Louise of Belgium
Louise Marie Amélie Princess of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Princess of Belgium (born February 18, 1858 in Laeken , † March 1, 1924 in Wiesbaden ) was a German - Belgian princess who caused a sensation due to a marriage scandal.
Life
Youth and marriage with Philipp von Sachsen-Coburg
Princess Louise was born as the first daughter of King Leopold II of Belgium and his wife Marie Henriette , an Archduchess of Austria. She was the oldest of four children, her only brother and heir to the throne Leopold fell ill and died at the age of 10 of pneumonia after falling into a pond. Louise and her sister Stephanie suffered a lot from the hard drill at the Belgian court, from which only the youngest Clementine was spared.
On February 4, 1875, Princess Louise was married to Prince Philipp of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha in Brussels . When he asked for her hand, it initially seemed like a stroke of luck, as he was by no means an unpleasant man and promised to take her on. On her wedding night in Laeken, the completely unenlightened girl was treated by her husband in such a way that the following morning, completely disturbed, she fled the rooms to a greenhouse in Laeken, where she was found by a gardener. Only as a result of the urgent persuasion of her fetched mother was Louise willing to return to her husband, although the relationship between the young couple improved in the later marriage months. A tragedy began to develop around Princess Louise that caused a sensation in European aristocratic circles from 1897 onwards.
Princess Louise had been a close friend and confidante of her brother-in-law Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria since 1875 . In her memoirs "Thrones I saw overthrown", published in Germany in 1926 and reporting openly about the former rulers of Europe, she describes the Crown Prince as follows:
“He was more than beautiful; he was seductive. Medium-sized and very well proportioned, although he seemed very delicate, he was very strong. His thoroughbredness was clearly evident, and one involuntarily thought of him as a thoroughbred horse; because from him he also had the essentials ... like this he had an easy mind and mood. Sentimentality was reflected in his dull complexion; his eye, whose brown, shiny iris began to shimmer at the moment of excitement, seemed to change shape with the expression. He was sensitive and changed his mood, was amiable one moment, angry the next, and was capable of being the most delightful person again in the third moment. "
The youngest brother of the prince, Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, who grew up with Prince Philipp and Princess Louise in the Vienna Palais Coburg - today a luxury hotel - , from 1887 Prince of Bulgaria, ostensibly courted his brother's wife - in the words of the princess , with whom he had a friendship for years.
Princess Louise writes about this in her memoir. She relates to a visit to Sofia:
“At this supper, which I can see in front of me as if it were today, he whispered to me without taking any notice of my husband, who was sitting across from us alone because the absent princess had stayed away because of an illness, the words: Everything what you see here, people and things, including my kingdom and me, I put at your feet ... I was extremely confused; he became more urgent and insisted brutally: It will be the last time that I will lay at your feet what I have already offered you before; do you understand me?"
On the part of Prince Ferdinand, who was only briefly and happily married at the time, this was probably a production that arose from his unusual humor and his inclination to acting, in order to fool his sister-in-law, since he must have known about her affairs.
The emperor's youngest brother, Archduke Ludwig Viktor , who was noticed by numerous scandals , also courted the princess, who after Juliana von Stockhausen was at the time “the most glamorous woman at the Viennese court”. In the memoirs of Princess Louise, it says:
“For many years Archduke Ludwig Viktor showered me with all kinds of attentions; The whole of Vienna knew about it, the Kaiser as well as the others ... yes, he was probably better informed than anyone, since these stories were part of his daily bread and it was a state affair for him to find out whether the Archduke was his goal achieved or not. "
Affair with Geza von Mattachich
After Princess Louise had had a love affair with Baron Daniel d'Ablaing van Giessenburg - her husband's adjutant - from 1883 until his death in 1888, she had another relationship with his successor, Baron Nikolaus Döry de Jobahaza, until she died in 1895 Wiener Stadtpark met the Croatian Uhlan lieutenant Graf ( sic ) Geza von Mattachich-Keglevich and both fell in love.
Archduke Ludwig Viktor told his brother about Princess Louise's affair with Mattachich. Emperor Franz Joseph then banished them from the court. Since Prince Philipp did not stand up for her, Princess Louise left him in the spring of 1897 and lived her relationship with Mattachich openly throughout Europe. The princess ran into enormous debts - an estimated 12 million francs. She assumed that one day she would inherit the enormous fortune of her father - owner of the Congo Free State . Since King Leopold II was one of the richest monarchs in the world, "generous" loans were granted.
In February 1898, Prince Philipp had to duel with Mattachich by order of the emperor . The prince was knocked out of action (severing the tendon of the right hand). The Viennese newspapers reported on the duel and the prince's recovery.
Incapacitation and imprisonment
In May 1898, on the orders of Emperor Franz Joseph, after she had been arrested in Croatia, Princess Louise was admitted to the private institution of Professor Heinrich Obersteiner in Oberdöbling / Vienna. Prof. Obersteiner diagnosed Princess Louise as having an "intellectual and moral inferiority".
In 1899 she was declared feeble-minded by a faculty report from Prof. Richard von Krafft-Ebing , holder of the chair for mental illnesses at the University of Vienna, and by the Obersthofmarschallamt, which was the authority for people who had been removed from general law under the Habsburg House Law of 1839 , placed under trustee on June 3, 1899 and was to be locked up forever in an insane asylum. The chairman of the Vienna Bar Association, Karl Ritter von Feistmantel, was appointed as the curator. The Obersthofmarschallamt did not see itself as responsible for the debts of Princess Louise, but for the question of her incapacitation. Since the princess was not wanted in Austria and Belgium, she was placed in the Dr. Reginald Pierson's "Lindenhof" institution in Coswig - today the Coswig Specialist Hospital - housed closed near Dresden.
Princess Louise is said to have forged the signature of her sister, Crown Princess Stephanie, on several bills of exchange.
Geza von Mattachich, who was also arrested in Croatia, was sentenced in 1898 by a military court to "six years of heavy dungeon" in absentia because of these unexplained alleged counterfeits. He lost his title of nobility. He had to serve his sentence in the military penal institution in Möllersdorf near Baden near Vienna. Due to the intense commitment of the Social Democrats in the Austrian Reichsrat - above all the Polish MP Ignacy Daszińsky - Mattachich was released from prison in 1902. In 1904 he published his memoirs, which were translated into several languages. This led to worldwide press reactions against the Austrian imperial family.
In 1904 a second assessment of the mental state of Princess Louise followed - this time by an international psychiatrist commission with Prof. Friedrich Jolly , professor for mental illnesses at the University of Berlin and director of the psychiatry and mental hospital Charité; Prof. Julius Wagner-Jauregg , professor for psychiatry at the University of Vienna and director of the I., from 1902 also of the II. Vienna Psychiatric Clinic, 1927 Nobel Prize winner; Medical Councilor Dr. Guido Weber, Director of the Sonnenstein-Pirna State Insane Asylum, then Germany's leading forensic scientist; Dr. Leopold Mélis, Chief Medical Officer from Brussels.
In the final report of the psychiatrists sworn in before the investigation of the princess before the district court of Meißen on March 11, 1904, it says:
“The way in which she spoke to us about Mattachich could arouse the belief that she by no means harbored a lively longing to meet him. The report of Dr. Pierson that she felt rather relieved when she was initially forbidden to leave the institution after Mattachich's attempted advances. We believe, however, that she is so weak-willed that if she got out again she would immediately let Mattachich ensnare her again and be induced to take new compromising steps. ... We come to the following conclusions based on the files submitted to us and personal perception:
- The state of morbid mental weakness noted by Her Royal Highness Mrs. Princess Louise of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha continues unchanged and makes the distinguished patient still incapable of looking after her affairs.
- The long-term stay of the princess in the closed institution is absolutely necessary in view of this state of illness and in the interest of the high-ranking patient.
- We have convinced ourselves that in the institution of the Medical Council Dr. Pierson all those conditions are given which guarantee the most expedient and careful treatment of the princess.
Prof. Jolly - Julius Wagner-Jauregg - San. Rat Weber - Dr. Leop Mélis "
Escape and old age
In the autumn of 1904, Princess Louise von Mattachich and two escape helpers - Mattachich's lover at the time, Maria Stöger, and the Viennese innkeeper Josef Weitzer, who was a friend of Mattachich - moved from the Wettiner Hof hotel in Bad Elster , where the princess resigned due to public pressure Guard was allowed to stay for the cure, released. Mattachich had to stay in the background because he was constantly monitored. A police manhunt started immediately, as the princess was under curate. According to a newspaper report, all roads in the Saarland were barred by the police. They managed to escape to France. A counter-opinion (May 23, 1905) by the French psychiatrists Valentin Magnan and Paul Dubuisson was obtained there . The Obersthofmarschallamt in Vienna then lifted the curator on June 26, 1905.
In 1904 the publicist and writer Karl Kraus published his essay Irrenhaus Österreich , in which he deals with the case of Louise von Coburg , in Der Fackel :
“I consider this woman, whose just cause cannot ruin the sympathy of sensational reporters, not only as sensible, but also after the interviews that she dictated to the correspondent into the pen and whose point I certainly do not trust a Frischauer to point out Spirit of rare freshness and firmness. This six-year-old nonsense mimic, who today is up to any argument from her shameful tormentors, would, thanks to a routine acquired in Leiden, provide a much more credible report on the mental state of Messrs. Wagner, Jolly, Mellis and Weber than was the other way around "
In 1906 the marriage of Princess Louise and Prince Philipp of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha was divorced. Her parents had cast out Princess Louise, and her father even forbade her from ever traveling to Belgium again. After the death of her father, Princess Louise sued in vain against the Niederfüllbacher Foundation for the return of the Congo assets, which were transferred back to the Belgian state by the foundation in 1911. She and her sisters had inherited 7 million francs and were compensated by the Belgian state with 12 million francs. In 1913, with a debt level of more than 17 million francs, the princess resided in the Hotel Esplanade in Baden near Vienna , where creditors sought the imposition of the waste curator against her at the local district court .
In the First World War Mattachich was arrested and sent to an internment camp near Budapest. Princess Louise was expelled from Austria and fled to Hungary via Dresden and Silesia. There she was sentenced to death by the Hungarian Bolsheviks in 1919 for alleged espionage and pardoned by Béla Kun immediately before the execution - after hearing the shootings in her cell for six days in the courtyard of the prison . She met Mattachich again in Vienna and lived there in the Parkhotel Schönbrunn until she was thrown out because she had again accumulated large debts. Now both went to Paris, where Mattachich died in 1923. Princess Louise herself was now traveling around Germany again with some loyal friends, where she ran up debts wherever she appeared, until she died in Wiesbaden in 1924, completely impoverished. She found her final resting place in the south cemetery there .
progeny
- Prince Leopold Clemens Philipp August Maria of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (1878–1916)
- Princess Dorothea Maria Henriette Auguste Louise of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (1881–1967)
- ⚭ 1898 Duke Ernst Günther of Schleswig-Holstein (1863–1921)
memoirs
-
Thrones that I saw overthrown . Almathea, Vienna, 1926 (²1927)
- My own affairs by the Princess Louise of Belgium . Cassel, London 1921
- American edition: ed. v. George H. Doran, New York 1921
- Autour des trônes que j'ai vu tomber Albin Michel, Paris 1921
- Geza Mattachich: Folle par raison d'état: la Princesse Louise de Belgique; mémoires inédits / Géza Mattachich . Paris 1904, Brussels 1998
- Geza Mattachich: Az utóbbi évekből . Emlékiratok, Kultur-Verlag, Leipzig 1904
- Geza Mattachich: From the last few years memoirs by Geza Mattachich . Kultur-Verlag, Leipzig 1904
Feature films and a drama
- The model for the feature film Louise von Coburg by Rolf Raffé (1927) was the book Louise von Coburg , published in 1924 . Around the crown and stand of Adolf Sommerfeld. The film was banned. A nitro copy is in the Federal Film Archive. In 2003 it was restored and is accessible again.
- A second Louise film, Her Royal Highness , BBC, aired in England on August 3, 1952, starring Ann Todd as Princess Louise and Harry Andrews as Count Mattachich. The film was destroyed a few years ago during a reorganization of the BBC archive holdings.
- The stage play Louise of Coburg by Felix Salten was performed in January 1933 at Vienna's Theater (ur). The model for this play was the interview that Louise gave to Je sais tout in 1905 .
literature
- Friedrich Austerlitz : A military judgment in Austria. The change of Princess Louise of Coburg . Printing and publishing company "Vorwärts" Fritsch and Co, Vienna 1902.
- Erika Bestereiner : Princess Louise of Belgium. In: The women from the House of Coburg. Piper, Munich 2008, pp. 107-167.
- Richard Dahl: The story of suffering of a king's daughter The truth in the affair of Princess Luise of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha and the former Austrian Uhlan Lieutenant Count Géza Mattachich-Keglevich Open letter to all friends of humanity and justice. Commissioned by Caesar Schmidt, Zurich 1904.
- Olivier Defrance, Joseph van Loon: Louise de Saxe-Cobourg Amours, argent, procès . Racine, Brussels 2000.
- Roberto Giardina : Royal Conspiracy. How the Coburgs conquered Europe . Bertelsmann, Munich 2006.
- Gerd Holler: Louise von Sachsen-Coburg your struggle for love and happiness . Almathea, Vienna 1991.
- Dan Jacobson: All for love. A novel. Hamish Hamilton, Penguin, London 2006.
- Maria Matray , Answald Krüger: Die Liaison , Scherz Verlag, Bern / Munich 1973.
- Adolf Sommerfeld: Luise von Coburg. About crown and status . Verlag Continent, Berlin-Friedenau 1914, 2nd edition 1924 and template for the film Louise von Coburg by Ralf Raffe
- Karl v. Stengel: Expert opinion on the legal claims to which Her Highness Princess Luise of Belgium is entitled to the assets of the former Fondation de la Couronne du Congo, submitted by Dr. Karl Frh. V. Stem ord. Professor of constitutional and administrative law at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich, Privy Council. Munich 1912.
- Juliana von Stockhausen : Figures, dolls and ghosts in the shadow of the Hofburg From my conversations with Princess Stephanie of Belgium, Princess Lonyay, the last Crown Princess of Austria-Hungary . FKHerle Verlag, Heidelberg 1952.
- Joseph Weitzer: The flight of Princess Louise of Saxony - Coburg - Gotha from Bad Elster. As told by Josef Weitzer based on his own experiences . Alois B. Lehar, Vienna 1904.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Sigrid-Maria Großering : Rudolf. Heartbreaker, free spirit, psychopath . Salzburg 2006.
- ↑ Hans-Joachim Böttcher: Ferdinand von Sachsen-Coburg and Gotha 1861-1948 - A cosmopolitan on the Bulgarian throne . Osteuropazentrum Berlin-Verlag (Anthea Verlagsgruppe), Berlin 2019, ISBN 978-3-89998-296-1 , p. 148 - 149 and a .
- ^ Figures, puppets and ghosts in the shadow of the Hofburg. From my conversations with Princess Stephanie of Belgium, Princess Lonyay, the last Crown Princess of Austria-Hungary
- ↑ Olivier Defrance, Joseph van Loon: Louise de Saxe-Cobourg Amours, argent, procès . Racine, Brussels 2000.
- ↑ a b Coburg State Archives, Paul von Ebart estate
- ↑ Document in the Coburg State Archives
- ↑ Obersthofmarschallamt B II 762, Kart. 427, No. Ad 561 BC April 19, 1899, medical report by Prof. Dr. Obersteiner. In: Gerd Holler: Louise von Coburg
- ↑ nytimes.com
- ↑ Gerd Holler: Louise von Sachsen-Coburg your struggle for love and happiness . Almathea, Vienna 1991.
- ↑ bium.univ-paris5.fr
- ↑ Little Chronicle. (...) Princess Luise of Belgium. In: Neue Freie Presse , Morgenblatt, No. 17645/1913, October 7, 1913, p. 7, bottom center. (Online at ANNO ). .
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Louise of Belgium |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Louise Marie Amélie of Belgium |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Princess of Belgium |
| DATE OF BIRTH | February 18, 1858 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Laeken |
| DATE OF DEATH | March 1, 1924 |
| Place of death | Wiesbaden |