Archduke Franz Ferdinand, Countess Sophie and their family

[Wenzel]

There is a mistake in the previous posts, who arrived to Argentina where baron Franz Ferdinand von Wuthenau and his wife Elinor Bromberg, they had four children Marie Antoinette born in Germany before WW2, and Francisco Fernando born in Argentina plus Elisalex and Paulette. The four brothers had family here in Argentina, Marie Antoinette is countess Sagramoso, and he had a son Lionello and a daughter Domitila, her brother has a large family and her other two sisters as well. Their grandmother Chotek never visited Argentina, was one of the sisters of Sophie Countess Chotek, after her wedding was the Duchess of Hohenberg. Their cousin Georg Herzog (Duke) von Hohenberg lives in Austria, he was a former Austrian diplomat, and he used to visit Argentine quite often. They are the ones related to the Kinsky family, their cousin Franz Ulrich passed away in Buenos Aires some five years ago, he had just one son, Charles who lives in London with his wife Dolores and family, he is the current head of the Kinsky family as "Reich Fürst" or head of the Princely Family of Kinsky.

[Wenzel]

As a matter of fact, there are several mistakes, first a son of Antoinette Countess Chotek, baron Franz Ferdinand von Wuthenau (Sophie Chotek's sister), whose godfather was Archduke Franz Ferdinand left Germany before the last war and travelled to Argentina. He was married to Elinor Bromberg. daughter of the German Businessman and industrialist Erwin Bromberg from Hamburg. The three daughters, Marie Antoinette, Elisalex and Paulette were born in Buenos Aires, as their only son Franz Ferdinand von Wuthenau, who was born in Argentina as well. Their grandmother Antoinette geb, Gräfin Chotek, never came to Argentina, just her son Franz Ferdinand and his wife Elinor. It is true that a second brother Alexander baron von Wuthenau went to Mexico, where he has lots of family. From the Argentine branch of the von Wuthenau family, Marie Antoinette married to count Sagramoso, had two children Lionello and Domitila, her sisters have offspring as well and her brother Francisco Fernando has lots of children too, like Elisalex. They are the only ones related to the Kinsky family, through their great grandmother (countess Wilhelmine Kinsky) and their only cousin Kinsky that had lived in Argentina was HSH Prince Franz Ulrich Kinsky, who passed away five years or so ago. He had just one son Charles Kinsky, who is the current head of the House of Kinsky (Reich Fürst und Durchlaucht) he lives and works in London now, with his wife Dolores and their two boys.  My complete name is Luis A. F. Wetzler, address Esmeralda 1255, 5th floor, 1007 Buenos Aires, Argentina and Marie Antoinette countess di Sagramoso, née baroness von Wuthenau can be reached through email, if any wants to get in touch with her, and with her permission I will send it to you, thanks a lot (please write to lafvwetzler@gmail.com, which is my main email)

[Marc]

Thank you for the information.

Wetzvonken,I am very glad you came back to this forum again after so many years.

[Wenzel]

Thanks a lot to you, this forum become a wonderful resource of European history not only about Royal and Imperial families, I am glad to participate once again after I don't remember how many years, but I hope that I can contribute to the common heritage of our Western and Christian civilization, kindest regards to everybody, Luis v. Wetzler

[Dru]

Do you have a better verssion of this beautiful photo of Pss Sophie? It has a very good size but the image is blurry, I've seen others where the quality of the image is good but the size doesn't help it :-(

Will this do?  Download for full size.

[Greenowl]

Excellent new book by Greg King and Sue Woolmans entitled "The Assassination of the Archduke"....Sarajevo 1914 and the murder that changed the world. I have just finished reading it and it is wonderful. I totally recommend it and it answers many of the questions that have been raised over the years on this thread.

GREENOWL
(MONIKA)

[Greenowl]

P.S.

At present the above-mentioned book is discussed in the "Books about the Romanovs and Imperial Russia" section.

[grandduchessella]

I've moved that thread to the Habsburg forum.

[Greenowl]

Wonderful news. Thank you!!
GREENOWL (MONIKA)

[Ajimmo]

Oh thank you for those pics ella!!!  She is very lovely!!  I like the second one you posted the best with that hairstyle.  And I totally agree that the hair back then seems to surpass the hair nowadays in terms of thickness and beauty.  I've always been envious of OTMA's hair, especially Olga's, because hers seemed to be just SO gorgeous--the color, thickness, the incredible length!!  That's what I wish I could obtain the most--that incredibly LONG hair!!!!

Not to mention the wigs, rats, padding and O, yes, teasing.
 

[KarinK]

BBC: Dancing over the edge: Vienna in 1914. The article includes a couple of mentions of Franz Ferdinand and Sophie, and a photo of the family that I don't remember seeing in this thread.

[Greenowl]

Thanks! I enjoyed reading that!

GREENOWL
(MONIKA)

[Janet Ashton]

BBC: Dancing over the edge: Vienna in 1914. The article includes a couple of mentions of Franz Ferdinand and Sophie, and a photo of the family that I don't remember seeing in this thread.

The article is a written extract of an essay broadcast last Monday, but will be available through BBC i-player for a year. There are also essays on Petersburg, Berlin, Paris and London.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b006x3hl/episodes/guide#b03pn0xm

Includes also quite a bit about Karl Lueger, the controversial mayor of Vienna who Franz Ferdinand appreciated as a politician for his arch-Catholic, pro-dynastic stance, which was also populist. John Boyer's books "Political Radicalism in Late Imperial Vienna: Origins of the Christian Social Movement, 1848-1897" and "Culture and Political Crisis in Vienna: Christian Socialism in Power, 1897-1918" are very interesting studies of Lueger's party, and FF features in the latter quite a bit.

Note that the word "Social" here means "society" and not "socialism" in the way we understand it now. The Party believed in a highly stratified society, but one which was integrated, so that, in effect, everyone knew their place and was happy in it. It was not egalitarian in the sense that we understand "socialism" now.

[Greenowl]

I was interested to hear that the former "Lueger Ring" was renamed "University Ring" in 2012, something I was not aware of. Franz-Joseph disliked Lueger and vetoed his election as mayor of Vienna on no less than four occasions. However, on the fifth occasion he had no choice but to give in to public pressure and Lueger became mayor of Vienna on April 8th, 1897, a position he held until his death 13 years later. Although initially Lueger was extremely antisemitic (Hitler is said to have acknowledged him as his "master") and anti-Hungarian, once appointed mayor he relinquished these stances to a great degree. His term of office was actually quite successful and he initiated numerous projects that made Vienna a more attractive place to live.

[Janet Ashton]

I was interested to hear that the former "Lueger Ring" was renamed "University Ring" in 2012, something I was not aware of. Franz-Joseph disliked Lueger and vetoed his election as mayor of Vienna on no less than four occasions. However, on the fifth occasion he had no choice but to give in to public pressure and Lueger became mayor of Vienna on April 8th, 1897, a position he held until his death 13 years later. Although initially Lueger was extremely antisemitic (Hitler is said to have acknowledged him as his "master") and anti-Hungarian, once appointed mayor he relinquished these stances to a great degree. His term of office was actually quite successful and he initiated numerous projects that made Vienna a more attractive place to live.

The first thing I ever heard about Karl Lueger was the fact that Hitler admired him, and when in Vienna I used to find it very strange to travel through the underground and to hear the crisp voice of the announcer telling us that we were at "Doktor. Karl. Lueger. Ring" station. I am surprised in a sense that the name survived for so long. Many early twentieth century politicians whose memorials happily survive in other capital cities had attitudes we would not agree with today, but Hitler's seal of approval tainted Lueger irrevocably!

John Boyer's work is very nuanced. It is hard in the present day to think well of a politician - however successful in his social programmes - who gained power by inciting his voters against those he deemed "outsiders", but Boyer sees the question of clericalism as being more important than anything else in contemporary Austrian politics, and argues that Lueger's antisemitism was his way of being anti-liberal without being accused of clericalism. A convoluted argument!

Hitler admired Lueger's use of the personality cult as much as his ideas, but Boyer thinks that Lueger's Christian Social Party is more the ancestor of austro-fascism than it is of Nazism.

It also, though, I think, laid the foundations for the CDU and CSU in modern German politics - which is of course a perfectly acceptable conservative movement; the parties of Angela Merkel and Otto Habsburg.