Princess Marie Adelheid of Lippe-Biesterfeld
Encyclopedia
Marie Adelheid of Lippe-Biesterfeld (Marie Adelheid Mathilde Karoline Elise Alexe Auguste Albertine; 30 August 1895 - 25 December 1993) was a daughter of Prince Rudolf of Lippe-Biesterfeld and his wife Princess Luise of Ardeck.
As the wife of Hanno Konopath, a prominent Nazi
official, Marie Adelheid was notable for being a popular socialite as well as an ardent supporter of the Nazi regime. She was instrumental in the Nordic Ring, which was a forum for the discussion of issues concerning race and eugenics
. Furthermore, Marie Adelheid served as an aide to Nazi Minister of Food and Agriculture Richard Walther Darré, and produced numerous works of fiction, poetry, translations, and other books. After the end of World War II, she published translations of prominent Holocaust-denying
works, such as Paul Rassinier
's Le Drame des Juifs européens [The Drama of European Jews] into German
in 1964.
). Her father was a son of Julius Peter, Count of Lippe-Biesterfeld and Countess Adelheid of Castell-Castell. Marie Adelheid was a niece of Ernst, Count of Lippe-Biesterfeld and a cousin of Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld
, who was the father of Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld
, husband of Juliana of the Netherlands
. She was also a first cousin of Princess Calixta of Lippe-Biesterfeld
, wife of Prince Waldemar of Prussia. Her family could be traced back to the twelfth century. In 1905, Marie Adelheid was granted the rank of princess.
, a man seventeen years her senior. He was a son of Heinrich VII Prinz Reuss zu Köstritz and his wife Princess Marie of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach, and had once been very close to succeeding Queen Wilhelmina
to the Dutch throne. The marriage was childless, and they were divorced less than a year later, on 18 February 1921.
On 12 April 1921 at Bremen
, Marie Adelheid married for the second time to Heinrich XXXV Prinz Reuss zu Köstritz, her first husband's younger brother. Heinrich XXXV had to divorce his wife Princess Marie of Saxe-Altenburg of ten years for his marriage to Marie Adelheid to occur. The couple had one son, who was born shortly after their wedding. Either brother could have been the father, but one source states that Heinrich XXXV was responsible. The couple divorced on 23 June 1923. Thereafter, Marie Adelheid used the title Princess Reuss zur Lippe.
In a departure from her two previous marriages, Marie Adelheid married a third and final time to commoner Hanno Konopath, a Nazi government official, on 24 February 1927. This marriage also ended in divorce nine years later, but not before it created some important contacts for her in the German regime.
, Marie Adelheid's birth place. As an ardent believer of the party's views, Marie Adelheid developed strong connections to the emerging Nazi regime, and became a leading socialite during that time.
She embraced "blood and soil" notions with great enthusiasm, and belonged to the paganist sect of Nazism. In 1921, the same year of her divorce, Marie Adelheid published Gott in mir (God In Me) in Bremen
. A small work of forty-one pages, its spacious layout and the exceptional quality of its paper is evidence that while Germany was suffering from an economic depression, the book was distributed in small quantities to a select, wealthy clientele. It is likely that soon after producing this work, Marie Adelheid was already moving in far-right circles or on the verge of becoming an ardent National Socialist; she became employed as an aide to the Nazi Minister of Food and Agriculture, Richard Walther Darré (a friend of her third husband's). Her cousin Ernst, Hereditary Prince of Lippe (son of Leopold IV, Prince of Lippe
) was also employed under Darré. As he was her mentor (and referred to her as "little sister"), Marie Adelheid devoted her writing talent to promoting National Socialist ideals, in particular those of Darré. These essays included Nordische Frau und Nordischer Glaube [Nordic Women and Nordic Religion] (1934), Deutscher Hausrat [Setting up the German Household] (1936), two edited collections of writings by Darre, and two novels, Mutter Erde [Mother Earth] (1935), and Die Overbroocks [The Overbroocks] (1942).
. Her third husband was a leader of this group. Kanopath was a member of the Race and Culture Division in the Reich Leadership Office. The group was a great proponent of the "Nordic idea", in which they believed that the Occidental
and Germanic
cultures were a creation of the Nordic race. To them, the Nordic race had been "losing ground rapidly" in the new industrial age due to an influx of "inferior" races to the enlarging cities; their goal was thus to reverse this trend before Germany followed France, Italy, and Spain in racial decline. Through these meetings, Marie Adelheid emerged as a leader of the Nordic Faith Movement. At one meeting she presided over in March 1935, she stated that children should be forbidden from reading the Old Testament
and asserted that there was not much sense in reading the New Testament
.
In the same meeting, Marie Adelheid also called on other Nordic pagans to remember that "thousands of blond-haired, blue-eyed women" had been burned as witches during the Middle Ages
, a fact, she declared, that meant they should be avenged by bringing back to life the old Nordic faith.
The Nordic Faith professed by Kannopath and Marie Adelheid soon declined in importance. Wilhelm Kube
, the leader of the NSDAP in the Prussian parliament and a fervent Christian
, soon discovered that Kannopath belonged to "a school of thought that even the most radical of Kube's group could no longer consider Christian". Soon afterwards, Kube had Kannopath ejected from his DC responsibilities; he was additionally deprived of all his party offices on "grounds of immorality".
and Hermann Göring
. As Darré's influence declined, so did that of Marie Adelheid and her cousin, as their family lacked a viable power base. While Darré retired to his hunting lodge outside Berlin
, she and Ernst continued their activities under the Nazi regime until the end of the war.
ended, Marie Adelheid continued her extreme right-wing activities, working as an author, translator, as well as being active in various neo-Nazi organizations. She translated Paul Rassinier
's Holocaust-denying work, Le Drame des Jusifs européens (The Drama of European Jews), into German
in 1964, and also published two more volumes of poetry.
She gave financial support to Die Bauernschaft, a periodical launched by Neo-nazi Thies Christophersen
in 1969. As a result of his publications, Christophersen was threatened with imprisonment for spreading Nazi propaganda, and finally had to leave Germany for Denmark. In 1971, she assumed the editorship and continued to keep the "blood and soil" ideas that had been so cherished under her and Darré in circulation.
, Schleswig-Holstein
, Germany
, aged 98.
, English
, and German
, Marie Adelheid produced translations of various works after the end of World War II
. Along with Paul Rassinier
's Holocaust-denying
work The Drama of the European Jews, Marie Adelheid also translated Lenora Mattingly Weber
's work My True Love Waits from French into German and Harry Elmer Barnes
' Perpetual War For Perpetual Peace: A Critical Examination of the Foreign Policy of Franklin Delano Roosevelt from English into German, among others.
As the wife of Hanno Konopath, a prominent Nazi
Nazism
Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
official, Marie Adelheid was notable for being a popular socialite as well as an ardent supporter of the Nazi regime. She was instrumental in the Nordic Ring, which was a forum for the discussion of issues concerning race and eugenics
Eugenics
Eugenics is the "applied science or the bio-social movement which advocates the use of practices aimed at improving the genetic composition of a population", usually referring to human populations. The origins of the concept of eugenics began with certain interpretations of Mendelian inheritance,...
. Furthermore, Marie Adelheid served as an aide to Nazi Minister of Food and Agriculture Richard Walther Darré, and produced numerous works of fiction, poetry, translations, and other books. After the end of World War II, she published translations of prominent Holocaust-denying
Holocaust denial
Holocaust denial is the act of denying the genocide of Jews in World War II, usually referred to as the Holocaust. The key claims of Holocaust denial are: the German Nazi government had no official policy or intention of exterminating Jews, Nazi authorities did not use extermination camps and gas...
works, such as Paul Rassinier
Paul Rassinier
Paul Rassinier was a French pacifist, political activist, and author. He was also an anti-Nazi French Resistance fighter, and a prisoner of the German concentration camps at Buchenwald and Mittelbau-Dora. A journalist and editor, he wrote hundreds of articles on political and economic subjects...
's Le Drame des Juifs européens [The Drama of European Jews] into German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
in 1964.
Family
Countess Marie Adelheid was born as the youngest child and only daughter of Prince Rudolf of Lippe-Biesterfeld and his wife Princess Luise of Ardeck (a morganatic granddaughter of Frederick William, Elector of HesseFrederick William, Elector of Hesse
Frederick William I was, between 1847 and 1866, the last Elector of Hesse-Kassel .- Life :...
). Her father was a son of Julius Peter, Count of Lippe-Biesterfeld and Countess Adelheid of Castell-Castell. Marie Adelheid was a niece of Ernst, Count of Lippe-Biesterfeld and a cousin of Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld
Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld (1872–1934)
-References:This article is based on this article on Dutch Wikipedia....
, who was the father of Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld
Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld
Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld , later Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands, was prince consort of Queen Juliana of the Netherlands and father of six children, including the current monarch Queen Beatrix....
, husband of Juliana of the Netherlands
Juliana of the Netherlands
Juliana was the Queen regnant of the Kingdom of the Netherlands between 1948 and 1980. She was the only child of Queen Wilhelmina and Prince Henry...
. She was also a first cousin of Princess Calixta of Lippe-Biesterfeld
Princess Calixta of Lippe-Biesterfeld
Princess Calixta Agnes Adelaide Irmgard Helene Caroline Elise Emma of Lippe-Biesterfeld was the wife of Prince Waldemar of Prussia, eldest son of Prince Heinrich of Prussia.-Family and early life:...
, wife of Prince Waldemar of Prussia. Her family could be traced back to the twelfth century. In 1905, Marie Adelheid was granted the rank of princess.
Marriage
On 19 May 1920 at Drogelwitz, Marie Adelheid married Prince Heinrich XXXII Reuss of KöstritzPrince Heinrich XXXII Reuss of Köstritz
Prince Heinrich XXXII Reuss of Köstritz was the eldest surviving son of Prince Heinrich VII Reuss of Köstritz and his wife Princess Marie Alexandrine of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach....
, a man seventeen years her senior. He was a son of Heinrich VII Prinz Reuss zu Köstritz and his wife Princess Marie of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach, and had once been very close to succeeding Queen Wilhelmina
Wilhelmina of the Netherlands
Wilhelmina was Queen regnant of the Kingdom of the Netherlands from 1890 to 1948. She ruled the Netherlands for fifty-eight years, longer than any other Dutch monarch. Her reign saw World War I and World War II, the economic crisis of 1933, and the decline of the Netherlands as a major colonial...
to the Dutch throne. The marriage was childless, and they were divorced less than a year later, on 18 February 1921.
On 12 April 1921 at Bremen
Bremen
The City Municipality of Bremen is a Hanseatic city in northwestern Germany. A commercial and industrial city with a major port on the river Weser, Bremen is part of the Bremen-Oldenburg metropolitan area . Bremen is the second most populous city in North Germany and tenth in Germany.Bremen is...
, Marie Adelheid married for the second time to Heinrich XXXV Prinz Reuss zu Köstritz, her first husband's younger brother. Heinrich XXXV had to divorce his wife Princess Marie of Saxe-Altenburg of ten years for his marriage to Marie Adelheid to occur. The couple had one son, who was born shortly after their wedding. Either brother could have been the father, but one source states that Heinrich XXXV was responsible. The couple divorced on 23 June 1923. Thereafter, Marie Adelheid used the title Princess Reuss zur Lippe.
- Prince Heinrich V Reuss of Köstritz (b. 26 May 1921, d. 28 Oct 1980)
In a departure from her two previous marriages, Marie Adelheid married a third and final time to commoner Hanno Konopath, a Nazi government official, on 24 February 1927. This marriage also ended in divorce nine years later, but not before it created some important contacts for her in the German regime.
Early years
Alarmed by the failure of their class to respond to the troubles occurring in Germany, many younger members of royal families joined the emerging Nazi party and other radical right-wing groups. In the beginning, many of them were women. Like the Hesse family, the Lippe dynasty joined the Nazi party in great numbers (ultimately eighteen members would eventually join). Some German states provided a proportionally higher number of SS officers, including Hesse-Nassau and LippeLippe
Lippe is a Kreis in the east of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Neighboring districts are Herford, Minden-Lübbecke, Höxter, Paderborn, Gütersloh, and district-free Bielefeld, which forms the region Ostwestfalen-Lippe....
, Marie Adelheid's birth place. As an ardent believer of the party's views, Marie Adelheid developed strong connections to the emerging Nazi regime, and became a leading socialite during that time.
She embraced "blood and soil" notions with great enthusiasm, and belonged to the paganist sect of Nazism. In 1921, the same year of her divorce, Marie Adelheid published Gott in mir (God In Me) in Bremen
Bremen
The City Municipality of Bremen is a Hanseatic city in northwestern Germany. A commercial and industrial city with a major port on the river Weser, Bremen is part of the Bremen-Oldenburg metropolitan area . Bremen is the second most populous city in North Germany and tenth in Germany.Bremen is...
. A small work of forty-one pages, its spacious layout and the exceptional quality of its paper is evidence that while Germany was suffering from an economic depression, the book was distributed in small quantities to a select, wealthy clientele. It is likely that soon after producing this work, Marie Adelheid was already moving in far-right circles or on the verge of becoming an ardent National Socialist; she became employed as an aide to the Nazi Minister of Food and Agriculture, Richard Walther Darré (a friend of her third husband's). Her cousin Ernst, Hereditary Prince of Lippe (son of Leopold IV, Prince of Lippe
Leopold IV, Prince of Lippe
Leopold IV, Prince of Lippe was the final sovereign of the Principality of Lippe...
) was also employed under Darré. As he was her mentor (and referred to her as "little sister"), Marie Adelheid devoted her writing talent to promoting National Socialist ideals, in particular those of Darré. These essays included Nordische Frau und Nordischer Glaube [Nordic Women and Nordic Religion] (1934), Deutscher Hausrat [Setting up the German Household] (1936), two edited collections of writings by Darre, and two novels, Mutter Erde [Mother Earth] (1935), and Die Overbroocks [The Overbroocks] (1942).
Nordic Faith Movement
In the late 1920s, Marie Adelheid regularly attended meetings for the paganist Nordic Ring, which were a forum for the discussion of issues concerning race and eugenicsEugenics
Eugenics is the "applied science or the bio-social movement which advocates the use of practices aimed at improving the genetic composition of a population", usually referring to human populations. The origins of the concept of eugenics began with certain interpretations of Mendelian inheritance,...
. Her third husband was a leader of this group. Kanopath was a member of the Race and Culture Division in the Reich Leadership Office. The group was a great proponent of the "Nordic idea", in which they believed that the Occidental
Occidental
Occidental may refer to:* Occidental, California, a town in Sonoma County, California* Occidental Mindoro, a province of the Philippines located in the MIMAROPA region in Luzon...
and Germanic
Germanic culture
Historical culture of the Germanic peoples:*Migration period art**Animal style**Anglo-Saxon cultureContemporary culture of Germanic Europe:*Dutch culture *English culture*Flemish culture*Frisian culture*Culture of German-speaking Europe...
cultures were a creation of the Nordic race. To them, the Nordic race had been "losing ground rapidly" in the new industrial age due to an influx of "inferior" races to the enlarging cities; their goal was thus to reverse this trend before Germany followed France, Italy, and Spain in racial decline. Through these meetings, Marie Adelheid emerged as a leader of the Nordic Faith Movement. At one meeting she presided over in March 1935, she stated that children should be forbidden from reading the Old Testament
Old Testament
The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...
and asserted that there was not much sense in reading the New Testament
New Testament
The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....
.
"In the Old Testament, the greatest and most sacred things are treated as a variety of sin. One should not, therefore, place in children's hands the sort of tales of which the Old Testament is made up. However, the new Testament is not much better. Throughout the Old Testament woman is treated as something shameful. We read there that a woman who has borne a child should make a sacrifice".
In the same meeting, Marie Adelheid also called on other Nordic pagans to remember that "thousands of blond-haired, blue-eyed women" had been burned as witches during the Middle Ages
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
, a fact, she declared, that meant they should be avenged by bringing back to life the old Nordic faith.
The Nordic Faith professed by Kannopath and Marie Adelheid soon declined in importance. Wilhelm Kube
Wilhelm Kube
Wilhelm Kube was a German politician and Nazi official. He was an important figure in the German Christian movement during the early years of Nazi rule. During the war he became a senior official in the occupying government of the Soviet Union, achieving the rank of Generalkommissar for...
, the leader of the NSDAP in the Prussian parliament and a fervent Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
, soon discovered that Kannopath belonged to "a school of thought that even the most radical of Kube's group could no longer consider Christian". Soon afterwards, Kube had Kannopath ejected from his DC responsibilities; he was additionally deprived of all his party offices on "grounds of immorality".
Fall of Darré
As the war caused unwelcome developments, Darré's romantic "blood and soil" views suffered as new and more efficient plans were produced by important Nazi officials Heinrich HimmlerHeinrich Himmler
Heinrich Luitpold Himmler was Reichsführer of the SS, a military commander, and a leading member of the Nazi Party. As Chief of the German Police and the Minister of the Interior from 1943, Himmler oversaw all internal and external police and security forces, including the Gestapo...
and Hermann Göring
Hermann Göring
Hermann Wilhelm Göring, was a German politician, military leader, and a leading member of the Nazi Party. He was a veteran of World War I as an ace fighter pilot, and a recipient of the coveted Pour le Mérite, also known as "The Blue Max"...
. As Darré's influence declined, so did that of Marie Adelheid and her cousin, as their family lacked a viable power base. While Darré retired to his hunting lodge outside Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, she and Ernst continued their activities under the Nazi regime until the end of the war.
Post-World War II
After World War IIWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
ended, Marie Adelheid continued her extreme right-wing activities, working as an author, translator, as well as being active in various neo-Nazi organizations. She translated Paul Rassinier
Paul Rassinier
Paul Rassinier was a French pacifist, political activist, and author. He was also an anti-Nazi French Resistance fighter, and a prisoner of the German concentration camps at Buchenwald and Mittelbau-Dora. A journalist and editor, he wrote hundreds of articles on political and economic subjects...
's Holocaust-denying work, Le Drame des Jusifs européens (The Drama of European Jews), into German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
in 1964, and also published two more volumes of poetry.
She gave financial support to Die Bauernschaft, a periodical launched by Neo-nazi Thies Christophersen
Thies Christophersen
Thies Christophersen , a farmer by upbringing, was a prominent German Holocaust denier.-Christophersen and the "Auschwitz Lie":...
in 1969. As a result of his publications, Christophersen was threatened with imprisonment for spreading Nazi propaganda, and finally had to leave Germany for Denmark. In 1971, she assumed the editorship and continued to keep the "blood and soil" ideas that had been so cherished under her and Darré in circulation.
Death
Marie Adelheid died on 25 December 1993 in TangstedtTangstedt
Tangstedt is a municipality in the district of Stormarn, in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. It is situated approx. 12 km northwest of Ahrensburg, and 22 km northeast of Hamburg....
, Schleswig-Holstein
Schleswig-Holstein
Schleswig-Holstein is the northernmost of the sixteen states of Germany, comprising most of the historical duchy of Holstein and the southern part of the former Duchy of Schleswig...
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, aged 98.
List of works
Marie Adelheid produced and published many different works under the names Marie Adelheid Prinzessin Reuss-zur Lippe and Marie Adelheid Konopath throughout her life. All of these original works contained right-wing propaganda, both during and after the fall of the Nazi regime.Poetry
- Gott in Mir [God in Me] (1921)
- Weltfrommigkeit (1960)
- Freundesgruss (1978)
Essays
- Das bist du [That is you] (1924)
- Deutscher Hausrat [Setting up the German Household] (1936)
- Nordische Frau und Nordischer Glaube [Nordic Women and Nordic Religion] (1934)
- Feiern im Jahresring (1968)
- Small contributions to the monthly magazine Odal. Monatssddchrift fur Blut und Boden (1932–1942)
Translations
As a speaker of FrenchFrench language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
, English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
, and German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
, Marie Adelheid produced translations of various works after the end of World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. Along with Paul Rassinier
Paul Rassinier
Paul Rassinier was a French pacifist, political activist, and author. He was also an anti-Nazi French Resistance fighter, and a prisoner of the German concentration camps at Buchenwald and Mittelbau-Dora. A journalist and editor, he wrote hundreds of articles on political and economic subjects...
's Holocaust-denying
Holocaust denial
Holocaust denial is the act of denying the genocide of Jews in World War II, usually referred to as the Holocaust. The key claims of Holocaust denial are: the German Nazi government had no official policy or intention of exterminating Jews, Nazi authorities did not use extermination camps and gas...
work The Drama of the European Jews, Marie Adelheid also translated Lenora Mattingly Weber
Lenora Mattingly Weber
Lenora Mattingly Weber was an American author of short stories and novels.Lenora Mattingly was born in Dawn, Missouri on October 1, 1895, and lived most of her life in Denver, Colorado. She married Albert Herman Weber in 1916 and was the mother of six children. Al Weber died in 1945.Throughout...
's work My True Love Waits from French into German and Harry Elmer Barnes
Harry Elmer Barnes
Harry Elmer Barnes was a prominent American historian in the 20th century. A "progressive who had some classical liberal impulses," he was associated for virtually his entire career with Columbia University.-Early career:...
' Perpetual War For Perpetual Peace: A Critical Examination of the Foreign Policy of Franklin Delano Roosevelt from English into German, among others.