by Susan Flantzer © Unofficial Royalty 2015
Prince Adolf of Schaumburg-Lippe was the first husband of Princess Viktoria of Prussia (Moretta), a granddaughter of Queen Victoria. He was born on July 20, 1859, at Schloss Bückeburg in Bückeburg, then the capital of the Principality of Schaumburg-Lippe, now in Lower Saxony, Germany. Adolf was the seventh child of the eight children of Adolf I, Prince of Schaumburg-Lippe and Princess Hermine of Waldeck and Pyrmont.
Prince Adolf had seven siblings:
- Princess Hermine of Schaumburg-Lippe (1845–1930); married Duke Maximilian of Württemberg
- Prince Georg of Schaumburg-Lippe (1846–1911); succeeded his father as Prince of Schaumburg-Lippe; married Princess Marie Anne of Saxe-Altenburg
- Prince Hermann of Schaumburg-Lippe (1848–1928)
- Princess Emma of Schaumburg-Lippe (1850–1855)
- Princess Ida of Schaumburg-Lippe (1852–1891); married Heinrich XXII, Prince Reuss of Greiz, their daughter Hermine was the second wife of Wilhelm II, German Emperor
- Prince Otto Heinrich of Schaumburg-Lippe (1854–1935); married Anna von Koppen
- Princess Emma of Schaumburg-Lippe (1865–1868)
In 1890, Prince Adolf met Princess Viktoria of Prussia, daughter of Friedrich III, German Emperor and Victoria, Princess Royal, during a visit to Princess Marie of Wied, the mother of Queen Elisabeth of Romania. On November 19, 1890, he married Viktoria, known as Moretta, in Berlin. After an extended honeymoon in Egypt and Greece, the couple took up residence in the Palais Schaumburg in Bonn. Moretta had a miscarriage early in the marriage and the couple remained childless.
Following the death of Woldemar, Prince of Lippe in 1895, Prince Adolf became the Regent for Woldemar’s successor and brother Alexander, Prince of Lippe who was mentally incapacitated. Adolf served as Regent until 1897 when Count Ernst of Lippe-Biesterfeld replaced him. Prince Adolf served in the Prussian Army and during World War I, he was the Deputy Commanding General of the 8th Corps in Bonn.
Prince Adolf died on July 9, 1916, in Bonn, Kingdom of Prussia, now in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, and was buried in the family mausoleum (link in German) in the Bückeburg Palace Park in Bückeburg, Principality of Schaumburg-Lippe, now in Lower Saxony, Germany.
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