KIDNAPPED A PRINCE

Waikato Times, Volume 94, Issue 14771, 10 October 1921, Page 5

KIDNAPPED A PRINCE

GRAND DUKE’S CRIME TO SECURE COUSIN’S BIRTHRIGHT. MILLIONS INVOLVED, (Australian and N.Z. Gable Assn.) Received October 9, 3.5 p.m. LONDON, October S. The Daily Express’ Berlin correspondenl lolls a dramatic story of a Grand Duke kidnapping and incarcerating his cousin in a lunatic asylum in order to force his cousin to renounce his princely rights.

It was revealed in the court at G 1 ate (Silesia), where the Grand 'Duke Wilhelm Ernst was charged by the former Prince Hermann of SaxeWcimar with compelling him to relinquish the title and claim to a fortune of between £4,000,000 and £5,000,000. When the Prince was a youth he was in a crack German cuirassier regiment. He contracted big gambling debts and fled to London, where h« married an Italian singer, whom he divorced. The Prince then went to Paris, where he lived in wild 'dissipation. The Grand Duke intervened, and told Prince Hermann’s mother that the youth would bo expelled from Paris unless she brought him to Germany. The mother, frightened, brought her son to Mannheim, where he was handed over to a tulor, who drove him to the asylum of Hohcnmark. There he was placed behind iron bars and kept like a wild beast until he yielded to the Grand Duke’s demand. After he had seized his cousin’s birthright the Grand Duke paid his cousin £IOOO a year.

Prince Hermann changed his name to Count Ostheim, and lived at Swended, breeding horses. He is now suing for the return of the estate.