The Three Monarch Cousins Attend A Wedding in Berlin
- Aug 17, 2023
- 8 min read
Updated: 4 days ago
Princess Victoria Louise of Prussia's Wedding
On May 24, 1913, Victoria Louise was to be married to the Duke of Brunswick, Ernest Augustus. The two were third cousins once removed, which seems strange, but was customary in that day. With this marriage, they hoped to end a lengthy dispute between the Houses of Hohenzollern and Hanover, but this was no "arranged marriage" as we will discuss later. Earnest was the Duke of Brunswick but he was the latest in a line who believed they were entitled to the Hanoverian throne.
Royal Relations at the Wedding
In honor of this grand occasion, Kaiser Wilhelm II invited his extended family from every realm. Interestingly, this meant that the King of Britain, and the Russian Tsar received invitations. This was King George V and Tsar Nicholas II. This would be the final time that these three related kings were in the same place at the same time before World War I would begin. One person noted this was "the largest gathering of reigning monarchs in Germany since German unification in 1871, and one of the last great social events of European royalty before World War I began fourteen months later."5 Victoria Louise, described it as, "It was the last great flare-up of the old court life, the last gathering of the monarchs of Europe before the shadows of the Great War began to fall."3
To those living in the modern times, it is fascinating to ask how it was possible that the leaders of Britain, Germany, and Russia were all related to one another...and not just distantly? The answer cannot be explained simply, but rather, it is a tangled web of lineage going all the way back to King George II. In fact, each leader was fifth cousins as equal descendants of King George II. But not only were they related going back to King George II, they were all more closely related than that. Nicholas and George were first cousins and the similarity in their appearance was uncanny. Wilhelm and George were first cousins whose grandmother was Queen Victoria. And Nicholas and Wilhelm were second cousins one way, and also third cousins another way. Wilhelm was also first cousins to Nicholas' wife, Alexandra Feodorovna.1 Did all that make sense?
Another interesting fact is that King George II's father, King George I, was at one time the Duke of Hanover. Yes, George I, who was of German heritage(it was not called Germany at the time), became the King of Britain on August 1, 1714. This was due to a legality stemming from the Act of Settlement of 1701. And now, his very own descendants were once again gathering in the German homeland as one of their daughters would marry the Duke of Brunswick, this "Hanoverian Prince," Ernest Augustus. History had come full circle, in a way.
The Love Story
Ernest August and Victoria Louise met in a somewhat miraculous but also most unfortunate circumstance. Ernest's older brother, was traveling via motorcar to his uncle's funeral. On his way, he wrecked his car in an unworn part of the road and died. The Kaiser instructed two of his sons to go to the site and the funeral and render any help necessary. This was a clear olive branch given the history of the two families. In response, Ernest traveled to the Kaiser's royal court on behalf of his father and thanked him. And that is when Ernest met Victoria for the very first time in May 1912.
A few weeks afterwards(his brothers death), Ernest Augustus, the second son of the Duke, by his brother's death became heir to the family feud, came on his father's behalf to thank the Emperor for his sympathy and aid in their sorrow. For the first time in their lives he and the Kaiser's daughter met, spent an hour or so in each other's company, and then, his mission fulfilled, he departed again. But a new element had been introduced into the quarrel. So strong was the mutual attraction felt by the two young people for each other that, in spite of the short time of their meeting, in spite of the tremendous prejudices and difficulties in the way, they at last wore down the opposition and conquered the accumulated hate of years. What the most practised diplomats failed to achieve, this boy and girl accomplished, and at last, through many troubles, delays, and vexations, won their way to their hearts desire.2
It was a story written for Hollywood. It might be curious to some whether the royal couple married for power and politics or whether they truly married for love. In Victoria Louise's autobiography, she wrote, "It was—if I may use the old-fashioned expression—love at first sight."3
The Wedding
As one might expect from a royal wedding, it was an extravagant event with no expense spared. One thousand two hundred people attended for the dinner alone.4 In Germany, it was a royal tradition to do something called a Torch Dance going back centuries, known as Fackeltanz in German.7
On the evening of the wedding of the Princess with Prince Ernest of Cumberland, now Duke of Brunswick, at the beginning of the historic Torch Dance which concludes the ceremonies, the radiant bride, taking her father by one hand and the Duke of Cumberland by the other, walked between them round the hall to the sound of the stately bridal music. It was a happy symbol, the erstwhile enemies linked together by the Kaiser's daughter, a visible sign of the alleviation, if not quite the ending of a situation which had for long years galled and irritated the German people.2
The Duke and Duchess of Brunswick entered their Duchy of Brunswick as a married couple on November 1, 1913. They would reside at the Blankenburg Castle. They received broad affection from the German people of Brunswick as their marriage brought peace to a century-old family feud. The couple went on to have five children and sixteen grandchildren.
Some were surprised that the Kaiser allowed the wedding to go through. However, it is a matter of record that Wilhelm wanted to please his late mother by ending the feud between the two families. Here are two accounts that give confirmation to that sentiment. In her memoirs, Victoria Louise writes, "[Wilhelm II] felt that by giving his blessing to the union, he was at last fulfilling the wishes of his late mother, who had always been a friend of the Hanovers and had suffered under the long estrangement."3 Another earlier account states, "The Emperor spoke with deep feeling of the Princess’s marriage...mentioning that it was a fulfillment of the legacy left by his mother, who had always sought to bring the Hanovers back into the Imperial fold."8
Wedding Interactions and Politics
Given that the three cousins would not meet again before the Great War, historians have studied the interactions between them.
There are limited insights into how the three cousins interacted leading up to, during, and after the wedding. One insight comes from Victoria Louise's memoir. She recalls a moment where the three cousins sat together at the banquet and the "political clouds" seemed to vanish while for a moment they laughed together like "the schoolboys they once were."3
Another source is the British Ambassador to Berlin, Edward Goschen. He wrote a work titled, The Diary of Edward Goschen where he releases his notes from his career, some of which included the wedding. A recurring theme is the apparent preference that Nicholas and George V had for one another. Here's three interesting quotes from Goschen's diary.
The King and the Emperor of Russia are inseparable and are always together. They might be twins. They seem to enjoy themselves thoroughly and to be glad to be together again....
It was a curious sight to see the three Emperors and the King all together—and to think of the vast interests they represent. They all seemed to be on the best of terms, but one couldn't help wondering what was going on behind those smiling faces...
The Emperor is evidently much pleased with the success of the visit... He said to me today: 'The King and I are on the best of terms, and I think this visit has done a world of good.' I hope it has, but I am not sure that it has changed the political situation much.10
World War I
A little more than a year after the wedding, on June 28, 1914, Franz Ferdinand and his wife were assassinated, sparking World War I. When World War I had finished, of these three powerful cousins, only King George V remained on his throne.. Nicholas and his family had been tragically executed at gun point during the Bolshevik Revolution, with his family at his side. And Kaiser Wilhelm II and his family were forced to flee Germany in exile, finding protection in the Netherlands.
Victoria Louise was not required to leave Germany in the wake of World War I. She was no longer considered primarily a part of House Hohenzollern, but rather, of House Hanover by marriage. Laws following World War I which targeted the property of the nobility class, were mainly aimed at those in House Hohenzollern while the House of Hanover was considered a victim of the Hohenzollerns. Ernest and Victoria both lived full lives. Ernest joined the Nazi party in 1934 reportedly out of necessity to protect his estate. Ernest died on January 30, 1953 at age 65 and Victoria Louise died on December 11, 1980 at age 88.
By 1920, the German government had its own revolution in the wake of the war, and the Weimar Constitution was adopted, creating a German republic. And in Russia, the Bolsheviks ushered in a communist dictatorship. The year 1920 was a landmark year as it marked the point at which there would never again be a king, dictator, or leader who took the reigns of leadership in Germany or Russia based on their bloodline. That, however, has not changed in the United Kingdom, even today. The wedding of Victoria Louis and Ernest August was indeed, "the last great flare-up of old court life."3
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Photographs of The Monarch Cousins
Tsar Nicholas II & King George V
Kaiser Wilhelm II & Tsar Nicholas II
Kaiser Wilhelm II & King George V
Sources:
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Brookings. “The Family Relationships That Couldn’t Stop World War I | Brookings,” July 19, 2018. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-family-relationships-that-couldnt-stop-world-war-i/#.
Topham, Anne. Memories of the Kaiser's Court. United States: Dodd, Mead, 1914. p 302 -303.
Viktoria Luise, Princess of Prussia, The Kaiser's Daughter: Memoirs of H.R.H. Viktoria Luise, ed. and trans. Robert Vovamp (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1977), 58–68.
Princess Victoria Louise of Prussia." Crowns, Tiaras & Coronets (blog). July 2, 2016. http://crownstiarasandcoronets.blogspot.com/2016/07/princess-victoria-louise-of-prussia.html.
Wikipedia, s.v. "Princess Victoria Louise of Prussia," last modified April 15, 2026, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Princess_Victoria_Louise_of_Prussia.
Petropoulos, Jonathan. Royals and the Reich: The Princes von Hessen in Nazi Germany. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006. p 168.
Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, s.v. "fackeltanz," accessed May 1, 2026, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fackeltanz.
Davis, Arthur N. The Kaiser I Knew: My Fourteen Years with the Kaiser (New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1918), 154.
MacDonogh, Giles. The Last Kaiser: The Life of Wilhelm II. New York: St. Martin's Press, 2000. p 340.
Goschen, Edward. The Diary of Sir Edward Goschen, 1900–1914. Edited by Christopher H. D. Howard. Camden Fourth Series, vol. 25. London: Royal Historical Society, 1980, 273–276.
