By special cable to the New York Times and the Chicago Tribune Press Service
Former Queen Sophie of the Hellenes died earlier tonight at the age of 61 at Professor Noorden's clinic in Frankfurt-am-Main. She died after a "lingering illness from cancer." Queen Sophie underwent an operation on November 21.
Her daughters and her younger son, Paul, were at her bedside when she died.
Princess Sophie Dorothea Ulrika Alice of Prussia was born on June 14, 1870, at Potsdam, the second youngest child of Friedrich III and his British wife, Victoria, eldest child of Queen Victoria.
Emperor Friedrich succumbed to throat cancer only 88 days after succeeding his father in 1888. A year later, Sophie was married to then Crown Prince Constantine of the Hellenes. They had met when Constantine was attending a German military school. She was seen to have "good prospects for a brilliant royal career, as she was the most masterful of the former Kaiser's four sisters."
Two years after her marriage, she aroused Kaiser Wilhelm's displeasure when she converted from Lutheranism to the Greek Orthodox church. Sophie and Constantine had six children: George, Alexander, Paul, Irene, Katherine, and Helen, the estranged wife of King Carol II of Romania. Helen "was her favorite daughter."
Sophie was the queen of the Hellenes on two occasions. Constantine's first reign lasted from 1913 until 1917 when the king "was excluded from the throne by the allied powers." Sophie's second son, Alexander, was named as king, and he reigned until his death on October 25, 1920.
Constantine returned to the throne shortly afterward. He reigned until September 27, 1922, when he abdicated and was succeeded by his eldest son, George II, who "was forced to leave Greece," on December 18, 1923.
2 comments:
On pg. 136 in the Royal Hellenic Dynasty(which I ordered thru your link) has an excellent picture of Sophie. She is one of my favorite granddaughters of Victoria. Also pgs 82 and 124 have nice pictures of her.
Interesting coincidence..The same day I read your post I came across a press photo of Queen Sophie with a report on her November surgery prior to her death...
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