Leopold I of Belgium: Difference between revisions

Leopold I, first King of the Belgians, was born on December 16, 1790, in Ehrenburg Castle in the Bavarian town of Coburg, Germany, and named "Georges Chrétien Frédéric." He was the youngest son of Duke Francis Frederick of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfield (1750-1806) and Augusta Reuss-Ebersdorf (1757-1831).

In 1795 -- Leopold was only a toddler -- he was appointed colonel of the Izmailovski Imperial Regiment by the Russian czar. Seven years later he became a general. When the Duchy of Saxe-Coburg was occupied by Napoleonic troops in 1806 he went to Paris. Napoleon offered him the position of adjutant, but he refused. Instead he succeeded his brother as head of the Duchy. Afterwards he campaigned against Napoleon. In 1815 Leopold was appointed field-marshal.

On May 2, 1816, he married Crown Princess Charlotte Augusta, (1796-1817; the only legitimate child of Prince Regent George (later King George IV) and therefore heiress to the English throne. On November 5, 1817, Princess Charlotte gave birth to a stillborn son, and she died the next day.

In 1830 Leopold was offered the Greek crown, but he refused it. After Belgium asserted its independence from the Netherlands on October 4, 1830, the Belgian National Congress asked Leopold to become king of the newly formed country. He accepted and became King of the Belgians on June 26, 1831. His inauguration took place in the Royal Palace in Brussels on July 21, 1831. This day became a Belgian national holiday.

Less than two weeks later, on August 2, the Netherlands invaded Belgium. Skirmishes continued for eight years, but in 1839 the two countries signed a treaty establishing Belgium's independence.

On August 9, 1832, Leopold married his second wife, Louise of Orleans (1812-1850), daughter of King Louis Philippe I of France. She was Belgium's first queen.

Leopold and Louise's first child, Louis-Philippe Leopold Victor Ernst of Saxe-Coburg, was born 1833 but died the next year. Their second child was born in Brussels on April 9, 1835: Leopold Louis-Philippe Marie Victor of Saxe-Coburg was to become Leopold II, second King of the Belgians.

With the opening of the railway line between Brussels and Mechelen on May 5, 1835, one of the king's fondest hopes -- to build the first railway in continental Europe -- became a reality.

On March 24, 1839, their third child, Philippe Eugene Ferdinand Marie Clement Baudouin Leopold Georges of Saxe-Coburg was born. Their fourth child, Charlotte Amelie of Saxe-Coburg, was born in 1840. She was to become Empress of Mexico. That year Leopold also arranged the marriage of his niece Queen Victoria of England to his nephew Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.

Leopold tried to pass laws to regulate female and child labor in 1842, but the time was not yet ripe for it.

A wave of revolutions passed over Europe after King Louis-Philippe was chased from the French throne in 1848. Belgium remained neutral, mainly because of Leopold's diplomatic efforts.

On October 11, 1850, Queen Louise-Marie died. Fifteen years later, on December 10, 1865, the king, too, died, in Laeken.

See also: Belgian monarchs