In the decades
after the American Civil War, newspapers and illustrated journals published
fulsome articles about the growing number of American heiress marrying European
nobility. Multi-columned reports
detailed the ancestries of the happy couple, the wedding finery, the
magnificent receptions, the splendid trousseaux, and sometimes even the marriage
contracts. Dowries are nothing
new, and titled fortune-hunters existed long before Regency novels. Many an impoverished family was rescued
by the quick infusion of American dollars, and the young ladies received titles
with which to dazzle the rest of Ward McAllister’s ‘400’.
Duchess, comtesse,
princesse, baroness, lady this-and-that… well, why not Queen? This article from London, published in
our local weekly newspaper in 1896, advertised for an heiress for the young
king of Serbia, Alexander I. Of
course, it is full of the British pawky sense of humor - who had certainly seen their noble houses succumb to an American invasion - but who knows? Would Alexander have been averse
to American millions?
WANTED – AN
HEIRESS
Empty Throne
Waiting for a Rich American Girl
"LONDON, ENGLAND,
April 17 – The boy king, Alexander of Servia, needs ready money very badly, and
he has decided that an American heiress will solve all the troubles of his
bankrupt kingdom. A throne is,
therefore, awaiting any American girl who has sufficient wealth to meet the
requirements. This is probably the
first time in American history that such an opportunity has been offered.
Along with the
distinguished title of queen goes a palace, a crown, a collection of royal
jewelry of stupendous antiquity and a number of castles scattered throughout
Servia. Servia is one of the
kingdoms that sprung up out of the ruins of the Roman empire. The people are Slavonic, with some
slight traces of the Roman influence.
For centuries it was strong and independent, and then the great power of
the Turkish empire forcing its way into eastern-Europe overwhelmed it. From the
fourteenth century, it was a Turkish province and only at the end of the last
century did it begin to assert its independence.
The king has
great personal powers, is Commander in Chief of the Serivan army, and supervises
acts of the national Legislature.
His queen would share to a great extant in many of his powers. She would be mistress of a large palace
in the capital, Belgrade, of the castle of Topschider, and a splendid park near
the capital, and of many other residences. She would have a great suite of ladies of the bedchamber,
courtiers and chamberlains at her disposal, for although Servia is poor, there
is no lack of officials with high-sounding titles.
She would
receive at her court the homage of noblemen who held their feudal estates before
William the Conqueror invaded England, even before the eastern empire had gone
to ruin and the philosophers of Greece had ceased to teach.
The terms of the
marriage contract are to include an unconditional transference to the king of a
large sum of money – at least ten millions. Servia is a very poor country, and that would go far
toward maintaining its monarch in good style and enabling him to open his
Legislature, the Skuptochina, in a handsome suit of clothes."
Heiresses! This could be you!
Apply Royal Palace, Belgrade
Ten million dollar donation requested
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Alexander was born August
14, 1876, the son of King Milan Obrenovic and his wife, Queen Natalja. King Milan abdicated in 1889 when
Alexander was 13, leaving his son to rule under a regency. In 1893, the teenage king decided that
he was old enough to rule on his own and got rid of the regency in a bloodless
coup. At the time when the above
article was published, he was nearing his twentieth year.
While on a visit to his
mother in 1896, he met and fell in love with one of her ladies-in-waiting,
Madame Draga Mashin, a widow some twelve years his senior. He seems to have had a penchant for
older women, as he was said to have fallen in love with a 33-year old countess
when he was fifteen and insisted on marrying her. Wiser counsels prevailed then, but in 1900, by sending his
father, the ex-king, out of the country to negotiate a marriage with a German
princess, he managed to marry Draga before anyone could stop him. This was not a popular move.
The couple was childless,
and rumors abounded that one of Queen Draga’s brothers would be named heir to
the throne. Whatever the truth of
that, it was used as a springboard for another palace coup, and on the morning of 11 June 1903, King
Alexander I & Queen Draga were barbarously assassinated.
He might have
done better with an American heiress.
Photo: King Alexander I and Queen Draga. Swiped from Wikipedia.
