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Louise Alexandra Marie Irene Mountbatten (previously Princess Louise of Battenberg; 13 July 1889 – 7 March 1965) became Queen consort of Sweden in 1950 and served as such until her death in 1965. Through her marriage, prior to her husband's accession as King Gustaf VI Adolf, Louise was Crown Princess of Sweden and Duchess of Scania.
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Louise was born a Princess of Battenberg at Heiligenberg Palace, Seeheim-Jugenheim, in the Grand Duchy of Hesse. Her father, Prince Louis of Battenberg, who was Admiral of the Fleet in the UK, renounced all his German titles in 1917, during World War I, and furthermore anglicized his family name to "Mountbatten". He was then created the first Marquess of Milford Haven in the peerage of the United Kingdom. His daughter then came to be known as "Lady Louise Mountbatten". Louise was a sister of Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma, an aunt of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, and was also a niece of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna of Russia.
Because of her father's work, the family moved around between different British territories, such as Malta, but they often returned to the Heiligenberg Palace outside Darmstadt, which they considered their home, although they did identify themselves as British. Louise often visited queen Victoria of Great Britain of the Isle of Wight with her mother during her childhood[1]. The family is described as harmonious; the parents of Louise lived in a happy love relationship, not in an arranged marriage, and Louise was particularly close to her brother, with whom she corresponded until her death[1]. Louise and her sister was educated by governesses, except for a brief period in Texter's girl's school in Darmstadt.
In 1914, Louise and her mother visited Russia, and were invited to a trip down the Volga with their Imperial relatives. During her visit, Louise was to have noted the influence of Rasputin with worry[1]. The trip was interrupted by the sudden outbreak of World War I, and Louise's father telegraphed them and asked them to return immediately. Louise's mother gave her jewelry to the empress for safe keeping, and they left Russia by boat from Hapsal in Estonia and travelled to neutral Sweden, paying for the trip with gold, as their money was suddenly not acceptable currency in Russia[1]. The stayed in Sweden as guests of the Crown Prince couple at Drottningholm Palace just one night before they returned to Great Britain.
During World War I, Louise was first active within the Soldiers and Sailors Families Association and the Smokes for Soldiers and Sailors, but she soon enlisted in the Red Cross for service as a nurse[1]. She was active at a French military hospital in Nevers, and then at a war hospital at Palaves outside Montpellier, from March 1915 until July 1917[1]. She was commended for her hard work, and was awarded The British war- and Victory-medals, a medal from the British Red Cross, as well as the Médaille de la reconnaissance francaise[1]. After the war, she was active in social work for the children in the slums of Battersea in London.
In 1909, Louise received a proposal from King Manuel II of Portugal. Edward VII was in favour of the match, but Louise declined, as she wished to marry for love[1]. In 1913 he married Princess Augusta Victoria of Hohenzollern.
At the age of twenty, Louise was secretly engaged to her brother-in-law, Prince Christopher of Greece, but they were forced to give up their relationship for financial reasons[1]. While living in exile more than 10 years later, he wed the wealthy widow, Nancy Stewart Worthington Leeds, and after her death he married Princess Françoise of Orléans in 1929.
Louise fell in love with a man of whom her parents approved shortly before World War I broke out, but he was killed in the early days of the war.[2]
Later during the war, while she volunteered as a nurse in Nevers, she began a relationship with Alexander Stuart-Hill, a Scottish artist living in Paris. Anticipating that her parents would be disappointed in her choice, Louise kept their engagement a secret. Eventually, she confided in her parents, who were initially understanding, and invited Stuart-Hill for visits at Kent House twice.[2] In fact, her family, referring to him as "Shakespeare" because of his odd appearance, found him "eccentric" and "affected". Lacking resources, the couple agreed to postpone marriage until after the war. But in 1918 Louise's father explained to her that Stuart-Hill was homosexual, and that a marriage with him was impossible.[2]
As a young woman, Louise claimed that she would never marry a king or a widower. Yet, on 3 November 1923, at age 34, Louise married Crown Prince Gustaf Adolf (later King Gustaf VI Adolf) of Sweden who was the widower of her relative, Princess Margaret of Connaught,[3][4] at St. James's Palace. Louise's only child, a daughter, was stillborn on 30 May 1925.
The marriage between Louise and Gustav Adolf was by all accounts a love match and described as very happy[1]. She was also liked by her mother-in-law because of her friendly nature, although they seldom saw each other, as Queen Victoria spent most of her time in Italy. The fact that her mother-in-law, the queen, spent most of her time in Italy meant that Louise was assigned the handling of a lot of representation from the beginning, which was initially hard for her as she was at this point described as quite shy. After the queen's death in 1930, Louise also officially the first lady of the royal house and expected to perform all the duties of a queen, twenty years before she was formally made queen. This meant that she was to take over the protection of all the organisations and associations traditionally assigned to the queen. She was made the protector of the Swedish Red Cross, Kronprinsessan Lovisas Barnsjukhus, Eugeniahemmet, Drottningens centralkomitté, Arbetsflitens Befrämjande, Sophiahemmet and Svenska Hemslöjdsföreningarns Riksförbund[1]. Regarding this matter, she remarked: "It is hard for me to be the protector of different institutions, as I have been accustomed to practical work, as an ordinary person, before my marriage"[1]. As a former nurse, a fact she was proud to point out, she was interested in improving the working conditions for nurses.
In 1926-27, the Crown prince couple made an international trip around the world to benefit Swedish interests, which was described as a great success, especially the trip to the USA, during which they travelled over the nation from New York to San Francisco. The public interest was great, and the couple acquired a reputation for being "democratic", after having refused such things such as greeting the guests at a reception sitting on thrones, which they had been invited to do at the reception of an American millionaire[1]. During an interview in Salt Lake City, Louise stated that she believed in gender equality and that women are fully capable of being active within all profession and in the business world as well as within politics: "Women are completely intellectually equal to men and, provided they are given sufficient education, are just as capable to deserve respect and admiration as men in this field"[1]. In 1934-35, she made a similar trip with Gustav Adolf to Greece and around the Middle East and Africa, called the Orient Tour. In 1936, she attended the funeral of George V of Great Britain.
During World War II, Louise was active in aid work within the Red Cross. She collected candles and other non-electric light sources for the needy during the campaign "Vinterljus" (English: Winter Lights)[1]. Another contribution was Kronprinsessans Gåvokommitté för Neutralitetsvakten (English:"The Crown Princess Gift Association For the Neutral Defence Forces"), which provided the soldiers mobilised to guard the borders of neutral Sweden with gifts: normally socks, scarfs and caps knitted by contributors from all over the country[1]. As a citizen of a neutral country, Louise was also able to act as a messenger between people who needed to communicate with relatives and friends across warfaring borders[1]. She also provided supplies to many private citizens in this way, such as "two old ladies in Münich", the former German language teacher of her husband's previous wife, and the former princess Tatiana of Russia in Palestine. It is said many would have died, had it had not been for her help[1]. In 1940, for example, she sent supplies to the British major Michael Smiley at the Rifle Brigade, who was captured and placed in a prisoner of war camp, after his mother-in-law Alicia Pearson had asked for her help[1]. During the Finnish winter war, she set up a home for Finnish war children at Ulriksdal Palace[1].
In 1950, Louise became queen after the ascension to the throne by her spouse. Louise is described as a true democrat at heart, and was therefore somewhat disturbed by being celebrated merely in her capacity of a queen[1]. In reference to the celebrations, she remarked: "People look at me as if though I were something special. Surely I do not look differently today from how I looked yesterday!"[1]
Louise disliked the strict court protocol, and as soon as she was queen, she reformed the old protocol of her mother-in-law from 1911 and issued a new one in 1954, which abolished and democraticized many old customs at court. In 1962, she abolished the court presentations and replaced it with "democratic ladies' lunches", to which she invited professional career women, a custom which was to continue under princess Sibylla after her death[5]. She also renovated and redecorated the interior of the Royal Palace in Stockholm.
Louise was described as eccentric for a royal and temperamental; she could get very angry, but she also possessed a good heart, a great sense of humour and a sense of self irony and distance to herself and her role as a royal. She could show her sympathies openly, and this was taken as a sign of her honesty. It was said at court that: "I would describe the queen as gentleman. She would never avoid acknowledging her own mistakes"[1]. Louise is described as a great lover and patriot of her new home country Sweden, and was often shocked by Swedish anti-patriotic customs.[1] She was a supporter of the political system and democracy in the form it had developed in Sweden[1] and stated her opinion to her relatives that no other political system than the Swedish one had created such a happy development for any nation[1]. Queen Louise also admired Swedish nature and in particular the Swedish women, because of what she considered their natural dignity regardless of class,[1] and remarked that she had never seen a country with less vulgarity than Sweden.[1]
Queen Louise was quite an eccentric and had several Pomeranian dogs which she would hide about her person when visiting abroad which caused problems when travelling through customs (which she usually did under the pseudonym "Countess of Gripsholm" or "Mrs Olsson"). After having spent the summer vacation with her husband in Italy every year, she always left earlier than him to visit England before her return to Sweden. There is a story which says that Louise, after almost being hit by a bus in London (because she would often jay-walk), took to carrying a small card with the words, "I am the Queen of Sweden" printed on it, so that people would know who she was in case she was hit by a vehicle.[6] In London, she often stayed at Hyde Park Hotel, and she often crossed a very trafficked street there to shop, which is why she wrote this note[1].
In 1963, Louise accompanied her spouse at an official visit to France, were she made a great impression on president de Gaulle. At dinner, she said to him: "I must ask you to excuse my ugly French. My French is the one spoken in the trenches of 1914"[1]. De Gaulle was present at her memorial in the Swedish church in Paris, which was the first occasion for a French president the visit the Swedish church of Paris, as well as one of only two occasions de Gaulle visited a memorial service of this kind. Her last official assignment was the Nobel Prize dinner of 1964, during which no one noticed that she was in fact already ill.
Queen Louise died on 7 March 1965 at St. Göran Hospital, in Stockholm, following an emergency surgery after a period of severe illness. She had made her last public appearance at the Nobel Prize Ceremony in December 1964. She is buried alongside her husband in the Royal Cemetery in Solna north of Stockholm.
Queen Louise was the second of the four children of Prince Louis of Battenberg, by his wife Princess Victoria of Hesse and by Rhine, a granddaughter of Britain's Queen Victoria and an elder sister of Empress Alexandra Feodorovna of Russia. Both Queen Louise and her stepchildren were great-grandchildren of Queen Victoria.
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Louise Mountbatten
Cadet branch of the House of Hesse-Darmstadt
Born: 13 July 1889 Died: 7 March 1965 |
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| Swedish royalty | ||
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| Vacant
Title last held by
Victoria of Baden |
Queen consort of Sweden 1950–1965 |
Vacant
Title next held by
Silvia Sommerlath |
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