King Edward appoints family to diplomatic positions

March 7, 1904

King Edward VII has "inaugurated a new and clever practice" by appointing relatives to "posts of military attaches of his embassies to foreign courts," reports the Marquise de Fontenoy.  

He nominated Maj. Count Gleichen to the position of military attaché at the embassy in Berlin.  Now he is sending the Duke of Teck, "to fulfill duties of the same nature" at the British embassy in Vienna.

Count Gleichen, is the only son of Queen Victoria's nephew, Prince Victor of Hohenlohe-Langenburg, whose marriage to Laura Seymour, daughter of Admiral Sir George Seymour was morganatic.  Not only is the count a cousin of King Edward and German Emperor Wilhelm II, but he is also the first cousin of the German Empress, Auguste Viktoria, whose mother, Princess Adelheid, was Prince Victor's sister.

Count Gleichen has "exceptional advantages at the court of Berlin," as he is treated less "than a foreign diplomat and soldier than as a near relative of the reigning house of Prussia."

The Duke of Teck will have an "equally agreeable position" in Vienna.  He is the eldest brother of the Princess of Wales, King Edward's daughter-in-law.  His mother was the late Princess Mary Adelaide of Cambridge, and his father, the late Duke of Teck, was the son of Duke Alexander of Württemberg and Hungarian Countess Claudine de Rhedey.

The Duke is a major in the Royal Horse Guards and has seen "active service" in Egypt and South Africa.  He is married to Lady Margaret Grosvenor, daughter of the late Duke of Westminster. 

 Although his title was given to his father by the King of Württemberg, the present Duke of Teck has lived his entire life in England.