George and Melusine’s elder daughters were passed off as the children of Friedrich Achaz von der Schulenburg and his wife Margarethe, Melusine’s sister. Their youngest daughter was passed off as the child of Rabe Christoph von Oeynhausen and his wife Sophie Juliane, another sister of Melusine’s. George never acknowledged his beloved daughters because his father had taught him that acknowledging illegitimate children was a disgraceful act that could do great harm to the House of Hanover. Some suspected that the three were really George’s daughters, but no one could prove it. Those in the know were few and far between, and they kept the secret well.
Louise was divorced circa 1714. The Emperor made her Reichsgrafin von Delitz in her own right. She never remarried, nor did she have any children. A contemporary (perhaps falsely) alleged that she was divorced after her husband caught her in flagrante delicto with a lover, and that she behaved promiscuously after her divorce.
Melusine, Countess of Walsingham, was her mother’s favorite. Her marriage was happy but childless.
Gertrud - “Trudchen” - was the apple of her father’s eye. To the great sorrow of her family, she died from tuberculosis a few years after she married. Her elder son, Georg August, was killed in a duel as a young man. Her younger son, Friedrich Ernst Wilhelm, succeeded his father as Graf. Like his maternal grandfather, he distinguished himself on the battlefield and as a patron of musicians.
George’s half-sister, the Countess of Darlington, was the maternal grandmother of Admiral Richard Howe and General William Howe of American Revolutionary War fame.
