FAMOUS DUKE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 5 November 1938, Page 6

FAMOUS DUKE

HEADS PARTY OF GERMAN EX-SERVICEMEN. RECENT VISIT TO LONDON. On the day that Mr Neville Chamberlain flew to Germany for his second talk with Herr Hitler there arrived in London 800 German ex-servicemen. Their leader was the Duke of SaxeCoburg and Gotha, who is one of the two surviving grandsons of Queen Victoria. The other is the ex-Kaiser. Another grandson was the late Prince Arthur of Connaught.

The Duke is the brother of Princess Alice, Countess of Athlone. The son of the Duke of Albany, he was educated at Eton 40 years ago, where the boys gave him a nickname of “dirty faced Albany.” When the Great War broke out he was faced with a dilemma, for his first causins were King George V. and the Kaiser. It was difficult for him to decide, but he joined the German Army.

Thereupon his Garter banner was taken down from St. George’s Chapel, Windsor, and his name was removed from the roll of the Knights of the Garter. There is no record of him ever returning his Garter insignia. With all solemnity the Duke, in 1918, abdicated his rights of succession to the British Throne, and his titles in the peerage of the United Kingdom were removed from the roll of Peers, according to an Order-in-Council. The Duke did all he could for British prisoners in Germany, and there are many who speak well of his efforts for their welfare. He was quick to deny stories of ill-treatmen,t of Germans in England.