Queen Marie (original) (raw)

Marie Alexandra Victoria – princess of Great Britain and Ireland was born on 29th October 1875 in the county of Kent. She was the daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh and Saxe-Coburg - Alfred and Maria Alexandrovna. Her father was the son of the British Queen Victoria and her mother was the daughter of the Russian Emperor Alexander II. Missie, as they all called her, had three sisters and one brother. Her father, Alfred was in service with the Royal Navy and when Missie was 11 her father was sent to the Mediterranean and the whole family moved to Malta. During the time she spent in Malta Missie fell in love with her cousin George, the future King of the United Kingdom, but her mother had already chosen a suitable match – Prince Ferdinand Hohenzollern, a nephew of Kaiser Wilhelm II and an heir to the Romanian Throne. After the death of the only son of Carol I, Prince Ferdinand was recognized as the heir-presumptive to the Romanian throne.

On 15.10.1893 Marie gave birth to her first-born son and heir to the throne Carol. After that there was Elizabeth, Maria, Nicholas, Ileana. Her last-born child Mircea, born in 1913, died early in his life at the age of three.

Because of deteriorating relationship between mother and son, Crown Prince Carol, in the 30ies of last century Queen Marie was forced to spend more time in her summer residence in Balchik. In the summer of 1937 she fell seriously ill, had treatment in Italy and Germany but after a year of hard struggle with the serious illness the queen died on 18.07.1938 in her Palace in Bran.
The territory of the former residence of Romanian Queen Marie has the status of Cultural Heritage Site.

In 1987 the complex was declared a Heritage Site under the name of Architectural-Park Complex “The Palace”. In 2002 the Architectural-Park Complex “The Palace” was declared a Group Architectural Monument of Culture as well as a Monument of Park and Landscape Architecture within the category National Monuments of Culture. In 2009 when the Law of Cultural Heritage came in force the Architectural-Park Complex got the status of Group Immovable Cultural Heritage Site.