Elisabeth Radziwill

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Elisabeth or Elisa Radziwill Elisa Friederike Luise Martha (Lithuanian: Elžbieta Radvilaitė) (28 October 1803, Berlin – 27 August 1834, Bad Freienwalde) was a member of Polish-Lithuanian high nobility of royal ancestry who was the desired bride of the Prince who later became Wilhelm I, German Emperor.

Elisabeth was a daughter of Prince Anton Radziwill and Princess Louise of Prussia, niece of King Frederick the Great. She was a cousin of the Prussian Royal Family. Prince William, her second cousin once removed, and the heir presumptive of the Prussian throne, was in love with her.

William was expected to marry and produce further heirs. His father and her kinsman King Frederick William III were fond of the relationship between Wilhelm and Elisa, but some in the Prussian court had discovered historical allegations that her ancestors had bought their princely title from Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor. In the eyes of certain haughty people, she was not deemed noble enough to marry the heir to the Prussian throne.

So, in 1824, the King of Prussia turned to childless Emperor Alexander I of Russia to adopt Elisa, but the Russian ruler declined. The second adoption plan by Elisabeth's uncle, Prince Augustus of Prussia, likewise failed, because the responsible committee considered that adoption does not change "the blood." Another factor was the influence of the Mecklenburg relations of the decease Queen Louise in the German and Russian courts who were not fond of Elisa's father and against the possible marriage.

Thus, in June 1826, Wilhelm's father felt forced to demand the renunciation of a potential marriage to Elisa. Wilhelm spent the next few months looking for a more suitable bride, but did not relinquish his emotional ties to Elisa. Eventually, Wilhelm asked for the hand of Augusta of Saxe-Weimar, fourteen years his junior, in marriage on 29 August 1826 (in writing and through the intervention of his father). Wilhelm saw his cousin, Elisabeth, for the last time in 1829.

Elisa was later engaged to Prince Friedrich of Schwarzenberg, but the engagement failed. She died, unmarried, in 1834, of tuberculosis.

Historian Karin Feuerstein-Prasser has pointed out, on the basis of evaluations of the correspondence between both fiancées, the different expectations Wilhelm had of both marriages: Wilhelm wrote to his sister Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, the wife of Emperor Nicholas I of Russia, with reference to Elisa Radziwill: "One can love only once in life, really" and confessed with regard to Augusta, that "the princess is nice and clever, but she leaves me cold." Augusta was in love with her future husband and hoped for a happy marriage, but the unhappy relationship between Wilhelm and Augusta was known to Elisabeth Radziwill, and she believed herself to be a suitable substitute for him.