Marriage
In 1876, Charlotte became engaged to her second cousin Prince Bernhard of Saxe-Meiningen, and they were married in Berlin on 18 February 1878. The couple had one daughter, Feodora, who was born on 12 May 1879 (the first great-grandchild of Queen Victoria). Following Feodora's birth, Charlotte retreated from family life in favor of the society life in Berlin. Feodora fell under the care of nannies and other servants when not visiting her maternal grandmother in Berlin or at her country estate, Friedrichshof. Charlotte subscribed to the conservative political views of her elder brother and Chancellor Bismarck, leading to further discord with her mother, who favored liberal policy. Charlotte and Feodora always had a difficult relationship, and were more or less estranged for long periods after Feodora's marriage to Prince Henry XXX of Reuss in 1898. Charlotte declared that Henry had given her daughter venereal disease, Feodora was angry at her mother's spreading of lied about them, and Charlotte threatened to bar her from her house 'for ever'. In 1914, Prince Bernhard inherited his father's dukedom to become Duke Bernhard III of Saxe-Meiningen. Although now elevated to the rank of duchess, her tenure was to be short, as Bernhard abdicated at the end of World War I. By this time, Charlotte, a chain smoker long plagued by ill health, was dying, finally succumbing to her illnesses on 1 October 1919 at the age of fifty-nine.
Read more about this topic: Princess Charlotte Of Prussia
Famous quotes containing the word marriage:
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—Beatrice Gottlieb, U.S. historian. The Family in the Western World from the Black Death to the Industrial Age, ch. 12, Oxford University Press (1993)
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