Kaiser Wilhelm II (1859-1941) and Family


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I am new to this thread and some of those pictures, how wonderful they were to view. Thanks for Posting! I can see from Viktoria Luise(?) pictures, where Princess Alexandra from Hanover gets a lot of her looks. I always wondered where she got her looks from because she is such a mix, but I really think she resembles her great grandmother.
 
I find the relationship between Edward VII and the kaiser fascinating. They were very similar personalities in some respects but Edward was the more mature and grounded of the two. They were also both sticklers for correct dress.
 
Kaiser Wilhelm II and Kaiserin Auguste-Viktoria of Prussia:
 

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HRH Prince George Friedrich opened an exhibition on his great-great grandfather;"The Emperor and Europe" at Huis Doorn,
the dutch residence of the exiled Monarch.

Huis Doorn

PPE Agency

Courtesy PPE/Nieboer/
 
Germany Innocent In 1914.

Hello,

I have just finished my new book, Our Century. It claims, among other things, that in 1914 Germany was the victim of a deliberate attack by the nations of the Entente - primarily France.

I agree with the views of Kaiser Wilhelm II as to the cause of the Great War, so I'm wondering:

Are there any members of the Hohenzollern family interested in setting the historical record straight?

Currently there is a debate raging on the History Channel (The History Channel - Home Page) about the cause of the Great War. Goto Community/forums/wars/world war1. My posts appear under the username: Peterhof

Peter
 
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For Prince Albert's Sake

Hello, I am new here and have been enjoying seeing all the beautiful pictures and interesting posts.
In spite of Willy's character, I cannot help but like him. I believe that Queen Victoria was very fond of him, even though she knew he was bombastic and arrogant (didn't she correct him for writing to her and signing his letters with a title :lol:). I think she was particularly fond of him because Prince Albert had been so proud of him.
In spite of his cruelty to his mother, whom, I think, he blamed for the difficulty with his arm, I think he spent his life desperately seeking approval - his mother's approval - and that often led him to behave in such an arrogant manner.
 
He was such an interesting man I Find his life most fasinating do you think he was the way he was because of His Position or the possible defects at birth??
 
Royal Fan said:
He was such an interesting man I Find his life most fasinating do you think he was the way he was because of His Position or the possible defects at birth??
Click to expand...
D: All of the above.
 
I believe that the disability of his arm gave him a horror of appearing weak. Also, throughout his childhood he endured so much humiliation and pain because of his arm (being unable to use a knife and fork, being forced again and again to mount his horse when he kept falling off because of his lack of balance, those horrendous machines he was place in to stretch his arm) so I think he hid all that shame behind the bluster of being 'strong'.
 
Good theory. :flowers:
 
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The Kaiser is a very interesting person - I learned a great deal about his character (some quite a surprise, may I say) from Catrine Clay's book King, Kaiser, Tsar: Three Royal Cousins Who Led the World War.
He had a very difficult childhood and a very unusual adult life.
In my opinion I have to agree Cantata - and I also think he is still a very much misunderstood figure by most people.
 
I note from another thread that there were attempts to kidnap Wilhelm after he fled to the Netherlands. I would think that security was a major issue for him. Was it provided by the Dutch or arranged/paid for by the German government?
 
Prinzessin Viktoria-Luise's Wedding

Rare archival footage of Kaiser Wilhelm II at the celebration of the marriage of his only daughter, Princess Victoria Louise to Prince Ernst August of Hanover, in Berlin.

YouTube - KAISER WILHELM II. 1913 - in Farbe!


* Background music, Preussens Gloria c1870, is easy to recognize * :)
 
Russophile said:
Cool! It looks like Ducky was in there. The Cecile mentioned, was it Cecile Battenberg? Who is the woman at the first? Unser kronprinzen?
Click to expand...

No, she was not a Battenberg. She was born Duchess Cecilie of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, daughter of Grand Duke Frederick Francis III of Mecklenburg-Schwerin and Grand Duchess Anastasia Mikhailovna of Russia. She married Crown Prince William of Prussia (eldest son of Kaiser William II and Princess Augusta Victoria of Schleswig-Holstein) and thus became Crown Princess of Prussia until the end of World War I in 1918.

Also... I may have missed it, but I didn't see any photo of "Ducky," otherwise known as Princess Victoria Melita of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. She is the one who shocked the royal world by divorcing her first husband (and first cousin) Prince Ernst Louis of Hesse and then marrying (another first cousin) Grand Duke Kyril of Russia.
 
claypoint2 said:
Also... I may have missed it, but I didn't see any photo of "Ducky," otherwise known as Princess Victoria Melita of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. She is the one who shocked the royal world by divorcing her first husband (and first cousin) Prince Ernst Louis of Hesse and then marrying (another first cousin) Grand Duke Kyril of Russia.
Click to expand...
Shock ran rampant in that family. . .:whistling:
 
I find it so strange that the Prince says that Churchill wanted the Kaiser to go stay after WW I in the UK.
No one wanted him to come stay. He arrived at the Dutch border by train and was kept waiting for longer than a day untill the diplomats had settled the matter. He was "humiliated" because the Dutch demanded that he take off his sword before entering the country. He then went and stayed with his entourage too long at Amerongen Castle, at the home the Benticks (his adjudant von Ilsemann fell in love and married their only daughter, which is romantic). And after a few years he bought Huis Doorn.

Dagboekaantekeningen van Sigurd von Ilsemann - vleugeladjudant van keizer Wilhelm II
 
Actually, Georg Friedrich may have misspoke or been misunderstood. It was during the Nazi invasion of the Netherlands in 1940 that Churchill asked the Kaiser to flee to Britain. He wanted to go at first, but then felt that he would be running out on the Dutch who had taken him in.
 
I was referring to this clip, he says considering he also had an offer from churchill he chose to come here. (not to stay here, in holland)

I mixed up the two WW, linking churchill with WW I, but strange that the prince mixed the wars up too, it is his family after all.

Why did Churchill invite the Kaiser to the UK?

lucien said:
Prince Georg and his uncle Prince Christian,who is blind,while on a visit to Huis Doorn,the residence of the late Kaiser in The Netherlands:

YouTube - SKKH Prinz Georg Friedrich von Preußen
Click to expand...
 
Churchill was a member of the British government at that time already,IIRC he was the secretary for the Navy,an under-secretary for Defence in one way or another anyway.He would have been in a position to make such a request/offer if he was given the go-ahead by the then PM to do so.I heard this story before and find it hard to believe,if the brits indeed made that offer,then why all the fuzz in requesting the Netherlands time and time again to extradite the warcriminal Wilhelm?It doesn't make any sense,but then war & politics and all those in charge,capable or not,never make any sense.
 
Perhaps the lesser of the two evils was to have the Kaiser safely in Britain rather than in the hands of Hitler where he could have been used or manipulated as a rallying point for the new Reich.
 
when you consider that the misery and poverty in Germany post WW I , a war that had a great deal to do with the kaiser I wonder why England was worried that he would be popular. I think the Hohenzollerns joined the German army during WWII but I do not think they were part of the SS.
 
I think that one of the sons of the Kaiser (August Wilhelm) wore a unoform, much to the disgust of the Kaiser himself btw, who thought it beneath their status to wear the uniform of a corporal.

I am sure that Goebbels could have made a few nice items with the Kaiser. They did use his funeral to do just that, something the Kaiser himself did not want at all.
 
Warren said:
Perhaps the lesser of the two evils was to have the Kaiser safely in Britain rather than in the hands of Hitler where he could have been used or manipulated as a rallying point for the new Reich.
Click to expand...

At the end of WWI and the twenties,corporal Adolf was no-where in sight yet...and really,we all wish it would have remained just like that...
 
:previous:
Yes Lucien, but we are talking about Churchill's offer to get the Kaiser to Britain in 1940.
 
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