This has been a dreadful week in royal losses!
I first met Duke Friedrich many years ago while attending a royal wedding. later, I met him several other times at various royal events (funerals, exhibitions, birthdays, weddings). He was always extremely kind and approachable. Friedrich had a good sense of humor and did not take himself too seriously. His boisterous laugh was quite refreshing. I am very saddened by his untimely death and only hope that he did not suffer…
The First of Isenburg and his wife were very kind to me in 2004 when they sent me an invitation to the wedding of their daughter Katharina to Archduke Martin of Austria. I traveled to Isenburg, a quaint small town hidden in the mountains near Frankfurt. While covering the wedding for Eurohistory, the Fürstin of Isenburg sent me a message with her youngest son Prince Viktor asking that I join the private festivities after the church wedding. I was thrilled. It was a lovely wedding and I was able to spend quite a long time taking photos of the many Gotha guests who were in attendance that day. Fürst Franz Alexander thought it amazing that an American magazine was interested in covering a German aristocratic wedding. He was also amazed that I had traveled all the way to Isenburg from San francisco..”come Mr. Beéche, you have earned a beer, or more than one,” he told me. Memories…
