Ferdinand Von Bismarck

Ferdinand Von Bismarck

Ferdinand Herbord Ivar, Prince of Bismarck (German: Ferdinand Herbord Ivar Fürst von Bismarck; born November 22, 1930, in London) is a German politician and the Prince of Bismarck since 1975.

The son of politician and diplomat Otto Christian Archibald von Bismarck and great-grandson of statesman Otto von Bismarck, the founder of modern Germany, he grew up in London, Rome and Sweden, and went to the prestigious boarding school Schule Schloss Salem. After a few years in Brazil in the early 50s, where he worked for the German-Brazilian Chamber of Commerce, he went on to study law, earning a law degree in 1956. He worked for the European Commission in Brussels for some years, and has since 1967 worked as an attorney in Hamburg, based from his home in Friedrichsruh. He has also managed his family's estate.

Ferdinand married the Belgian countess Elisabeth Lippens in 1960. They have four children: a son Carl-Eduard von Bismarck was briefly a Member of the Bundestag, the lower house of the German parliament; a son was Count Gottfried von Bismarck (1962 – July 2, 2007); Gregor von Bismarck-Schönhausen (1964); Vanessa von Bismarck-Schönhausen (1971).

Ferdinand was Count of Bismarck-Schönhausen from his birth until the death of his father in 1975, when he succeeded to the title of Prince.

He became a member of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany when he was 30 years old, and was chairman of the local party in Aumühle. He is member of the board of the Otto-von Bismarck-Stiftung, and is patron of the Bismarckbund and the Bismarck Order, as well as chairman of the Stiftung Herzogtum Lauenburg.