Laure Permon was born in 1785 in Montpellier, France. Her family was originally from Corsica and were friends of the Bonapartes. During the Directory, the family lived in Paris, and her brother Albert was friends with Napoleon.

In 1800, Laure married one of Napoleon’s aides-de-camp, General Junot. She was an intimate member of Napoleon’s court as First Consul and was an eyewitness to key events during his rise to power and reign as emperor. In 1807, as a thank-you for services rendered in the Portuguese campaign, Napoleon made Junot and Laure the Duc and Duchesse d’Abrantès. But Junot and Napoleon both had a terrible year in 1814 – Napoleon because he was finally defeated and exiled, and Junot because he died (probably of suicide, after descending into madness).

After Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo, Laure was poor and desperate with no husband a lot of mouths to feed (she and Junot had at least seven kids, from what I could gather in these excerpts). She befriended the novelist Honoré de Balzac, who encouraged her to write her memoirs. And holy cow, did she ever take his advice. There were either 18 total volumes or 7, published from 1831-1835. Le Bourhis’s intro says 18; Bernier’s says 7 – different editions, perhaps? Laure Junot died a few years later, in 1838 at the age of 52.

In his introduction, Bernier notes that her unabridged memoirs contain a lot of filler – stories are repeated, and lots of ancillary information gets thrown in. Why? Because writers were paid by the line, which reminds me of Dickens and his serialized novels. Hence the reason for an abridged version of the memoirs. Okay, makes total sense.

But I'm left with the feeling that someone dropped the ball in terms of selecting what to include because this book felt choppy, uneven, and incomplete. Is that how the memoirs feel when read as a whole? I wish I could tell you. This complaint might be completely unfounded, but there’s no way to know without reading all 7 volumes.

Also, in the foreword to this book, le Bourhis calls her writing “racy,” “intimate,” “authentic” and “spicy.” (xi) I didn't get a good sense of that. Was I just off for the couple days I read this book? Maybe. Intimate, I get – for many scenes, you do feel like you’re right there next to Napoleon. But I didn’t get the sense of much racy or spicy material here. YMMV.

Tidbits

• Laure refused to sleep with Napoleon, despite his strange way of coming on to her – by appearing in her bedroom at 5 am several mornings in a row.
• Napoleon pinched the ear of people if he liked them. It annoyed the crap out of everyone, including Laure.
• At Napoleon’s coronation in 1804, she wore black in protest at not being selected as one of Josephine’s ladies-in-waiting. (viii)
• In 1808, Laure had an affair with Metternich, the Austrian ambassador. Caroline Bonaparte stole him from her – she was a better source of information for him.
• Junot was appointed French ambassador to the Portuguese court at Lisbon, and Laure went with him. She also went with him to Madrid when he was posted to Spain during the Spanish campaign. She did not go with him when, in 1812 or early 1813, he was appointed Governor of Venice.
• Laure describes (with obvious jealousy) the gorgeous diamond earrings of the Princess of Brazil: “Her ear-drops were perfectly unique; I never saw anything like them. They consisted of two diamond pears, perfectly round, of the purest water, and about an inch in length. The two brilliants which surmounted the drops were likewise superb. The exquisite beauty of these jewels, combined with the extreme ugliness of the person who wore them, produced an indescribably strange effect…” (284)
• Laure refused to see Napoleon during the Hundred Days – she was over it.

Caveats

• Seemingly uneven selection of content. The bulk of the book covers the period before Napoleon made himself emperor. On page 312 of 387, we’re only in 1806. His second wife, Marie Louise, is barely present – I’d been hoping to get a clearer view of her through Laure, but it didn’t happen – mostly because Laure was in Burgos when the wedding happened. She shares what her friends wrote to her, but the information isn’t firsthand. The final section of the book, titled The Fall of Napoleon, begins on page 369 and contains just two excerpts: Laure’s reaction to the death of Bessières and Duroc, and a description of court on January 1, 1814 that segues into a summary of his fall – 2 pages, tops, followed by an editor’s summary of Napoleon’s fall and exile. That may very well be how Laure’s memoirs appear in unedited form – if so, this caveat may be unfounded. But as it stands, the coverage appears imbalanced; a simple editor’s note saying “That’s all she wrote, folks,” would suffice to keep me from feeling like I'm missing something.
• The introductions mention things and people you don’t get to see. Laure’s affair with Metternich? Off the page. Eugene de Beauharnais, who was “seducing every woman in sight,” is off the page, too. (11) Bummer.
• I feel like I’ve read a more complete version of at least one of the included anecdotes. Without going on a wild goose chase to find the original, I’ll have to summarize it for you. Pauline Bonaparte had a rivalry with Josephine in terms of being the most sumptuously dressed woman around. Once time, Pauline – determined to outdo Josephine – put on the most lavish outfit she could, draped in fine fabrics and jewels and positively dripping with glamour. In this book, that anecdote ends here. I am almost positive I’ve seen that anecdote somewhere else, but with a different ending: on this occasion, Josephine got word of Pauline’s outfit in advance, and wore something devastatingly simple to make her look gauche and overdone. Are these two different incidents…or did this volume edit out that ending?

Should You Read This Book?

I’m torn.

Even at the risk of reading repetitive, unnecessary filler prose, I think I might rather take my chances with the real thing.

The first third of the book introduces the concept of a go-between and explains how they functioned prior to and during World War I. A go-between is a civilian working as an unofficial diplomat thanks to their connections, linguistic ability, and ability to move in high social circles. Obviously, aristocrats and royals fit the bill perfectly. They were ideally suited to float ideas and ask sensitive questions to high-ranking enemies during wartime, when ambassadors and rulers were unable to do so officially. Their conversations kept these dangerous subjects off the books – making this an admittedly hard subject to research. Mad props to Urbach for taking on such an elusive subject.

As a primary example for the pre-Hitler period, Urbach selects Prince Max Egon II zu Fürstenberg, who served as a go-between for the imperial Austrian and German courts. Other go-betweens covered include Prince Sixtus of Bourbon-Parma, the Dowager Duchess of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha and her four daughters: Queen Marie of Romania, Grand Duchess Victoria Melita of Russia, Infanta Beatrice of Spain, and Princess Alexandra of Hohenlohe-Langenburg.

Next, the book looks at a few more examples of go-betweens in the inter-war and early WWII years: Carl Eduard, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, Princess Stephanie Hohenlohe, and Prince Max Egon zu Hohenlohe-Langenburg. All three of them worked on Hitler’s behalf to further the relationship between Germany and Great Britain. Urbach shows how Carl Eduard’s sister Alice whitewashed his Nazi career in the post-war aftermath, how Stephanie Hohenlohe blew her cover leaving Lord Halifax’s home, and how Max Hohenlohe overstated his influence with decision-makers in the Third Reich.

These stories are fascinating, but in the end, Urbach asks and answers the inevitable question: did these go-betweens make a difference? Unfortunately, in every case but one, the answer is ultimately no.

Caveats

Most online reviews of this book are glowing. I hate to say it, but I feel like I’m missing something. Although I respect the hell out of the research that went into this book, its organization and follow-through felt patchy and incomplete. It’s missing a lot of context, background information, depth, and points of comparison and contrast.

Let's start with the title. Is this book a comprehensive look at Hitler's go-betweens? No. It only covers a select number of German aristocratic go-betweens largely focused on Great Britain. Surely there were go-betweens for other Axis enemies, but they're not covered.

Urbach barely mentions Prince Philipp of Hesse (maybe because Jonathan Petropoulos’s Royals and Reich covered his story in depth?). While Hesse was mainly a go-between for the Italian royal family, he also had substantial contact with British royals, including George, Duke of Kent. This book feels flat without incorporating him into the narrative because he fits the bill so precisely. Why exclude him from the analysis? Why not compare his efforts to those of her chosen subjects?

As another example, despite Hitler being in the title, he barely figures in the book. Although Carl Eduard and Stephanie met and socialized with Hitler, we’re not given much information about what Hitler said or thought about them. The notable exception is Hitler’s statement that Carl Eduard must not be captured (i.e., he should be killed first, if it came to that). Carl Eduard was one of his earliest supporters, and may have been involved in unsuccessful attempts to influence Edward VIII, but had largely receded in importance by the end of the war. If Hitler spoke further about Carl Eduard, we’re not told. Much of the go-betweens’ work seems focused on Goering, Ribbentrop, and Himmler instead. That begs the question...how much did Hitler know what they were doing? We’re not told. And because Hitler is at best a distant presence in the book, the title feels like click-bait.

Here are a few more of my issues - YMMV:

• Not all quotations are cited. As just one example, Urbach mentions a quote from Kaiser Wilhelm II where he “ranted that Jews should be ‘erased’.” (233) No citation.
• There are generalizations with no support. I get it – no book can cover every aspect of a topic. But this happened often enough that I noticed it, which means it happened too often. For example, Urbach tried to make a point about aristocratic bloodlines being devalued in the post-WWI period. She argues that “purists” believed highborn bloodlines “transferred negative qualities. Being ‘mongrels’, whether dogs or human beings, implied imperfection.” (61) Okay, but can we get an example of who, precisely, felt this way? A quote from a reputable writer of the time making this point? Because if we're going with the dog metaphor, inbreeding - always a problem for royals, if not aristocrats - produces the opposite of mongrels. A more likely common viewpoint about royals and aristocrats might be that they were inbred and weak, not strong hybrid mongrels. In the next paragraph, Urbach does provide an example - but it's indirect and ineffective. That example is the Talleyrand-Perigord family, but the one newspaper article Urbach cites doesn’t ding them for their “impure” bloodline. It talks about how hard it is to figure out how to treat property owned by people who split time between countries that are now at war. A much better example of this would have been the Bourbon-Parma family. Prince Elias’s ownership of the historic Chateau de Chambord was contested by the French government for decades because he was an officer in the Austro-Hungarian army. So not only did she *not* support the bloodline point, she didn’t have the most effective example of the point she digressed into. As a second example, Urbach mentioned Hitler making fun of the “degenerate aristocracy.” (168) But we’re not given any examples or quotations to support this. Wouldn’t that seem like a natural inclusion?
• Some important threads are not followed up. On the next-to-last page of her conclusion, for example, Urbach mentions Hess (the Nazi who flew to Scotland, attempting to use back channels to investigate options for a separate peace with Great Britain). Why only bring him up with two hundred words to go? Who were his back-channel contacts in Britain? Were they his contacts or Hitler’s?
• There is not enough background information on the circumstances that prompted the go-betweens’ work. Unless you already know exactly what happened to the Sudetenland, for example, you’re going to be confused during the Stephanie Hohenlohe chapter.
• There are some random value judgments that felt out of place. I’m all for including personality in history writing. But I’m not sure I’m okay with value judgments on a person's appearance or intentions. Here, Urbach describes King Alfonso XIII and Queen Victoria Eugenie of Spain: “Looking at photographs of Victoria and Alfonso, even their visual differences are striking. While she had an intelligent face with inquisitive eyes, her husband looked like the cliché of a shifty gigolo (a cliché he tried to live up to by producing a multitude of illegitimate children).” (73) She also refers to Carl Eduard of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha's sister Alice as “devious” for whitewashing her brother's Nazi past. Possibly. But consider the fact that Alice’s memoir was also called For My Grandchildren. Would you tell your grandchildren every sordid detail of your brother’s past, especially in a public forum like a published book? Before I condemn Alice as devious, I’d need an analysis of what she wrote elsewhere, in material not intended for said grandchildren. Did she cover up Carl Eduard’s past everywhere? Or just in this one source, which was never intended as a tell-all?

Should You Read It?

If you can get it from a library, yes. Despite my caveats, I recommend this as an introduction to the people mentioned and the diplomacy of the time.

This was a fun, fast read – although I don’t agree with the author’s conclusion about Mayerling. The book is well written and Listowel evaluates other sources honestly and intelligently. That being said, she bases her final conclusion about Mayerling largely on hints dropped by the descendant of the man who last possessed the Mayerling papers, Austrian prime minister Count Eduard Taaffe. This does not seem reasonable to me, but YMMV.

In short, Listowel believes Rudolf was murdered by commando sharpshooters of the Austrian army, at the order of his relative, Archduke Albrecht. Why? Because Rudolf had participated in some sort of treasonous Hungarian scheme that was apparently worth killing him over.

The murder theory hinges on several retellings, all of them second or third-hand:

• Prime Minister Eduard Taaffe had possession of important papers relating to the Mayerling tragedy, given to him by Emperor Franz Josef. Taaffee swore he’d keep them secret. Those papers passed from Eduard to his son Henrich to his grandson Edward. When Edward Taaffe died suddenly in 1967, the papers should have been inherited by his cousin, Group Captain Rudolph Taaffe. But Rudolph claimed he didn’t have the papers and had never seen them. He believed Edward Taaffe hid them someplace secure, possibly the Vatican. Rudolph Taaffe believed Rudolf was murdered by the Austrian army because of his participation in some sort of Hungarian conspiracy. He said he had no proof, but this was his opinion based on “certain letters I have read and from my conversation with my cousin Edward. He talked about Mayerling, but he never showed me the papers” (236). He believes Prime Minister Taaffe knew of the plot and said nothing because he wanted Rudolf gone. Later, Rudolf said, after the crown prince’s funeral, Prime Minister Taaffe told Franz Josef what had really happened.
• The German ambassador to Vienna, Prince Reuss, wrote to Bismarck that Emperor Franz Josef only agreed to the suicide story to prevent investigation into what was actually a murder, which would have revealed Mary Vetsera’s presence with Rudolf. Reuss also wrote that he heard from the papal nuncio, Monsignor Galimberti, that the bullet “did not pass from right to left, as is officially stated, but from back left behind the ear upwards…the revolver found by the bed did not belong to the Crown Prince, and all six bullets had been fired.” (243) Reuss’s dispatch also said that Mary’s gunshot wound was at the top of her head, not the temple. When Mary’s body was exhumed and reburied in 1959, the people who opened her coffin did not see a bullet hole in the skull – but the very top of the skull was missing.
• Rudolf’s friend and newspaper publisher, Moritz Szeps, published a report after Mayerling that contradicted the official medical opinion published after Rudolf’s death in one key detail. According to that official report, Rudolf held the gun to his temple and shot. In Szeps’s article, he wrote that Rudolf held the gun to this throat, below his right ear. Because of lazy censors, this article made it into print. Listowel believes this discrepancy indicates that Szeps had more accurate insider information. Since Szeps’s account tallies with Galimberti and Reuss’s account, Listowel believes that where there’s smoke, there’s fire.
• A descendant of Rudolf’s told Listowel that Rudolf had been murdered by two sharpshooters who had orders to kill him if he hadn’t killed himself by 6:30 am. They crept into the Mayerling hunting lodge at about 7 am and shot him.

Listowel says the murder is what caused Franz Josef to keep what happened at Mayerling a secret – not the fact that Rudolf had shot Mary.

But there are a few problems with this story.

First, Listowel never explains how Archduke Albrecht knew that Rudolf planned to commit suicide that very day. We know Albrecht spied on Rudolf, and we know several people knew Rudolf had been talking about suicide for awhile. But is it really possible they knew the *exact* day and time he was planning to do it? He and Mary were at Mayerling for two nights, if I remember correctly. How did they know Rudolf was planning to kill himself on the second night? Why didn’t they send their sharpshooters in on the first night? It doesn’t make sense.

And when and where did this Hungarian conspiracy take place? What evidence did Albrecht have? It’s one of the conundrums of the Mayerling conspiracy that many authors believe Rudolf was involved in something sketchy, but no one has ever found proof. Listowel herself writes, “Despite thorough, patient research by many experienced historians, not a scrap of solid evidence to bear out this allegation has ever been unearthed” (163).

It’s said that a plan for Rudolf to come out in support of Hungarian language rights in the army might have been unfolding during Rudolf’s stay at Mayerling. Several telegrams he received there might have told him the plan was off or had failed. But if so, that meant Albrecht didn’t yet have evidence of his treason, if supporting a pro-Hungarian language initiative could be called that. Why send sharpshooters to kill a guy you don’t have the evidence to convict? And would Albrecht really have decided to kill Rudolf for treason rather than turn him in to his father, who was exceedingly pedantic and duty-bound when it came to following the rules? I’m not convinced. That’s hanging a lot of responsibility on Albrecht, and I don’t know enough about him to judge whether he was capable of that.

Listowel also notes that one of Galimberti’s sources was the Grand Duke of Tuscany, who is not a reliable witness. For example, he said that he and Franz Josef saw a doctor picking glass out of Rudolf’s brain and skull. But there’s no way that’s true, for reasons discussed in books by Judtmann and King/Wilson. So anything Galimberti told Reuss is suspect if it came from the Grand Duke.

Plus, we know that Franz Josef’s efforts to obfuscate what happened at Mayerling predate Rudolf’s funeral (which is when he learned about the murder, according to this theory).

Long story short, there just isn’t enough credible evidence for me to believe this theory. Did none of the sharpshooters ever talk? Compare this situation to the Romanov murders – several of the executioners talked afterward, despite being sworn to secrecy. That evidence might surface someday, but until it does, I’m not convinced.

A Couple Interesting Tidbits

• In a census form, Emperor Franz Josef once filled out the occupation field with “self-employed civil servant.” (231)
• In 1929, William Randolph Hearst offered Eduard Taaffe’s descendant, Edward Taaffe, $200,000 for any info he had on Rudolf. Taaffe said these weren’t his secrets to sell. (232)
• Rudolf supposedly had an illegitimate child with an illegitimate daughter of Tsar Alexander II (not one of the Dolgorouky children). This woman fled to America, had the baby in Hot Springs, Arkansas, and died not long afterward in Missouri. The child, a boy, lived his entire life in America, claiming a connection to the Habsburgs. I had never heard this story before and tripped out big time. Listowel includes a brief retelling of this story in the appendix, so it’s not vetted and likely untrue.

Should You Read This?

If you’re super interested in Mayerling, yes. If you’re not – or only casually interested – read Judtmann’s book instead. Then, if you’re still interested, try this one.

The book interlaces Hitler’s story with that of Franz Ferdinand and his three kids. We see Hitler as a high-school dropout in Vienna, angry at being rejected and reduced to taking menial jobs – like shoveling snow in front of the Hotel Imperial as Karl and Zita arrive to attend a reception there. We see Hitler’s flight to Bavaria to avoid both being arrested for fraud and compulsory service in the Austro-Hungarian army. We see Franz Ferdinand and Sophie assassinated in Sarajevo. Then we see Hitler enlist in the Bavarian army and earn decorations for bravery in World War I.

After the war, the book continues to intertwine Hitler’s story with that of Franz Ferdinand’s three children. While Hitler took a class in oratory and tested his skill in getting people to do what he wanted, Franz Ferdinand’s daughter married and moved to Czechoslovakia. His two sons remained in Austria, having been evicted from Konopiste, their childhood home, by Czech president Tomas Masaryk. Ernst became a farmer in Styria, while Max became a politician, driven to help bring back a constitutional monarchy. Both men spoke out against Hitler and paid the price.

Immediately after the Anschluss in 1938, Hitler ordered them arrested. According to Longo, they were the first two Austrian “criminals” deported to Dachau. Himmler assured Ernst’s wife the brothers would be “treated fairly there, without any danger to their lives.” (178) Pffft – as if.

The story of what happened to Franz Ferdinand’s three kids during the war is horrifying. I don’t want to give too much away, because if you don’t know what happened, reading this book can feel like a suspense novel: will they survive…and if so, how? I read this in two sittings – it was that interesting.

Interesting Tidbits

 Most of these are from the first half of the book because I don’t want to include any spoilers.

• The author mentions Crown Prince Rudolf, but emphasizes the mystery of his death: he “died by his own hand, or by assassination. The government’s clumsy cover-up made the truth elusive.” But, as far as I know, modern scholarship and forensics have pretty well proven it was a suicide. The assassination theory came from other Habsburgs via secondhand information and has little if any evidence to back it up. I was surprised to see Longo give it credence here.
  
  
• At one point, Franz Ferdinand’s chauffeur was Ferdinand Porsche.
  
  
• King Edward VII of Great Britain convinced Emperor Franz Josef to take his one and only ride in a car. Franz Josef hated it and never did it again.
  
  
• I love this quote about Franz Ferdinand and his wife, Sophie: “Her longtime American friend, Maria Longworth Storer, wife of the United States Foreign Minister to Austria-Hungary, wrote, ‘The Archduke Franz Ferdinand was captivated, not only by his wife’s unusual beauty, but by her brilliant mind, and the Christian zeal and integrity of her character.’” (65)
  
  
• According to Longo, the Austro-Hungarian government refused to pay for the autopsies and embalming of the bodies of Franz Ferdinand and Sophie. Instead, their children’s uncle, Count Thun, had to sell Sophie’s jewels and a property of Franz Ferdinand’s to clear debts and make sure the kids had enough cash to live on.
  
  
• “Germany’s Crown Prince publicly declared to an American newspaper, ‘Undoubtedly this is the most stupid, senseless, and unnecessary war in modern times.’ Kaiser Wilhelm II reprimanded his son for telling the truth.” (95)
  
  
• Kaiser Wilhelm II once offered to make Franz Ferdinand’s oldest son, Maximilian, the duke of Lorraine – an idea aimed at ending the constant tug-of-war between France and Germany for that disputed territory. Archduchess Maria Theresa reminded him of this offer during the war, but he said the time wasn’t right to start negotiating for peace.
  
  
• Maximilian Hohenburg married a Lobkowicz! Countess Elisabeth Waldburg-Wolfegg’s grandmother was Princess Marie Lobkowicz Waldburg-Wolfegg. After my deep dive into Eleonora (Lobkowicz) von Schwarzenberg’s life, I’m always on the lookout for more connections to her family.
  
  
• In the immediate wake of the Anschluss, some countries were granting political asylum to political refugees. Britain was not one of them – at least not for Max and Ernst Hohenberg: “Prime Minister Chamberlain ordered no exit visa be issued for Prince Ernst Hohenberg and instructed the staff to immediately expel him and his family from the [British] Embassy.” (151)
  
  
• Elisabeth Hohenberg’s father, Prince Maximilian IV of Waldburg, lived on the highest hill in the area – with clear radio reception for uncensored news broadcasts from Switzerland. Hard of hearing, he turned up the radio as loud as possible so everyone nearby could hear what was *really* going on. “The Prince was so loved in the region that not even the Gestapo dared tell him to turn his radio down.” (182)

Caveats

• There are a couple recurring grammatical errors. Mildly annoying, but not a deal breaker. For example, the text frequently refers to Sophie’s “lamb broach.” A “brooch” is a jewel. To bring a topic up for discussion is to “broach” the subject. That’s something a copyeditor should have caught. And for half the book, Franz Ferdinand’s kids are referred to in plural possessive as “the Hohenberg’s” instead of “the Hohenbergs’ ” (i.e., the Hohenberg’s home, the Hohenberg’s final days). Still not a deal breaker, but something else a copyeditor had many chances to catch.
  
  
• If you care about endnotes, buy the paperback or hardback, not the eBook. If you buy the eBook version like I did, you’ll notice as you read the text that there are no footnotes/endnotes. Frustrating, yes? If you’re like me, when you see an interesting tidbit or direct quote, you really want to know where it came from. Well, you can’t…until you get to the end of the book, that is. Apparently, the publisher didn’t include the superscript note indicators in the actual text – they just included all the notes at the end. That’s supremely unhelpful because you can’t (easily) pair the note with the specific quote or piece of information it refers to in the text without an insane amount of digital page flipping. Ugh. If you care about sources, spring for a paper copy to make your life easier.

Should You Read It?

Yes. If, like me, you didn’t know much about what happened to the Hohenbergs during World War II, this is fascinating.

You might also enjoy The Assassination of the Archduke by Greg King and Sue Woolmans (affiliate link), which focuses more on Franz Ferdinand and Sophie less on the kids – but was written with the cooperation of their descendants.

This seems to have been the first published biography of Ka’iulani – in the bibliography, the authors almost sound embarrassed because they have no further sources to recommend on her. Luckily, more authors followed suit and today, you can find a few more books to add to your shelf if you’re interested in Ka’iulani.

As a place to start, it’s not bad. I really appreciated the glossary of names and pronunciations at the beginning of the book. But you should definitely supplement this book with others about Hawaii, its royal family, and Ka’iulani, because there are a few places where I thought the authors were a little insensitive in the words they used to describe native Hawaiian culture and practices. It’s something that probably wouldn’t have triggered anyone in the 1960s, when it was written and published, but today, we’d be a little more sensitive with word choice. More about this in the caveat section…

The book does a good job of presenting Kaiulani as she was, not as the media of the time portrayed her. Because Hawaii and its annexation were such contentious topics at the time, reporters often took sides. If you were for annexation, it was best to emphasize the foreignness and otherness of the native Hawaiians. If you were against annexation, you emphasized their capability and right to manage their own destiny.

The result? You get newspaper portrayals of Ka’iulani making her out to be either (a) a saint, or (b) a “dark-skinned” princess too young and inexperienced to rule a country. The authors, thankfully, quote snippets of letters that show Ka’iulani as a real person: at times flirtatious, proud, angry, bitter, depressed, and searching for something to believe in and live for.

Caveats

• The story elements. Periodically, there are snippets of dialogue as well as emotions attributed to the historical figures in sentences that read more like historical fiction than non-fiction. So I was left wondering…was that conversation made up? Are the authors assuming what Ka’iulani felt at that moment? Or did they take that info from a source that’s just not cited?
  • As an example, there’s a dialogue between young Ka’iulani and her governess, Miss Gardinier, about what happened when Ka’iulani refused to practice the piano. Did this incident actually happen? If so, what source is it from? There’s no memoir of Miss Gardinier’s in the bibliography…so are we to assume this dialogue is made-up? If so, why is it necessary? The constant need to evaluate tidbits like this was a little annoying.
  • As another example, when Ka’iulani travels to Jersey, one of Britain’s Channel Islands, the text reads: “The salt air off the English Channel was pure and bracing and did instant wonders for her appetite. She was soon fairly glowing with energy.” (92) Okay…but with no citation, how are readers supposed to know if this is a bit of assumption and storytelling, or if someone actually commented on her energy levels?
• The hints of cultural insensitivity. I don’t believe the authors intended anything in this book to come off as culturally insensitive - quite the opposite. But we’ve come a long way since the early ‘60s. It’s inevitable that the modern reader will look at some of the words and phrasing they used and think, geez, I wouldn’t have put it like that.
  • “There came as if from nowhere an ancient crone in a flowered holuku, who lifted her cracked voice to chant a mele praising the achievements of David Kalakaua…” (11) Why “ancient crone” with a “cracked” voice? Using stereotypical fairy-tale language turns this very real person into some element of the “other.”
  • “The grim old lady had witnessed great changes in Hawaii since first her captain brought her to a semi-savage archipelago.” (69) Why “semi-savage”? Why not just say she’d seen great changes?
  • “Handsomely gowned and jeweled, exquisitely civilized, yet with a hint of something barbaric flashing occasionally in her calm black eyes, Elizabeth was to be a striking addition to the circle at Ainahau.” (157) Why “barbaric”?
• Lack of footnotes or endnotes. When the authors quote newspapers, they mention the name of the paper in the text, as they should. Cool. But at other times, there are direct quotations without citations so you have no idea where it came from.

Should You Read This?

If you’re short on time and want a quick introduction to Ka’iulani, go for it.

If you have a little more time, I’d recommend Peter W. Noonan’s Kaiulani of Hawaii instead – a much more recent, more comprehensive biography. (Review coming soon)

Meet Augusta

In the author’s words: “This book was never meant to be entertaining; it is quite simply a chronological collection of all available facts directly or indirectly related to Princess Auguste.”

But it is entertaining if you’re interested in 18^th century royalty. Augusta’s mom was Princess Augusta of Great Britain, a sister of King George III. Augusta’s husband was Duke (later king) Friedrich of Wurttemberg. Her father was Duke Karl of Brunswick. Her sister-in-law was Grand Duchess Maria Feodorovna, later Empress of Russia. Tangentially, all their stories help illuminate Augusta’s.

Augusta was distantly related to Catherine the Great, who took her under wing when she arrived at the Russian court with her husband, whom Catherine had appointed as her governor-general of Vyborg (Finland). But Friedrich was…a dick. There’s no way around it. He was a dick. He was verbally and physically abusive to Augusta (and his second wife). He was moody, petulant, selfish, and almost incapable of seeing a situation from anyone else’s point of view. At the same time, he was smart and resilient – even Napoleon later described him as the most intelligent man on a throne in Europe.

Augusta was smart, too, but no one gave her credit for it. She was also fiercely independent and did NOT like being told what to do – at least not by Friedrich. She stood her ground against Friedrich, against her father, and even against Catherine the friggin’ Great when it was necessary. No one gave her credit for this, either.

Prior to this book, when Augusta was mentioned at all, it was as a flighty, flirty woman who just made things difficult for everyone. For Friedrich, by irritating him and not doing what he wanted 24/7. And for Catherine, by poaching hot guys at the Russian court that the empress was interested in. Neither of these things are actually true, but somehow, that’s what went down in history. Long story short, Auguste and Friedrich separated, and Catherine arranged for her to chillax and recover at Castle Lohde in Estonia. She sent her there with an old friend, Wilhelm Pohlmann, to look after her and run the castle and manage her expenses. But less than two years after her arrival, Augusta was dead.

That’s the only incontrovertible fact the public knew.

Stories and gossip flew between Brunswick and Russia. The two most popular versions of the story went something like this: (a) Catherine imprisoned and murdered Augusta for daring to have an affair with someone she had dibs on, or (b) Augusta slept with (or was raped by) Pohlmann and died giving birth to his illegitimate child.

Neither of these versions are true.

You’ll have to read this book to find out what really happened.

Caveats

I got nothin’. Seriously. This book was a labor of love and it shows.

Does it veer into occasional tangents, about other unfortunate relatives from Brunswick who perished in Russia? Yes.

Does it linger quite a while on Augusta’s parents at the beginning of the book? Yes.

By the very nature of a tangent, these digressions don’t necessarily affect Augusta’s story. But with them, you get a richer picture of the time Augusta lived in and her family history. Just be aware that you’re 21% into the book (page 136 of 590, according to Kindle’s readout) before we get into the meat of Augusta’s story.

The only real caveat I have is that there’s only an electronic version of the book – no hard copy exists (yet?). And because of the digital format, the author had to make a decision how to present footnotes and endnotes. So footnotes are hyperlinked using one set of numbers, and endnotes are given but not hyperlinked, then provided at the end of the book. But the note that explains this appears at the end of the book, so I spent awhile being very confused by the two sets of numbers, only some of which were hyperlinked.

Should You Read It?

Yes. If you have any interest in August or her family, this book is a must.

If you don’t have a specific interest in her, it’s still a great look at Catherine the Great and how she dealt with a man who was a notoriously abusive husband in her court.

In the best possible way, this book makes anything I was working on obsolete. The author put 10 years of research and travel into this book, and nothing I could do as a total amateur (or, as I like to put it, a girl with an internet connection) could compare.

I’m keeping this brief since I’m a little behind on my reviews right now. Trust me when I tell you to read this book if you’re interested in Ka‘iulani’s story. The author touched on topics I wouldn’t have thought would be included in a book for young readers – this includes Likelike’s dramatic suicide threat, and Queen Emma’s mischievous recipe for winning the election.

Caveats

• Occasionally marred by fictional touches. This was probably for the benefit of young readers, to keep them engaged in the story. I get it, but this sort of tactic makes it really easy for an author to overstep their bounds, even one who’s clearly done as much research as Linnéa. A couple quick examples:
  • “Go, all of you,” Likelike whispered to the retainers who were nursing her. Obediently they left, closing the door with a soft thud...Her skin was gray in the muted light, and she was eerily thin. (52)
  • Ka‘iulani couldn't help but notice that he was stomping around and muttering about this state of affairs. (64)
  • She made a few painfully polite remarks to him - then pointedly asked to be taken to her rooms. Her feelings about Koa were so strong that she couldn't even bear to talk to him. (129)
• The occasional overstep or questionable judgment about what Ka‘iulani was thinking or planning. One quick example – the author writes that Ka‘iulani was prepared to take the throne in early-to-mid 1898, and that she likely had chosen her candidates for cabinet posts: “How could she have done otherwise?” (189) Well, by continuing to believe the monarchy was past resurrection – something she had clearly believed at various points in the previous years (including when she wrote to her father that she didn’t even want to return to Hawai‘i from Europe). I’m not convinced Ka‘iulani ever believed the throne was in reach, and with no documented proof, the “how could she not” argument holds no weight with me.
• The occasional typo/grammatical error. A couple examples:
  • A reference to the Belle Epoch (should be Belle Epoque – either keep both words in French or translate both of them to “Beautiful Epoch” or “Beautiful Age”)
  • Constant use of “the Davies” to refer to the entire Davies family (instead of the correct "the Davieses")
  • Mention of U.S.S. The Maine – I’d always heard it referred to as “the USS Maine” – and that’s how the Navy’s history site refers to it. Maybe this is a technicality and her version is right, but it struck me as off.

Should You Read It?

If you’re interested in Ka‘iulani, yes. If you’re not interested in her specifically, you might enjoy Julia Flynn Siler’s Lost Kingdom, which tells the story of the Hawaiian Revolution from a wider perspective.

The challenge in reading – and, presumably, writing – this book is that it’s subtle. Mary’s life wasn’t as dramatic as, say, her German or Romanov relatives who faced revolution as an aftereffect of war. On the surface, she lived a relatively guarded, placid life.

Of course, every human being has fears, wants, needs, and other relatable emotions, and Mary is no different. But she struggled to keep so many of those emotions under wraps that it’s not always easy to tease them out again.

This is a very well-done biography, but it must be said that the subject isn’t the most engaging royal of her generation. That doesn’t mean she isn’t worthy of attention. It just means you’re not going to get as cracking a story here as you do with, say, Princess Marina of Greece and Denmark (her sister-in-law) or Princess Marie Louise (her first cousin once removed).

The author does a very nice job of clearing up a few misconceptions about Mary’s life – particularly, why she didn’t attend Princess Elizabeth’s wedding to Prince Philip in 1947, and what Downton Abbey got wrong about her life.

What this book does very well is force you to respect the role of a working royal. It’s called “work” for a reason. Actors frequently talk about how exhausting press junkets are when they have a new movie or TV show being released. Well, imagine the movie is your whole life. It doesn’t end. And neither does the junket. Sure, you have a few co-stars to share the burden with, but you have to be ready to go, to answer questions, to smile for the camera, to look your best, to hit your mark dozens of times per month, hundreds of times per year. It’s exhausting. And Mary did it without complaining because it was her duty. You can’t help but come away from this book feeling like she had an iron will that she only ever imposed on herself.

I’m going to have to go back to that Famous Jewel Collectors book, though, because this book didn’t put much emphasis on jewelry. When Mary married, Basford notes that she didn’t have much of a collection, so that’s what she asked for when people wondered what to get her. The only time she’s mentioned as taking pride in her jewels, though, was at Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation. She collected 18^th century fans, Fabergé trinkets, and linen…but there’s nothing about her having a passion for jewels, either wearing them, revamping them, or acquiring them. A mystery that requires more digging!

Interesting Tidbits

• In the fall of 1914, Mary had the idea to give a Christmas gift to every British soldier fighting in World War I. She raised enough money to give a gift to more than 2.5 million people (soldiers, sailors, prisoners of war, nurses, and next of kin of casualties). After the initial gift had been sent out, they kept making more of the brass tins filled with cigarettes, sweets, spices, chocolate, and other little goodies. When the Lusitania sunk in May 1915, it went down with 45+ tons of brass coming from New York to make more tins. It took until 1920 for all the gifts to be delivered. (55)
  
  
• When Mary and her husband Harry inherited and moved to Harewood House in 1929, they found the 40-acre lake perfect for hockey matches. They would take the kids out and play, along with residents from the estate. Mary’s position? Goalie. That. That right there is the kind of detail I love because it’s so humanizing. (141)
  
  
• Mary suffered from Graves Disease, an autoimmune disease that sends the thyroid into overdrive. It wasn’t diagnosed until 1935, and an operation seemed to help. (178)
  
  
• Mary’s son, George, became a prisoner of war during World War II – he was held at Colditz with other high-value prisoners. In March 1945, Hitler signed his death warrant but the camp commandant refused to carry it out since the war was all but over. (214)

Caveats

None, as long as you go in knowing that we’re talking about a life of duty. This is not a gossipy bio – this is a calm, measured bio.

Well, there is one nitpicky point I’ll drop here. I’m sure it’s a product of faulty copy-editing (and maybe an automated spellchecker), but the show Downton Abbey is repeatedly referred to as Downtown Abbey.

Should You Read This?

If you’re a fan of her mom, yes.

If you’re a fan of the modern royals, yes – this is a good look at how the role of a working royal began to evolve.

But if you’re a thrillseeker who prefers big drama in her biographies, this might not be your cup of tea.

The bulk of this book covers the two most famous of Queen Victoria’s grandsons: Wilhelm of Prussia and George of Great Britain. To a lesser degree, you get coverage of Albert Victor (Eddy) of Great Britain, Henry of Prussia, Ernst Ludwig (Ernie) of Hesse and by Rhine, Alfred of Edinburgh (Affie), Christian Victor (Christle) and Albert (Abbie) of Schleswig-Holstein, Arthur of Connaught, Charles Edward (Charlie) of Albany, and the three Battenberg sons: Alexander (Drino), Leopold, and Maurice.

Wilhelm and George get top billing here, perhaps not surprisingly. They’re the most visible on the world stage, and there are plenty of published sources available to draw from. The lack of previously published sources didn’t leave the author much to draw from for some of the others.

More sources have since come onto the market, including Diana Mandache’s books containing the Edinburgh letters (Dearest Missy and its sequel, coming out this fall). In addition, Kristina Urbach’s Go-Betweens for Hitler devotes some space to Charles Edward of Albany.

As you can tell from the title of that book, we now have a problem when it comes to this book: its coverage ends in 1918. But since most of the men were still alive at the end of World War II, you’re not getting the full story of their lives. That’s fine, since the time limit was firmly established in the title - it’s not a surprise. Still, I found myself wanting a more complete picture of what happened after the war.

If you also have Kindle Unlimited and can read this for free, I recommend it. If not, I think I’d steer you toward the same sources the author used to get a bigger picture of these men. These include but are not limited to:

• Theo Aronson, Crowns in Conflict
• Roger Fulford (ed.), Beloved Mama, Your Dear Letter
• Harold Nicolson, King George V
• Hannah Pakula, An Uncommon Woman
• Frederick Ponsonby, Recollections of Three Reigns

Tidbits

• Queen Victoria doubled as the tooth fairy. “More indulgent with her grandchildren than she had been with her own children, she was sure to make their holidays fun, giving them a shilling for every baby tooth they lost; and, when Willy had a tooth extracted she gave him five shillings – a crown.” (37)
  
  
• Louise of Belgium’s son-in-law named Marie Louise of Nowhere’s brother his heir. If you’ve been keeping up with my videos, you know that Louise of Belgium’s daughter, Dora, married Ernst Gunther of Schleswig-Holstein. He later inherited the duchy, and named Marie Louise of Schleswig-Holstein’s brother, Albert, as his heir. Unforeseen connections! “…there were stays at their paternal relations’ estates in Augustenburg, where they spent time with their cousins, Calma; Ernst Gunther, who would eventually inherit the duchy, naming Abbie as his heir; and Augusta Victoria (Dona), who would go on to marry their maternal cousin, Willy of Prussia.” (75)
  
  
• Queen Victoria wanted her widower son-in-law, Louis of Hesse and by Rhine, to marry her youngest daughter, Beatrice. “Neither Louis nor Beatrice was attracted to the other and they were both relieved when they discovered that the Church of England forbade prohibited marriage between brothers- and sisters-in-law. The disgruntled Queen suggested that the rule should be changed in this instance but her hopes were dashed and nothing came of the plan.” (84)
  
  
• Queen Victoria’s son, Arthur of Connaught, fell in love with the Duchess of Westminster. “Most irksome of all, though, for the Queen, was the fact that her handsome son enjoyed several affairs and soon developed an unnerving infatuation with his sister-in-law, the Princess of Wales, with whom he danced virtually every dance at the Marlborough House balls, before falling ‘violently in love’ with the wife of the Duke of Westminster.” (87) That duchess of Westminster? Meet her here, in my post about kokoshnik tiaras.
  
  
• Christian Victor (Christle)’s military service and death inspired his cousin, Maurice, to join the army. Christian Victor died of enteric fever at age 33 in the year 1900, after participating in the Ashanti Expedition, the Battles of Omdurman and Khartoum, and being posted to South Africa during the Boer War. “It was left to his sister, Thora, to break the news to the Queen, whose first thoughts, despite her own grief, were for his fellow officers. She had already agreed to open the Marble Arch for a parade of the returning soldiers, and not wishing to dampen their rejoicing, she asked that the news of Christle’s death be kept secret until the procession was over. Ironically , in the light of later events, on hearing of his death, Christle’s young cousin, Maurice Battenberg, went late one evening in his dressing gown to Thora’s room at Balmoral and told her softly, ‘It may comfort you to know that I have decided to join the 60th when I am old enough.’ (164)
  
  
• Wilhelm II’s son had a swearing problem. “Basically, Willy found it difficult to understand his sons, and his erratic nature made it equally difficult for them to understand him. On being told, for example, that the Crown Prince’s tutor had had to reprimand the boy for swearing, Willy jokingly responded: ‘The devil! He must be broken of that; but where did the little Schcisskerl [sic] (the very same phrase complained of) hear that expression?’ (185) This reminds me of that 80s commercial where the dad asked his son where he learned how to use drugs and the son said, “You, all right? I learned it by watching you.” Wilhelm swore, too, after all. 😉
  
  
• George V was not a fan of opera. “Cousin George in England was far less discerning, once remarking that he didn’t like opera except for La Bohème because it was the shortest…” (267)
  
  
• Albert of Schleswig-Holstein (Abbie) felt very British, just as his sister, Marie Louise, did. “Abbie of Schleswig-Holstein was also in a difficult situation since he, too, had been raised in England where all his family lived. Only seven years earlier, he had corrected the French Empress, who mistook his nationality, by telling her: ‘I am not a German. I was born at Windsor and my mother is an English woman.’” (294)

This book opens with a summary of Rasputin’s murder in December of 1916. It proceeds to give you enough background information on Rasputin and Felix Yusupov to understand the events of that night. It explains what happened to Felix afterward – exile, and fleeing Russia during the revolution.

Then we switch settings to Hollywood in the 1930s, where we learn a bit about the establishment of the early studios and Irving Thalberg, who headed MGM. Napley gives a brief overview of the movie’s creation and filming (without the level of detail you get from Mercedes de Acosta’s memoir). He summarizes what you see on-screen in Chapter Eight, and moves on to summarize the release and reviews. He explains how Fanny Holtzmann enters the story in Chapter Nine (although without as much detail as you get in Holtzmann’s nephew’s biography of her).

This is where we get into the meat of the story, about the Yusupov lawsuit against MGM. Chapter Eleven is where we get into the nuts and bolts of the proceedings, delivered here with an incredible (and sometimes excruciating) level of detail. Long story short, the author takes the backseat to the details, apart from the occasional snippy aside. He’ll tell you when he thinks the barrister’s approach is useless or misguided, or when he should have done something else entirely. But for the most part, you just get to read a detailed summary of the trial with little authorial interference.

Napley was actually present during the 1934 trial, and his goal in writing this was to “help readers live through these intriguing events” (ix). While writing, he had a copy of the transcript to work with, and it shows. Plus, he inserts at least one brief event that he remembers seeing but that didn’t make it into the transcript (it doesn’t affect the outcome at all).

All in all, this was more detail than I expected to find about the trial, including the exact words Irina used to answer many of the questions put to her. That’s what I appreciated most – getting my heroine’s exact words.

That’s the hardest part of writing about lesser-known royal women (and being an amateur historian, without access to funding or archives). I’m deeply grateful to have found this book so I could see how Irina behaved on the stand. (Here’s a hint: she was a rock.)

Should You Read It?

If you’re interested in this case, yes.

If you’re deeply interested in the Yusupovs, yes.

If you’re not, you can probably skip this one and just watch my video instead. 😉