The Wedding of Grand Duchess Maria of Russia and Prince Franz-Wilhelm of Prussia
by Seth B. Leonard
Originally published in the European Royal History Journal, Issue CXXV, Volume 23.1 - Spring 2020.
Grand Duchess Maria Vladimirovna of Russia was born on 23 December 1953, at the Nuestra Señora de Loreto Clinic in Madrid. She was the only child of Grand Duke Vladimir Kirillovich of Russia, Head of the Imperial House of Romanov, and his wife Leonida. Nearly forty-years-old, Leonida began to fear that she would be unable to give her husband a much-needed heir. Increasingly desperate, Leonida made a pilgrimage early in 1953 to the relic of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker at Bari, Italy, and, several weeks after returning to Spain, she was thrilled when her doctor informed her that she was expecting. “My pregnancy was very difficult,” Leonida remembered. “I had to stay on bed-rest for eight months, which for a woman with a rather dynamic temperament, presented me with an additional challenge. Fortunately, Queen Giovanna of Bulgaria was kind enough to come and spend many an afternoon at our home to keep me company. The doctor told me that the child could only be saved if I stayed in bed. The sacrifice was worth it.” Needless to say, Grand Duchess Maria’s parents always rather regarded their daughter as something of a miracle (“a child from God”), and the three formed an exceptionally close familial bond. Upon being baptised into the Russian Orthodox faith on 3 February 1954, the infant was given the name Maria; the chosen godparents were her great-uncle Grand Duke Andrei Vladimirovich, who due to poor health was represented at the event by Prince Nicholas of Romania; and Queen Giovanna, Queen Mother of Bulgaria.
The Romanov trio spent the year rotating between their various homes. In Spain, they resided in a comfortable apartment on the rue Velasquez that was just around the corner from the home of Maria’s maternal grandparents, who had relocated to the country after the fortuitous marriages of their children. At some point, the family exchanged the apartment for a more spacious villa in the posh Madrid suburb of Puerto de Hierro. The French residences included Ker Argonid in St. Briac, built by a retired Breton seaman in the 1880s and acquired by Grand Duke Kirill in 1926, and a flat in Paris. Hélène Kirby, Maria’s half-sister, also lived with her mother and stepfather, who granted Hélène the title of Countess Dvinskaya in 1976.
Grand Duchess Maria has recalled her early years: “I had a very happy childhood. There was such a harmony between my parents. They very much loved each other. They never quarrelled or were separated. I was thus raised in an atmosphere of mutual love and respect.” When she was a toddler, Maria was often taken by her parents to visit her great-uncle Andrei and his wife Mathilde at their “enchanting” Villa Molitor in Paris, with its “big windows and conservatories.” There, Maria enjoyed playing with the Grand Duke’s pet turtle, Rosalie, who was kept in one of the gardens and was one of Maria’s earliest guests at her childhood tea parties.
Other companions included her slightly older Leiningen and Prussian cousins, the numerous children of her aunts, the grand duchesses Maria Kirillovna and Kira Kirillovna, respectively. Along with her parents, Maria witnessed wedding of her cousin Marie-Cécile of Prussia with Duke Friedrich August of Oldenburg in 1965. Two years later, in August 1967, the Romanovs were joined at Ker Argonid by Kira and her husband, Prince Louis Ferdinand of Prussia, and their brood of children to celebrate the fiftieth birthday of Grand Duke Vladimir. Amid the celebrations, Princess Kira began to feel ill: when she was transported to hospital in nearby St. Malo, she passed away from a heart-attack. Her death made the immediate family circle a bit smaller, as Maria’s other paternal aunt, Dowager Fürstin Maria of Leiningen, had already died in 1951, also from a heart-attack, and also while visiting her brother Vladimir and his wife, though her unfortunate passing occurred in Madrid.
Like most royal children of a bygone era, Maria was partially raised by a nurse: a Swiss-German woman by the name of Hanny Vögelin. Described as “firm but fair,” Vögelin taught the little girl how to read and write, and stayed on with the family until Maria went to primary school at the age of seven. After completing primary school, Maria went on to the British Institute in Madrid. Passionate about languages, she then made the choice to enter Oxford University, where she began her studies in 1972 at Lady Margaret Hall. Maria spent her first year at university living with her parents at a house they let in Boars Hill; thereafter, the grand duchess moved into the dormitories so that she could share the same life as the other students. Ever the protective parents, Vladimir and Leonida continued to rent a cottage close-by for the remainder of Maria’s time at Oxford.
One of the most memorable occasions during this British sojourn was when the family received an invitation from Buckingham Palace for tea with Queen Elizabeth II. Although three servants were in plain sight, the Queen herself poured the tea, which was “of the celebrated British brand Twinings,” and served it “with a thin slice of lemon in a Worchester cup.” As the Romanovs shared this rare tête-à -tête with their Windsor cousin, they were sitting next to a window and gazed out to see the Queen Mother boarding a helicopter on the Palace grounds. “Oh, Mummy is a phenomenon!” the Queen exclaimed, “I hate helicopters, they frighten me, and she…she takes them like one would take a bus or a taxi!”
In early 1975, Grand Duchess Maria left Oxford an accomplished polyglot, fluent in English, French, Russian and Spanish, as well as possessing a thorough knowledge of Russian literature. Around this time, she had also made up her mind as to the man with whom she wished to spend the rest of her life. This handsome suitor was none other than her third-cousin once-removed: Prince Franz Wilhelm of Prussia. Theirs was to be the third—and, to date,—final, dynastic match between a Romanov and a Hohenzollern.
On 6 August 1940 at his residence at Doorn, the former German kaiser Wilhelm II officially announced the engagement of his grandson Prince Karl Franz Joseph with his stepdaughter, Princess Henriette of Schönaich-Carolath. Ever since his remarriage, the Kaiser had generally stayed out of his stepchildren's affairs, with the exception of Henriette, Kaiserin Hermine’s youngest child, who was born on 25 November 1918 at Berlin. Kaiser Wilhelm possessed a genuine affection for Henriette. She came to be known as “the general.” Of all Hermine’s children, only Henriette had come to live at Haus Doorn, where she “performed the role of resident grandchild, passing the sugar when coffee was served” at the Kaiser’s table.
Karl Franz Joseph and Henriette were civilly married on 1 October 1940 at Doorn, The Netherlands; the ceremony was performed by the Mayor of Doorn. The religious ceremony followed on 5 October 1940 in Berlin. Kaiserin Hermine and Princess Marie-Auguste, the mothers of the bride and groom, respectively, both appeared in the official wedding photographs with the young couple. The groom’s grandfather and the bride’s stepfather died shortly after their wedding: Wilhelm II passed away at Haus Doorn on 4 June 1941.
Prince Karl Franz Joseph and Princess Henriette had three children: Franz Wilhelm. Friedrich Christian, and Franz Friedrich (b.17 October 1944). Princes Franz Wilhelm and Friedrich Christian were twins, both being born at Schloß Saabor on 3 September 1943. Sadly, only Franz Wilhelm survived, as Friedrich Christian died several weeks after birth on 26 September 1943. The union of their parents did not last; Karl Franz Joseph and Henriette’s marriage was dissolved by divorce on 5 September 1946.
Prince Karl Franz Joseph went on to marry twice more. The prince contracted a morganatic marriage with his second wife, Luise Dora Hartmann (1909—1961), on 9 November 1946 in Hamburg. This marriage ended in divorce in 1959. Karl Franz Joseph remarried in Lima, Peru, on 20 July 1959 to Doña Eva Maria Herrera y Valdeavellano (1922—1987), with whom he had two daughters, Princesses Alexandra (b.1960) and Désirée (b.1961). Prince Karl Franz Joseph, a grandson of the last German Kaiser and a descendant of Queen Victoria, died in Arica, Chile, on 23 January 1975. He was fifty-eight. The prince was eventually buried at Furstenfriedhof Maria-Zell, Hechingen, on 1 June 1981.
Sometime after her divorce, Princess Henriette of Schönaich-Carolath had another son, Udo (b.1956), although she never remarried. The princess died in Neuendettelsau, West Germany, on 16 March 1972. Henriette was fifty-three years-old; she was buried at Haseldorf bei Pinneberg, Holstein.
In his earlier years, Prince Franz Wilhelm was raised by his maternal grandmother, Kaiserin Hermine. The prince went on to study law and business administration at the universities of Mainz and Frankfurt am Main. He then worked in both Europe and South America.
By the time Franz Wilhelm’s engagement with Grand Duchess Maria of Russia was announced, they had been seeing one another for some time: they had originally met at a soirée in Germany organised by Maria’s uncle, Louis Ferdinand of Prussia. In the spring of 1975, the pair had come to the decision that they wanted to marry. Maria and Franz Wilhelm were first publicly photographed attending the religious wedding of King Leka (I) of Albania and Miss Susan Cullen-Ward, which was held on 10 October 1975 in Toledo. Among the guests at this union were Queen Margarita of Bulgaria, Queen Farida of Egypt, Prince Nicholas and Princess Thereza of Romania, Grand Duke Vladimir and Grand Duchess Leonida of Russia, the Duke and Duchess of Cadiz, and the Count and Countess d’Érveux. Juan Carlos and SofÃa, then Prince and Princess of Spain, had to decline their invitation for reasons of security due to tensions that existed at that time in the country.
On 9 July 1976 at Ker Argonid in France, Grand Duke Vladimir and Grand Duchess Leonida formally announced Maria’s engagement to her third-cousin once removed, Franz Wilhelm. Grand Duke Vladimir stated: “I must say that this event fills us with joy. Our daughter could not make a better choice.” When Grand Duchess Maria was asked if she could elaborate on the plans for the wedding, she responded: “We had originally decided, with my parents, that the wedding would take place in Geneva, where there is a large Orthodox church, and because it is a more central location in Europe for all our cousins and friends to come. The wedding will likely take place at the end of September. However, King Juan Carlos, my cousin, let us know that he wanted to attend the celebration. Since he can not leave Spain in September, we will get married in Madrid, but the Orthodox Church here is quite small. As for the date, it is the king who will fix it, since being here, we can not decide what day will work best for his schedule.” Interestingly, linguistics played a role in the communication between the engaged couple: Maria spoke fluent Russian, French, English and Spanish; Franz Wilhelm spoke fluent German and English. Therefore, the couple conversed in English — though Maria expressed a desire to improve her German so as to add a second language to their means of discourse.
On 21 July 1976, a degree was drawn up to cement the alliance between Grand Duchess Maria, heiress presumptive of the Russian Imperial House, and Prince Franz Wilhelm. In the document, Grand Duke Vladimir took several steps to guarantee the survival of his house. Firstly, Vladimir granted his permission for the marriage between his daughter and her fiancé. Secondly, he made known the fact that Franz Wilhelm had converted to the Russian Orthodox faith on 8 July 1976 at the Saint Sergei Church (l'église Saint-Serge de Radonège) in Paris. Thirdly, it was announced that upon baptism Franz Wilhelm had adopted the name Michael Pavlovich. Fourthly, Vladimir granted his soon-to-be son-in-law the title of Grand Duke of Russia. Fifthly, Vladimir made clear that Michael Pavlovich had agreed to raise any children born of his union with Grand Duchess Maria in the Russian Orthodox Faith. Finally, the Grand Duke expressed his desire that any children born of Maria and Michael’s union would bear the surname of “Romanoff” and the title “Grand Duke/Grand Duchess of Russia,” while they would secondly bear the surname “Hohenzollern” and the title “Prince/Princess of Prussia.” The negotiations concerning the marriage contract took place between Grand Duke Vladimir and his brother-in-law, Prince Louis Ferdinand, Head of the Royal House of Prussia.
On 4 September 1976, Grand Duchess Maria and Prince Franz Wilhelm were married in a civil ceremony at the Hôtel de Ville of Dinard. It was presided over by Yvon Bourges, the mayor of Dinard and former French Minister of Defence under President Valéry Giscard d’Estaing. The witnesses for the grand duchess were Michel Schupoff, the son of a Tsarist general, and Loyola de Palacio, who later became a minister in the Spanish government and then a member of the European Commission. The witnesses for the prince were H. Munich and Baron Peter von Recum. After the civil ceremony, the father of the bride offered a celebratory luncheon for some fifty persons at the family home of Ker Argonid in Saint-Briac-sur-Mer on the Breton coast.
The religious wedding was attended by an American couple from Eureka, California: Dr Samuel P Burre and his wife (née Olga Alexandrovna Mahakovsky). Olga’s godmother Valentina Blagoy, a Russian emigrée and former actress, also accompanied the couple to the imperial celebration in Spain.
The Burres recalled their introduction to Grand Duke Vladimir, Grand Duchess Leonida and the engaged couple shortly before the wedding: “Shortly after we arrived in Madrid, we received an invitation to tea at the residence of the Grand Duke and Grand Duchess Vladimir of Russia. The grand duke’s chauffeur picked us up at our hotel in Madrid and we traveled at a snail’s pace through the 6 o’clock traffic of a Saturday afternoon. The grand ducal villa, about five miles from the hotel, dwelled on the outskirts of Madrid, densely arbored in an area of modern Spanish mansions. The residence was enclosed by a tall stone wall. As we reached the iron gate, the chauffeur gave a signal of his arrival. A young maid opened the gate with a key, much in the fashion of opening one’s front door. We were admitted by the maid to a very large living room — impressive with statues and family portraits in oil, large chandeliers and a large fireplace of white stone over which hangs a life size portrait of their daughter, the Grand Duchess Maria, whose nuptial ceremonies were to be held in a few days. After a brief wait, the grand duke and grand duchess entered and after an exchange of greetings seated themselves with
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