Sophia of Prussia

Queen Victoria's Grandaughter, Princess Sophie, was born in the Neues Palais in Potsdam, Prussia on 14th June 1870.

Her father, Crown Prince Frederick of Prussia, and her mother, Victoria, Princess Royal of the United Kingdom, were already the parents of a large family and as the penultimate child, Sophie was eleven years younger than her eldest brother, the future Emperor William II of Germany.

Her parents, Frederick and Victoria, were a close couple, both on sentimental and political levels.

They preferred to live away from life at the Berlin court.

Sophia received a liberal and Anglophile education, under the supervision of her mother, Victoria, Princess Royal.

Sophie was raised with a great love for England and all things associated with it as a result, and had frequent trips to visit her grandmother Queen Victoria, whom she loved.

Sophie often stayed in England for long periods, especially on the Isle of Wight, where she liked to collect shells with her older siblings.

In 1889, less than a year after the death of her father, she married her third cousin the Diadochos Constantine, Duke of Sparta and heir of the Greek throne.

On 27 October 1889, Sophie and Constantine married in Athens, Greece in two religious ceremonies, one public and Orthodox and another private and Protestant.

Sophia would go on to give birth to six children, and became involved in the assistance to the poor, following in the footsteps of her mother-in-law, Queen Olga.

Throughout her life in Greece, Sophia was actively involved in social work and helping the underprivileged.

She led various initiatives in the field of education, soup kitchens and development of hospitals and orphanages.

In 1896, the Crown Princess also founded the 'Union of Greek Women', a particularly active organization in the field of assistance to refugees from the Ottoman Empire.

During the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, the Greek faced great Wars.

She founded field hospitals, oversaw the training of Greek nurses and even helped heal wounded soldiers.

Sophia also facilitated the arrival of English nurses in Greece and even participated in the training of young women volunteers to provide assistance to wounded soldiers.

Sophia was hardly rewarded for her actions, even after her grandmother, Queen Victoria, decorated her with the Royal Red Cross after the Thirty Days' War, the Greeks criticized her links with Germany.

When her Grandmother, Queen Victoria, died on 22nd January 1901 in Osborne House, Sophia traveled to the United Kingdom for her funeral and then attended a religious ceremony in her honor in Athens, with the rest of the Greek royal family.

A few months later, in the summer of 1901, Sophie went to Friedrichshof to look after her mother, whose health continued to decline.

Five months pregnant, the Crown Princess knew that the Dowager Empress was dying and, with her sisters Viktoria and Margaret, she accompanied her until her last breath on 5th August.

In the space of seven months Sophia lost two of her closest relatives.

At the outbreak of World War I on 4 August 1914, Sophia was in Eastbourne with several of her children while her husband and their daughter Helen were the only representatives of the dynasty still present in Athens.

Given the gravity of the events, the Queen quickly returned to Greece, where she was soon joined by the rest of the royal family.

During World War I, the blood ties between Sophia and the German Emperor caused suspicion.

After imposing a blockade of Greece and supporting the rebel government of Eleftherios Venizelos, France and its allies deposed Constantine I in June 1917.

Sophia and her family then went into exile in Switzerland, while the second son of the royal couple replaced his father on the throne under the name of Alexander I.

After the outbreak of the Greco-Turkish War in 1919 and the untimely death of Alexander I the following year, the Venizelists abandoned power, allowing the royal family's return to Athens.

The defeat of the Greek army against the Turkish troops of Mustafa Kemal, however, forced Constantine I to abdicate in favor of his eldest son George II in 1922.

Sophia and her family then were forced to a new exile, and settled in Italy, where Constantine died one year later in 1923.

With the proclamation of the Republic in Athens, in 1924, Sophia spent her last years alongside her beloved family in Germany.

She also made frequent trips to the UK, under the permission of King George V.

Sophia fell ill in 1930, which forced her to go to a hospital in Frankfurt to follow treatment, which proved successful.

In December, she took full advantage of her regained strength and during 1931 she traveled to Great Britain, Bavaria and Venice.

In September, her condition deteriorated again and she had to return to Frankfurt, where she underwent surgery.

It was during this time that the doctors diagnosed advanced cancer and they gave the Dowager Queen a few weeks to life.

After the New Year celebrations of 1932, Sophia gradually stopped eating and her health declined rapidly.

She finally died surrounded by her children in the hospital, on 13 January 1932.

Sophia's body was transferred to the castle of Friedrichshof, where she rested a few days before being sent to the Russian Church in Florence.

She was buried alongside her husband and mother-in-law.

They stayed there for four years until the restoration of George II on the Greek throne in 1935.

After his restoration on the Greek throne, George II organized the repatriation of the remains of members of his family who died in exile.

Sophia's body was buried at the royal burial ground at Tatoi Palace, where she still rests today.

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Source~Wikipedia

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