Prince Georg of Bavaria

Prince Georg of Bavaria (German: Georg Franz Joseph Luitpold Maria Prinz von Bayern) (April 2, 1880 – May 31, 1943) was a member of the Bavarian Royal House of Wittelsbach and a Catholic priest.

Georg was born in Munich, Bavaria, the elder son of Prince Leopold of Bavaria and his wife Archduchess Gisela of Austria. The New York Times described him as the favourite grandson of both the Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria and the Prince Regent Luitpold of Bavaria.

Georg entered the Bavarian army as a Second Lieutenant (German: Leutnant) a day before his 17th birthday on April 1, 1897; he was assigned to Infanterie-Leib-Regiment. On February 8, 1903, he was promoted to the rank of First Lieutenant (German: Oberleutnant) and then reassigned to the 1st Royal Bavarian Heavy Cavalry “Prince Charles of Bavaria”. Two years later, on October 27, 1905 he was promoted to Rittmeister and on October 26, 1906 to Major. From August 17, 1908, he was also a Rittmeister and later Major in the 11th "Moravia" Austro-Hungarian Dragoons. While in the army, he became a champion boxer.

In December 1911 Georg became engaged to Archduchess Isabella of Austria (b. November 17, 1888 in Pressburg), daughter of Archduke Friedrich, Duke of Teschen, and his wife, Princess Isabella of Croy. The wedding took place on February 10, 1912, in the Mariä Vermählung (Marriage of the Virgin Mary) Chapel in the Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna, officiated by Cardinal Franz Nagl.

The couple honeymooned in Wales, Paris and Algiers, but separated before the end of the honeymoon. There were several unsuccessful attempts at reconciliation. On January 17, 1913, the union was dissolved by the Royal Bavarian Supreme Court; on March 5, 1913, the union was annulled by the Holy See on the grounds of non-consummation.

Isabella became a nurse in the Austrian army during World War I. During the war, she fell in love with the surgeon Paul Albrecht (1873–1928) and was briefly engaged to him until Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria forbade the marriage. She never married again, and died in La Tour-de-Peilz, Switzerland on December 6, 1973.

During World War I, Georg fought both on the Western Front (including the First Battle of Arras and the First Battle of Ypres) and on the Eastern Front. He started the war as commander of the Bavarian mechanized troops and eventually served under General Erich von Falkenhayn in Palestine. He was awarded both the I and II Class of the Iron Cross and on December 14, 1917 reached the rank of Colonel (German: Oberst).

In 1919 Georg resigned his military career and began studying theology in Innsbruck, Austria. He was ordained a Catholic priest on March 19, 1921, and shortly afterwards received a doctorate in canon law from the Catholic Faculty of Theology at the University of Innsbruck. He continued his religious studies in Rome and in 1925 graduated from the Pontifical Ecclesiastical Academy.

On November 18, 1926, Pope Pius XI named Georg a domestic prelate with the title Monsignor. In the 1930s, Georg was appointed a secular canon at St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. On November 12, 1941 Pope Pius XII named Georg a protonotary apostolic de numero participantium (one of the highest ranks of monsignor).

Throughout his time in Rome, Georg lived at Villa San Francesco with the Franciscan Brothers of Waldbreitbach. He maintained regular contact with his family, including his first cousin Crown Prince Rupprecht of Bavaria who moved to Rome in 1939. He was also in regular contact with other royal and princely houses; in 1930 he attended the Rome wedding of the Prince of Piedmont (later King Umberto II of Italy) to Princess Marie-José of Belgium, and in 1935 he attended the Rome wedding of Infante Jaime of Spain. In 1938, as grand prior of the Sacred Military Constantinian Order of Saint George he arranged the transfer of the remains of King Francis II of the Two Sicilies and of his wife Queen Maria Sophie from Schloss Tegernsee in Bavaria to the Chiesa del Santo Spirito in Rome.

On May 31, 1943, Georg died at Villa San Francesco. One source says that he had been ill for some time. Another source says that he died unexpectedly of tuberculosis contracted while working at a hospital. He is buried in the Campo Santo Teutonico, the German cemetery immediately outside the walls of Vatican City. In his will he left money to pay for new bronze doors for St. Peter's Basilica; these include the "Door of Death" by Giacomo Manzù and the "Door of the Sacraments" by Venanzo Crocetti.

A few writers (e.g. Martha Schad ) maintain that after the death of his father in 1930, Georg became the successor to the Greek rights of his great-uncle King Otto of Greece who was deposed in 1862. Georg's uncle Ludwig and his descendants were more senior, but Ludwig had renounced his Greek rights in 1869. However, the Greek Constitution of 1844 required that the successor of King Otto "shall profess the Greek Orthodox religion."As a Catholic, Georg was thereby excluded from the succession.

• Domestic prelate by Papal Decree.
• Canon at St. Peter's Basilica by Papal Decree.
• protonotary apostolic de numero participantium by Papal Decree.
• Grand Prior of the Order of Saint George.
• Knight of the Order of Saint Hubert.
• Knight of the Order of the Golden Fleece.
• Knight of the Order of the Black Eagle.
• Bailiff Grand Cross of Justice decorated with the Collar of the Sacred Military Constantinian Order of Saint George.

He was President of the Royal Automobile Club of Bavaria (Königlich Bayerischer Automobil-Club). In 1911 he became Protector of the Bavarian branch of the German Navy League. In 1929 he became a member of the Archconfraternity of the Suffering Mother of God in the Campo Santo Teutonico.

In 1933 a portrait bust of Georg was sculpted by Arno Breker.

Decorations and honors

Bavaria

• Order of Saint Hubert (1898)
• Royal Order of Saint George for the Defense of the Immaculate Conception

Prussia

• Order of the Black Eagle (1910)
• Iron Cross 2nd Class (1914)
• Iron Cross 1st Class (1915)
• Cross of the Mount of Olives (1910)

Other German states

• Duchies of Saxe-Altenburg, Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, and Saxe-Meiningen: Ducal Saxe-Ernestine House Order (1907)

Other countries

• Austria-Hungary: Order of the Golden Fleece (1900)
• Tuscany: Order of Saint Joseph (1901)
• Romania: Order of the Star of Romania (1902)
• China: Order of the Double Dragon (1903)
• Korea: Grand Order of the Plum Blossoms (Lihwa Taehunjang) (1903)
• Portugal: Order of the Tower and Sword (1906)
• Spain: Military Order of Our Lady of Monteza (1907)
• Ottoman Empire: Order of Glory (Nichan Iftikar) (1908)
• Bulgaria: Order of St. Alexander (1908)