Kaiser of Germany
-part 3-
The American President, Woodrow Wilson, was imposing Germany a severe treaty of peace; among other things he was demanding for the abolition of the monarchy and in consecuence for the kaiser's abdication. Meanwhile the revolution began to spread through the German nation; the popilation claimed for the Kaiser's abdication too. It was said that Wilhelm should put himself at the head of the Army and suppress the revolt anywher it could sprang out. Hindemburg suggested him to visit the soldiers in the front and altough Prince Max's opposition the Kaiser left Berlin and went to the general quarter in Spa. For the population, tha fact that Wilhelm had left Berlin in order to join the Army was a clear sign that was not thinking in abdication, and the claims for his resignation. Prince Max's opinion was that Wilhelm's abdication must not be forced but volunteer, and it was inminent. He didn't want the mob to forced the Kaiser to abdicate. He must left the throne by himself and save his honour. General Wiulhelm Groener, who had replaced Ludendorff as First General Intendent, tought that the question of Wilhelm's abdication could not even been mentioned to the Army, but on November 5, facts demnostrated he was wrong; the German flote amotinated in Kiel and the next day the revolt had extended to several cities.
By November 8, Hindemburg and Groener had realised thatit was unuseful to do nothing against the revolt and the only solution was teh Kaiser's abdication. On Novemebr 9, they informed Wilhelm: "The Army must return home in peace, leaded by its chiefs and generals, but not under Your Majesty's command, because the Army does not support Your Majesty any more". Thirty nine generals and chiefs of regiment had been asked about the troops's attitude towards Wilhelm and only one was in favour, fifteen kept silence and twenty three were against. Wilhelm refused to accept the true; he said he would stay with his Army till the end. Hindenburg begged him to abdicate and to escape to Holland. Without the Kaiser's authorization, Prince Max gave publicly the news of Wilhelm's abdication in Berlin. He wanted to save the monarchy's honour. On November 10, Wilhelm crossed the Hollandese border. The next day, he wrote to his wife, who had stayed in Postdam: "My reign has ended, my miserable life has ended and I have been rewarded only with treason and ingratitude". Dona had decided to remained in her Husband's house, altough she had been advised to leave. Some days later, her son Eitel Friderich, took he r to his house, Ville Ingenheim. On November 27, Dona joined Wilhelm inh Amerogen, Holland.
The Allies demanded the Hollandese government to deliver Wilhelm, who was considered a war criminal. He would be judge by a special comission conformed by five judges representing the countries involved: United States, England, france Italy and Japan. In December 1918, the government of the Netherlands established that as a neutral country, they would not deliver Wilhelm. The only think they asked him was to abstain from any political intervention during his residence in Holland. WEilhelm agreed and he stayed i Amerogen for 18 months. At the beggining of 1920, he bought a house in Doorn, 8 kilometers away from Amerogen. Before leaving Amerogen, he gave the town a small hospital, financed with his own money. He also wrote two books that resumed the European history between 1878 and 1914.
Wilhelm and Dona moved to Doorn on May 15, 1920. On July 15, their youngest son, Prince Joachim, who was separated form his wife, Marie Auguste of Anhalt, commites suicide. Joachim, unable to accept his new status after his father's abdication, adn suffering from fitsd of depression, he shot himself being at a cottage near Postdam. Both parents were greatly affected by his tragic death; in fact, Dona never recovered; her health worsened and she finally died on the morning of April 11, 1921, less than a year after her son. Wilhelm was devasted; he had lost his country, his crown and now his wife, his faithful companion, had gone. Before her death, Dona had express her wish of being interred in Germany. The German government agreed but Wilhelm was not allowed to go into German territory. Dona's death left a great emptiness in Wilhelm's life. "I miss her too much", he wrote, "Nothing can replace her... I sometimes sit by her bedside and I talk to her spirit..."
In 1922, he recieved a congratulations letter for his 63th birthday from a young boy, son of the Prince of Schoenaich Carolath, who had died in action during the war. Wilhelm invited the boy and his mother, Princess Hermine, to visit him in Doorn. Hermine was the daughter of Prince Henry XXII of Reuss; she was 34 years old and was the widowed mother of five children. She arrived at Doorn on June 9, 1922. Wilhelm was deligthed with her companyand she seemed to him a very attractive woman. He decided to marry her and altough the opposition of his children and of some of his monarchist supporters, Wilhelm married Hermine on November 5, 1922. Wilhelm had always blamed Max of baden for his abdication, and he had blamed Hindemburg for his exile, to which he had acceded only to avoid a civil war in his country, and he was in disagrrement with the way the Marshall had recognized the German republic. When Hermine visited hindenmburg at Hanover in 1924, the visit was taken as a sign of reconciliation between the Marshall and the Kaiser. When Hindenburg was elected president of the German republic, Wilhelm kept silence.
The Kaiser's surviving children were all married, and some of them even divorced. Crown Prince Wilhelm had married Princess Cecilie of Mecklenburg Schwerin; he ruined his marriage because of his constant infidelities, and since the early 20's, he and Cecilie lived separate lifes. He followed his father into exile and avoided to be involved in any military question. Eithel Friedrich had married Princess Sophie of Oldenburg; they were divorced in 1920 because of Eithel Friedrich's homosexuality. Adalbert married princess Adelheid of Saxe Meiningen; he followed a military career and after the war, he and his wife lived quietly in Switzerland, using the titles of Count and Countess von Lingen. August Wilhelm embraced Nazism in March 1930, declaring that Adolf Hitler was "God's gift to Germany". Married to his cousin Alexandra of Scleswig Holstein, he as well as his brother, the Crown Prince and his stepmother, Empress Hermine, was convinced that Hitler would restore the Hohenzollerns in the throne. Even Wilhelm had some hopes of a possible restoration. When Hindenburg died on August 1st. 1932, and Hitler assumed the power and received the swering of the Army, Wilhelm relised that he would spent the rest of his life in exile. When August Wilhelm relaised the racial policy that Hitler was following, he was dissapointed. Years later he would be expelled from the SS, stripped of his uniform and placed under arrest. After the War in 1948, he had to face a denazification court and was sentenced to two and a half years of imprissonment, dying a year later.
Wilhelm's fifth son, Prince Oscar, married morganatically to Countess Ina von Bassewitz. At the outbreak of Worl War II, he served as leiutenant at the 51 infantry regiment; he was killed in Poland while on active in September 1939. Wilhelm's daughter Viktoria Luise was married to Ernest August of Brunswick.
In May 1940, Doorn was invaded by German troops. Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands offered Wilhelm to move to a safier place, but he kindly rejected her offering. Besides the daeth of Prince Oscar, Wilhelm had to face the death of his grandson Wilhelm, the Crown Prince's eldest son, who was severely wounded while on service in the north of France and died some days later. He had also been worried about his favourite granddaughter Frederika (Viktoria Luise's daughter). who was married to the Crown Prince of Greece, who had to escape form their country at the German advance.
Altough he deplored the war, in June 1940, when the German troops took Paris, Wilhelm couldn't avoid to rejoice. He even sent Hitler a congratulations telegram. During May 1941, Wilhelms health began to decline; his haert was not in good condition and he was suffering pneumonia. By early June, it was obvious that his mind was not in the present; he died on June 4, 1941. Nine years before, he had expressed that if if he returned to Germany he should be interred in Postdam but if he died in exile he should be interred in Doorn. Altough Hitler wanted the Kaiser's body to be taken to Germany, Wilhelm's will was at last respected and he was interreed in Doorn, on a sunny day, at he osund of Beethoven's Yorck March. Empress Hermine survived her husband six years; she was captured by the Russians at the end of the war and impressoned in a camp for displaced persons where she died in 1942.
Viktoria Luise of Prussia: The Kaiser's Daughter
Palmer, Alan: El Kaiser
Ludwig, Emil: El Kaiser Guillermo II
Massie, Robert K.: Dreadnought
