POST 65: GERMANY’S LAST EMPEROR, WILHELM II, PICTURED WITH UNKNOWN FAMILY MEMBER

Note: In this post, I discuss a postcard given to me showing the last German Emperor, Wilhelm II, taken in Doorn in the Netherlands in May 1926, following Wilhelm’s abdication from the throne after Germany’s defeat in WWI, with an unknown member of my extended family standing amidst the Royal family.

Related Posts:
Post 8: Dr. Otto Bruck & Tiegenhof: National Socialist Parades
Post 15: Berlin & My Great-Aunts Franziska & Elsbeth Bruck
Post 17: Surviving In Berlin In The Time Of Hitler: My Uncle Fedor’s Story
Post 31: Witness To History, “Proof” Of Hitler’s Death In My Uncle Fedor’s Own Words

Among my father Dr. Otto Bruck’s surviving collection of pre-WWII photos are several unique ones of historic interest. These include a small number replicated in Post 8 showing Field Marshall Hermann Wilhelm Göring, one of the most powerful figures in the Nazi Party, taken in 1935 in Tiegenhof, Free State of Danzig [today: Nowy Dwór Gdański, Poland]; at the time, Göring was participating in a campaign event in support of the slate of Nazi candidates running for office there, and an election parade passed just below the office building in which my father had his dental practice.

An equally fascinating photo, illustrated in Post 17, shows a young Käthe Heusermann, who at the time was working as a dental assistant for my uncle, Dr. Fedor Bruck, in Liegnitz, Germany [today: Legnica, Poland]. In 1933, after my uncle was forced by the Nazi overlords to shutter his dental practice, Käthe relocated to Berlin and was hired by Hitler’s dentist, Dr. Hugo Blaschke, as his dental assistant. Following the end of the war, Käthe Heusermann, was instrumental in helping the Russians identify Hitler’s dental remains, although, as discussed in Post 31, it would be many years before this fact was publicly acknowledged by the Russians. Because Käthe had always attended Hitler’s dental treatments, she was well-positioned to recognize Blaschke’s distinct and outdated periodontal work.

And, apropos of this post with a photo of the last German Emperor Wilhelm II, in Post 15 one of my father’s surviving photos illustrates the Kaiser’s daughter-in-law, the last Crown Princess of Germany and Prussia, Princess Cecilie. (Figures 1-2) She is touring my renowned great-aunt Franziska Bruck’s flower school and shop in Berlin. Duchess Cecilie of Mecklenburg-Schwerin (Cecilie Auguste Marie; 20 September 1886 – 6 May 1954) was the last German Crown Princess and Crown Princess of Prussia as the wife of German Crown Prince Wilhelm, the son of German Emperor Wilhelm II.

 

The current post is about an intriguing, captioned family photo that was given to me by one of my third cousins (Figures 3a-b), Andreas “Andi” Pauly, whom regular readers will recognize from earlier posts. The photo was part of a collection of family pictures I obtained, so I only came to realize its significance after I had the message translated. (Figure 4) The photo was turned into a postcard, and obviously mailed in a stamped envelope because the postcard has no stamp and address on the flip side, but unfortunately the envelope has not survived so the sender is unknown.

 

 

 

 

 

I didn’t comprehend who the people in the photo were until I did an Internet query on “Doorn.” I discovered this is in the Netherlands and is where Germany’s former Emperor, Wilhelm II, went into exile after he abdicated the throne following Germany’s defeat in WWI. I had no reason to recognize Wilhelm II but mention of Royalty led me to ask one of my German cousins who is a historian whether he recognized anyone in the photo, and he confirmed it was Germany’s last Kaiser. My cousin was quite excited by this discovery because it reinforced his belief in our family’s connection to the upper echelons of Prussian society.

 

 

 

The message on the card pinpoints only a young princess, “Carolath,” and the postcard-sender’s wife standing behind her without a hat, with no name given. (Figure 5) Comparing the postcard to known photos of the Royal family, we can identify in the front row, the German Emperor’s second wife, Princess Hermine Reuss of Greiz (1887-1947); her youngest daughter by her first marriage, Princess Henriette of Schönaich-Carolath (1918-1972); and the former German Emperor, Wilhelm II. The writer tells us among the rest of the entourage are some of Princess Hermine’s older daughters, as well as some of the Emperor’s former generals. I’ve not positively been able to identify by name any of Princess Hermine’s other children, nor any of the Kaiser’s generals, although I was able to find a picture on the Internet with only Princess Hermine, Wilhelm II, and Princess Henriette (Carolath) taken at Doorn at about the same time. (Figure 6)

 

What I’ve also been able to learn is that after Princess Henriette’s father died in 1920, her mother, Princess Hermine, remarried in 1922 the former German Emperor, Wilhelm II. Hermine had five young children, but it was decided that only the youngest, Princess Henriette, would come with her mother to live at Doorn. Wilhelm II generally kept out of his stepchildren’s affairs apart from Henriette. He had a genuine affection for her, and when she got engaged to the Emperor’s own grandson, Prince Karl Franz of Prussia, on the 6th of August 1940 at Doorn, Wilhelm II made the official announcement.

The message on the postcard provides clues as to who mailed it and to whom it was mailed and was an obvious starting point for trying to unravel the sender and receiver of the card. Faintly visible at the bottom is the date the postcard was written, the 28th of May 1926. My intimate familiarity with my extended family tree and the fact the photo was given to me by a member of the Pauly family clearly led both Andi and me to conclude the card had been sent to my great-great-aunt, Rosalie “Salchen” Pauly née Mockrauer (1844-1927). (Figures 7-8) Rosalie Pauly was the only one of her Pauly generation still alive in 1926, although she would die the following year.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Having rather quickly satisfied myself as to the receiver of the postcard, I then tackled the much more challenging task of trying to resolve who sent the card to Rosalie Pauly. Readers will immediately notice the sender only signed his initials, “W.B.,” who, at first, I thought might be a member of my Bruck family; I quickly discarded this theory because the writer tells us that on the 28th of May 1926 his wife is due to give birth in about eight days, thus in early June 1926, and I know of no Bruck offspring related to Rosalie Pauly born in that timeframe.

We know the postcard-writer was male because, as previously mentioned, he identifies his wife in the picture standing behind Wilhelm II’s stepdaughter, Carolath, as he refers to her. It’s not clear whether “Carolath” was a diminutive intended as an affectionate nickname to be used only by close family and friends, or how she was known publicly. It seems odd that a member of my extended family would be photographed amidst the former Royal family in a seemingly intimate setting if they were not readily acquainted in some way. More on this later.

The writer of the postcard tells my great-great-aunt Rosalie that the visit of her grandson reminded him to send her the photograph of the Royal couple; Walter Rothholz senior (1893-1978) (Figure 9), mentioned by name a few lines further down, was Rosalie’s eldest grandson and would have been 33 years of age at the time the card was written.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have a theory as to the sender of the postcard, so far unprovable but conceivable. Walter Rothholz senior was married to a Norwegian woman, Else Marie “Elsemai” Bølling (1915-1976). (Figure 10) Initially, I considered the possibility that one of Else Marie’s brothers had a prename beginning with the initial “W.” I located a Bølling family tree on Geni.com naming Else Marie’s siblings but none begin with this letter. However, I discovered on this family tree that Else Marie’s father had a brother born in Kristiania (Oslo, Norway) named Wilhelm Henning Bølling (1891-1930), that’s to say her uncle, who would have been the right age to have a young family in 1926; he would have been only two years older than Walter Rothholz. If Wilhelm Bølling was the writer of the postcard, his wife is the one pictured. Her prename was “Ingrid,” although no surname is provided. While the Bølling family tree includes multiple photos of family members, including one of Wilhelm Bølling (Figure 11), none of Ingrid are included making it impossible to compare against the woman on the postcard.

 

According to the Bølling family trees on Geni, Wilhelm and Ingrid had a daughter named Wivi Aase Bølling, but no vital data is provided nor is any photo included.

 

Wilhelm Bølling is known to Walter Rothholz’s living son, also named Walter; Wilhelm was a very wealthy shipowner who transported coal. According to Walter, he committed suicide. (Figure 12) Given Wilhelm’s connection to the coal trade and its importance to Germany at the time, it’s imaginable he may have been a business associate of and socialized with the German Emperor during and after his rule. Pending the discovery of a photo of Wilhelm Bølling’s wife or a date for the birth of his daughter Wivi Aase, the question of which family member stands amidst Germany’s last Royal family remains a mystery.