal sexuality??  It has been a very short time since any conversation about sexuality has not been taboo.

I believe that we, as humans, are always interested in the private lives of those we venerate.  Even if it is only Brittney and her lack of underwear and her self degrading and self destructive performance at the recent televised music awards.

Maybe it just makes all of these seemingly "unreachable" people more human - more like us with all of our own faults and foibles.



YaBB_Jose

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #335 on: September 17, 2007, 07:50:31 AM »
Since there is at last an implied wish for a list in this thread, her is a provisional one for the UK:

The Normans:

William II (William Rufus)

The Plantagenets:

Richard I (the LionHeart)
Edward II
Richard II (suspected)

The Stuarts:

James I
William III (suspected)
Mary II (suspected)
Anne (suspected)

The Hanoverians:

Ernest, Duke of Cumberland  -  later King of Hanover (suspected)

Saxe-Coburg :

Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh  -  later Duke of Saxe-Coburg (suspected)
Prince Alfred of Saxe-Coburg  -  son of the above (suspected)
Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence and Avondale (suspected)

The House of Windsor

Edward, Duke of Kent  (suspected)

You are forgetting that Charles, Pr. of Wales, allegedely was caught in bed with a valet/secretary...

dolgoruky18

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #336 on: September 17, 2007, 08:14:02 AM »
Dear God ! I despair of EVER being able to post the replies I am aching to give on this subject. This is the THIRD time I have attempted to give a measured response on this subject.

I apologise for my mistake about 'Edward', Duke of Kent. Of course I meant George, Duke of Kent killed on active service in WWII.

Ernest, Duke of Cumberland, later King of Hanover, suffered a near fatal attack by his valet, Sellis. There was widespread suspicion (which appeared in the press of the time) that a sexual relationship existed between the two. This Duke was also suspected  -  not without reason  -  of having impregnated his sister, Princess Sophia.

I will still try to write my lengthier response when everyone else is in bed and asleep.

Alixz

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #337 on: September 17, 2007, 08:45:46 AM »
I am sure that we have all heard of experimentation!  Many young people experiment with members of the same sex and yet are not homosexual.

Being caught in flagrante one time does not mean that a pattern exists.

I know that in many cases, there is just cause and historical documentation to come to the conclusion that a royal (or anyone else for that matter) is a non-hetero.  In many other cases, there is just rumor and innuendo.

In the end, it truly does not matter.

Offline Vecchiolarry

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #338 on: September 17, 2007, 09:03:17 AM »
Hi Everyone,

I'm glad you cleared up which Duke of kent you were talking about.

Prince Edward, the current Duke of Kent, I'm sure is heterosexual.
The reason:  he once was a guest at the Officers Mess in Soest, Westphalia, and danced with my mother.  My mother still raves to this day about her twirls around the floor with this 'handsome prince'!!!!
I say 'twirls because she later went over to him and asked him to dance again...  This is probably against protocol but my mother, thinking he was shy (and he is!) took it upon herself to boldly ask...
The prince immediately jumped up and they danced 3 more dances in the next 10 minutes.

My mother hasn't come down off her cloud in 50 years - - this all happened in 1957 - - and so there you have it....
I know this is not a valid proof of someone's heterosexuality - - but there you have it!!!

Larry

dolgoruky18

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #339 on: September 17, 2007, 09:34:46 AM »
Reply to Alixz and others:

There is today an unconscious/subconscious impression abroad that the "sexual" self is, in great measure, the true self as opposed to the public, more inhibited self. Hence the preoccupation with people's sex lives, sexual preferences and habits. In the past the sexuality of Royalty was of international importance for dynastic, religious and territorial reasons. Whether they could produce heirs and thus continue alliances could  -  and did  -  affect the destinies of large communities. The Austrian Empire was built up through judicious marriages. The failure of a line could  -  and often did  -  lead to war.

The interest in the private lives of royalty today is, in some ways, a relic of this former fact of existence. The genetic inheritance of Royalty has recently taken on a new significance in the ongoing debate between "nature" and "nurture" in assessing behaviour  -  Royal Families having better access to historical records than most people and which tend to go much further back into the past. Repeating patterns of behavious can then be observed and analysed.

With regard to elected authorities and officials, their vulnerability is only too apparent. I remind posters of politicians both recent and in the not-so-distant past whose careers were damaged or destroyed by sexual 'misconduct'.

It should not matter in the 21st century, but it does. For a historian this aspect of an individual's life canot be ignored as it was so important to that individual in life and may well have affected their actions and policies. Demographers are also preoccupied with sexual habits, so are economists, anthropologists and so on.


 

Robert_Hall

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #340 on: September 17, 2007, 11:44:04 AM »
Having a wife and children does not prove one's heterosexuality. That should be pretty well obvious by now, to everyone.
 Another reason a ruler's sexuality- gay or straight, was of some importance is the case of favorites.  mistresses and male lovers  quite often could have great influence, more so than  a consort in some cases.
 Also, blackmail.  Someone of importance caught in a compromising situation was subject to that as well.
 It should not be so, but it is still a political downfall to be accused of being  homosexual in many countries. Whether or not the accusations are true the slur by opponents is used to some effect, recently  with much publicity in Africa and Asia.
 We could go on and on about the Windsor's sexual antics,  but frankly, I am bored with them now.
 

Offline Grace

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #341 on: September 18, 2007, 04:20:01 PM »
Grace-what a lovely,sweet,innocent thing to say that owning casts of male genitals doesn't imply the owners non-heterosexuality.

I will take this as a compliment, Victor.

I would need more than a single anecdote from a 'bored curator' about a now non-existent collection of plaster models to convince me that Alfred, Duke of Coburg, a man said by many to be as aggressively heterosexual as his older brother, the Prince of Wales (though his dalliances were not as well documented), had any homosexual tendencies at all.  I have read a great deal about Queen Victoria and her family and in all the books I have or have read, there is not a single suggestion anywhere that any of her four sons, including Alfred, was involved in any homosexual activity.

When there is anything approaching genuine evidence for this, I might be inclined to believe it.  None has been presented to date.


Offline Victor

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #342 on: September 18, 2007, 05:34:25 PM »
Grace,my remark was certainly meant as a compliment.Your comments are well reasoned.Victor.
'The world breaks all of us but some of us are stronger in the broken places.'Ernest Hemingway.

helenazar

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #343 on: September 18, 2007, 06:22:12 PM »
It appears - unsurprisingly of course - that among the royals, about the same percentage are homosexual as the general population (about 4% is it? - I personally suspect it's more than that)...

helenazar

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Re: The Non-Hetero Royals
« Reply #344 on: September 18, 2007, 06:24:37 PM »
You are forgetting that Charles, Pr. of Wales, allegedely was caught in bed with a valet/secretary...

Hmmm... did that really happen?