Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld

Bernhard was born Bernhard Leopold Friedrich Eberhard Julius Kurt Karl Gottfried Peter, Count of Biesterfeld in Jena, Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach, German Empire on 29 June 1911, the elder son of Prince Bernhard of Lippe and his wife, Baroness Armgard von Sierstorpff-Cramm, member of one of the oldest Lower Saxon noble families, House of Cramm. He was a grandson of Ernest, Count of Lippe-Biesterfeld, who was regent of the Principality of Lippe until 1904, and was also a nephew of the principality's last sovereign, Leopold IV, Prince of Lippe.

Because his parents' marriage did not conform with the marriage laws of the House of Lippe, it was initially deemed morganatic, as Armgard did not belong by birth to any ruling or the former ruling families of Europe, Bernhard was granted only the title of Count of Biesterfeld at birth. He and his brother could succeed to the Lippian throne only if the entire reigning House became extinct. In 1916, his uncle Leopold IV as reigning Prince raised him and his mother to the rank of Prince and Princess of Lippe-Biesterfeld, thereby retroactively according his parents' marriage dynastic status. The suffix Biesterfeld revived the beginning of a new cadet line of the House of Lippe.

After World War I, Bernhard's family lost their German Principality and the revenue that had accompanied it, but the family was still reasonably well-off. Bernhard spent his early years at Reckenwalde palace (Wojnowo, Poland), the family's new estate in East Brandenburg, thirty kilometres east of the River Oder. He was taught privately and received his early education at home. When he was twelve, he was sent to board at the Gymnasium in Züllichau (Sulechów). Several years later he was sent to board at a Gymnasium in Berlin, from which he graduated in 1929.

Bernhard suffered from poor health as a boy. Doctors predicted that he would not live very long. This prediction might have inspired Bernhard's reckless driving and the risks that he took in the Second World War and thereafter. The prince wrecked several cars and planes in his lifetime.

Bernhard studied law at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland, in fall 1929 until the spring of 1930, then in Berlin, then in Munich the following year in the fall of 1931, and then again in Berlin. In Munich Bernhard enrolled himself on 24 October 1930. Van der Zijl also stresses the notoriety of the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München as extreme-right including sending away Albert Einstein as a lecturer in the twenties and the early ban of all Jewish societies. She characterizes of the city of Munich as the birthplace of the NSDAP.

Back in Berlin at the Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität in October 1931 after a serious illness, he could also indulge in his taste for fast cars, horse riding, and big-game hunting safaris. He was nearly killed in a boating accident and in an aeroplane crash. (He later suffered a broken neck and crushed ribs in a 160 km/h (100 mph) car crash after his marriage to princess Juliana in 1938). Bernhard was an active member of the Motor-SA and of the Deutsche Studentenschaft, where he inscribed himself on 27 April 1933.

While at university in Berlin for the year 1933, Bernhard joined the Nazi Party, exactly dated on his membership card as 1 May 1933. He also enrolled in the Sturmabteilung (SA), stating to his biographer Sefton Delmer that such a membership was necessary to register for exams – but Van der Zijl points out, that there were no official exams at this university until 1935.

Bernhard left Berlin in December 1934 when he graduated and went to work for IG Farben. The Prince later denied that he had belonged to SA, to the Reiter-SS (SS Cavalry Corps), and to the paramilitary National-sozialistisches Kraftfahrerkorps (NSKK), but these are well-documented memberships. According to journalist Philip Dröge, Bernhard was also a member of Nazi youth movement Sturm. While he was not a fierce champion of democracy, the Prince was never known to hold any radical political views or express any racist sentiments, although he admitted that he briefly had sympathised with Adolf Hitler's regime. van der Zijl clearly demonstrates, that Bernhard again and again fabulates on his memberships and other activities, to enhance his postwar stance that he never willingly would have joined any Nazi-organization. In October 2023, Bernhard's original NSDAP membership card was discovered in his old residence in Germany.

The Prince eventually went to work for the German chemical giant IG Farben in the early-to-mid 1930s, then the world's fourth-largest company. In 1932, it had already sponsored Hitler's election campaigns. (It survives today as BASF, AGFA, and Bayer). He joined the statistics department of IG Farben's N.W.7 wing, the company's main information gathering and management centre headquartered in Berlin and with offices worldwide (known as VOWI) that evolved into the economic intelligence arm of the Wehrmacht. He was lodged with Count Paul von Kotzebue (1884–1966), an exiled Russian nobleman of German descent, and his wife Allene Tew, who was born in the United States. After training, Bernhard became a secretary in 1935 to the board of directors at IG Farben's Paris office.

In 1994, the Prince had a colon tumour removed and suffered severe complications due to respiratory distress. In December, his daughter Queen Beatrix rushed to the hospital straight after landing from a trip to Africa. By Christmas the prospect of death had faded and by spring the next year he recovered enough to go home. His health problems continued in 1998 when he had a prostate swelling and in 1999 when he suffered difficulties breathing and talking. He did, however, attend the wedding of his grandson, straight after having prostate surgery. In 2000, his life was endangered again when he suffered neurological complications and continued breathing problems. Two days after intensive medical attention the Royal Press Office issued a statement the Prince was reading newspapers again.

Over the following years Bernhard continued to appear at the military parades on the national liberation day celebrating the defeat of Nazi Germany. Only when Juliana died in March 2004 did Bernhard become exceedingly fragile. Up to the last moment it remained uncertain if he could attend the royal funeral, which he eventually managed to attend. He said his final farewells to his war comrades on Liberation Day in May and in November that same year he was diagnosed with untreatable cancer.

Bernhard died of lung cancer at the age of 93 at University Medical Center Utrecht in Utrecht on 1 December 2004. Ten days later, he was interred with a state funeral at the Nieuwe Kerk, Delft. Bernhard's funeral was different from those of Prince Claus and Queen Juliana in that Bernhard's coffin was transported on the undercarriage of a cannon instead of in the traditional carriage used when the coffins of Prince Claus and Queen Juliana were transported to Delft. Together with the playing of many military marches and the forming of guards of honour by Second World War veterans this gave the funeral procession a military character as the late Prince, a Second World War veteran, had wished. As a final tribute to his former military role in the Royal Netherlands Air Force, three modern F-16 jet fighters and a World War II Spitfire plane performed a low flypast during the funeral in a classic missing man formation.

Marriage and children

Bernhard met then-Princess Juliana at the 1936 Winter Olympics at Garmisch-Partenkirchen. Juliana's mother, Queen Wilhelmina, had spent most of the 1930s looking for a suitable husband for Juliana. As a Protestant of royal rank (the House of Lippe was a sovereign house in the German Empire), Bernhard was deemed acceptable for the devoutly religious Wilhelmina. They were distantly related, seventh cousins, both descending from Lebrecht, Prince of Anhalt-Zeitz-Hoym. Wilhelmina left nothing to chance, and had her lawyers draft a very detailed prenuptial agreement that specified exactly what Bernhard could and could not do. The couple's engagement was announced on 8 September 1936, and they were married at The Hague on 7 January 1937. Earlier, Bernhard had been granted Dutch citizenship and changed the spelling of his names from German to Dutch. Previously styled as Serene Highness, he became a Royal Highness by Dutch law. His appropriateness as consort of the future Queen would later become a matter of considerable public debate.

Prince Bernhard fathered six children, four of them with Queen Juliana. The eldest daughter is Beatrix, (born 1938), who later became Queen of the Netherlands. His other daughters with Juliana are Irene (born 1939), Margriet (born 1943) and Christina (1947–2019).

He had two illegitimate daughters. The first is Alicia von Bielefeld (born in San Francisco on 21 June 1952), who became a landscape architect and lives in the United States. His sixth daughter, Alexia Grinda-Lejeune (born in Paris on 10 July 1967), is his child by Hélène Grinda, a French socialite and fashion model. Although rumours about these two children were already widespread, their status as his daughters was made official after his death. In December 2004, Dutch historian Cees Fasseur claimed that Jonathan Aitken, former British Conservative Cabinet Minister, is also a child of Prince Bernhard, the result of his wartime affair with Penelope Maffey.

BS militia

The Binnenlandse Strijdkrachten (BS, Domestic Armed Forces) militia, set up and under command of Prince Bernhard towards the end of World War II, gained a notorious reputation for unruly and out-of-control behavior including incidents of pillaging and plundering at the time the country was being liberated from Nazi occupation. Prince Bernhard was appointed commander of this militia in early September 1944 by Queen Wilhelmina, who had unified several Dutch resistance groups into the BS. However, under Bernhard's leadership, the militia proved difficult to control and was marred by controversy due to its disorderly conduct and failure to reign in misbehavior among its ranks.

One of the worst incidents occurred in the afternoon of 7 May 1945 on Dam square, Amsterdam. The BS militia was explicitly warned not to provoke and disarm German soldiers, as this was designated to be the responsibility of the approaching Canadian Allied forces. The armistice agreement on May 4, 1945, included the condition that only Allied units would directly carry out the disarming of German troops in the Netherlands. However, Prince Bernhard's BS militia on the ground disregarded their orders and arrested two German soldiers nearby Dam square. One German soldier refused to surrender his weapon, fired a shot, and was subsequently killed by the militia. This act provoked German soldiers, who were stationed inside the nearby Groote Club building, to open fire on the crowd celebrating the end of the war. They fired machine guns from windows, balconies, and the roof into the crowd, resulting in panic and a chaotic shootout lasting about two hours, with over three dozen bystanders killed.

Hofmans Affair

In the mid-1950s, Queen Juliana and Prince Bernhard's marriage faced significant strain because of the ongoing influence of Greet Hofmans, a faith healer and layer-on of hands. For nine years she acted as a confidante and adviser to Queen Juliana, often residing at Palace Soestdijk. Originally, Hofmans was introduced to Queen Juliana at the initiative of Prince Bernhard in 1948 to treat an eye illness of their youngest daughter, Princess Christina (then still called Marijke). This illness arose because Juliana was infected with rubella during pregnancy. Hofmans developed an influence on the Queen, encouraging pacifist ideas. In the period of the Cold War, this caused a crisis in the Royal Household.

While the Dutch press did not report widely on the issue, outside the Netherlands, a great deal was written about the Hofmans affair. On 13 June 1956, an article was published in the German magazine Der Spiegel, titled "Zwischen Königin und Rasputin" – "between the Queen and her Rasputin". It portrayed Hofmans in a less-than-flattering way. Later, Bernhard admitted that he had personally provided the information for the article. Observers said that, in doing so, he hoped to have Hofmans removed from the court. In the face of escalating tensions, the couple appointed a committee of "three wise men" (elder statesmen) to advise the royal couple. Hofmans was banished as were various allies and supporters who had grown to prominence within the Royal Household.

In 2008 the report of the "three wise men" was made public. Historian Cees Fasseur drew from it for his book, Juliana & Bernhard (2008); in addition, the Queen had granted him access to the private royal archive. He noted that Bernhard was reprimanded in 1956 for having leaked confidential information to the international press. Fasseur said that Bernhard resorted to bringing in the international press only after repeated, desperate and often dramatic pleading with his wife to distance herself from the Hofmans group. Fasseur wrote:

"Bernard was obviously a free spirited chap, who independently went about his business. But he was still very much a family man. I got the feeling he was the only one that was seeing things were getting completely out of hand and tried to salvage the situation as much as he could."