DISHWASHER TO BARON

Greymouth Evening Star, 2 July 1936, Page 3

DISHWASHER TO BARON

ZOUBKOFF’S FOLLY “A beggar on horseback. A Juncj and December marriage.” These and, similar phrases became very familiarj to Alexander Zoubkoff, the dishwasher who married the Princess Victoria Schaumberg-Lippe. daughter of thej Emperor Frederick 111. sister of the’ ex-Kaiscr, writes Francis Maitland in a London journal. j At the time 1 of the marriage Zoub-; koff was 27, and the princess 58. Al-! though the Royal lady did all she, could to “make him a gentleman” andj to introduce him under proper aus-. pices into the best social circles, the, marriage was a failure from the beginning. | It was entirely the young man’s: fault. Whatever one may say. on think, about a woman marrying a man] thirty years her junior, there is no: doubt that the Princess did make great efforts to ensure the success of the match. But Zoubkoff of humble origin—he had been a porter, a cleaner of roads, and a sculleryman—set out to rob the poor woman of all her wealth. It is said the princess married him for two reasons. First, she was lonely, and because of her age could not marry a man of her own standing. Secondly, she.pitied (and pity is akin to • love) this handsome young man with his plausible stories of how illused he had been in his native Rus- ' sia. i I once met the princess and the barI on, as she had him created, at Deauville, and my heart went out to the frail old lady. For on every hand one heard comments and it was so plain to see that she was making an effort to stand by a bad bargain. j He treated her so ill that in 1929, ’ two years after the tragic marriage

in her palace at Bonn, she offered him f £lO,OOO if he would consent to a dl-|i vorce. He had told her he was a RuS-Vlj sian aristocrat, but his conduct aloj.e.,]] belied this. ' th The princess was generous, and thje ,j baron enjoyed a life of luxuryr-jwhile Tier money lasted. The ex-Kaiser anil .Ii ■all the Hohenzollern family reined to'd 'receive him. but many people oC§tand-,.|’ ing did. He traded on this—anti pa 'eventually.’drove the princess to hank-.( 1 ruptcy. 11 i How far he managed to get a gri.P| on her money is proved by the fact.' { . I that, even after her death in 1929, he ” i still had £15,000 to squander. He did 'the rounds of the fashionable G.cj’pmn spas, and even tried to inake asnifir- t. 1 riage with a girl of good iamily. : the parents would not hear of it. 1 Gradually Society began to appraise - i him at his proper worth. In Vienna,, ■whither he went in style with a valet jand an imposing pile of baggage he I was refused admission to the State ! Opera House, where he had “ordered H la box. His money gone, he descended !to the disgraceful trade of selling post-H card pictures of his dead wife d,ii . tliep. , streets, an insult on the memory of at. woman who had been unfailingly kiud < , to him. ? ■ '•'•r'Xt- - ( IN A CIRCUS. ' ; People pointed him out in the sti’eesSj|l . But he could still get a cheap meaW i and a drink from such snobs as were 1 glad to know a baron who had mar-f - ried a princess. Then even these de-/ - serted him, and he had either to starve */ or work. He started a circus, but • one would support him. His reputa; • - tion was too well known. ': ' Jf. j Always, long after the 2 death, he tried to trade on his i tion with the Hohenzollerns;’rHe’ apt proached every member of the great : family he could trace. And;-his ijn- i , portunities became so flagrant' that 1 e several of the family gave orders (to-<

? footmen to throw him out at sight.| He got a job as a waiter in Luxembourg, a city which ,had seen him in) his hey-day,' the perfect “beggar on| horseback." But now he was an ob-| ject of scorn. • ■ - ( Also, the' police, nqw, ,l)ad a line on I him. They knew all about, him; they iiad smashed to pieces his “aristo?'l hey * rega rd cd hi m iis a social pest. He was expelled from Germany. Italy refused to harbour him. So did France and Belgium. At last he came down to where he started—a wdsher of dishes in a sec-ond-rate restaurant. And still he spoke of. his connection with the Hohenzplle.rns; stlinW4lfed.td.“put himself across” as Baroif 'Alexander von Zoubkoff. He died in poverty, the personification of human folly. Only a clergyman and a restaurant waitress were present at.his end, and he was buried in a .pauper’s grave. It is difficult to understand how any man could have been so short-sighted as to refuse; deliberately, such an opportunity for».a > t life ofyluxuribus comfort. - - 't < ■ J . • ;Had he pla.Ved’ the k^fe' by the prinhad he behaved like a gentleman, hd, would have lived a’life of gracious ease among the rich and famous —perhaps even the proud. Hohenzollerns would finally have "received him. 1 For the princess, who tried so hard ,to give/him-every chance even when charm aftd authijrityfildchayc him ac■cepted; jn every cdjtintT'y of ; the world his position as : lwr; husband. >•'* i ’ l ' , ’ )But iio, he could hot rise above the ,dishcloth. So his passing went unhonoured and unsung. Alexander Zoubkoff 1 , once wedded to royalty, to riches, 'the obscure washer of dishes upon whom a title had been conferred bv one of the greatest ladies of Europe, died in disgrace’.