Wilhelm I's brother Karl was a fairly odious man. He was married to Maria of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach, who was Wilhelm's wife's elder sister. The story between both couples is similar to that between Alexander III of Russia & Minnie and his brother Vladimir & Aunt Miechen, since the latter could not stand being so close to the throne and having no political influence at court. Nevertheless, Marie managed to lead Berlin society, since her sister was a rather odd woman with a very bipolar personality, sometimes shouting at her own son Fritz, according to a note he gave his future wife Vicky in England when they were betrothed.
Karl and Marie's son (The Red Prince-nicknamed like that because of the colour of his favourite unuiform, not his political views) was no better than they. Friedrich Karl (Fritz Carl) was an odious man, very Prussian (i.e. conservative); he often praised the fact of how good a general each of his sons would make; he could not stand the fact that his wife kept on giving birth to daughter after daughter, and when she (Marianne on Anhalt-Dessau) gave birth to their third daughter (and no son having been yet produced) he boxed her ears so much that she was permanently deaf. The child did not live for long, but Marianne did manage to give birth in 1865 to a son. Vicky was immediately drawn to this sad woman, whom she thought not very bright but good at heart, unlike most of the Hohenzollerns that surrounded her.
