Marriage
In the 1930s, Queen Wilhelmina began a search for a suitable husband for her daughter. At the time, the House of Orange was one of the most strictly religious royal families in the world, and it was very difficult to find a Protestant prince who suited their standards. Princes from the United Kingdom and Sweden were "vetted" but either declined or were rejected by the princess.
At the 1936 Winter Olympics in Bavaria, she met Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld, a young German aristocrat. Prince Bernhard was a suave young businessman, and though not a playboy, certainly a "man about town" with a dashing lifestyle. But his rank and religion were suitable, and so Princess Juliana's royal engagement was arranged by her mother. Princess Juliana fell deeply in love with her fiancé, a love that was to last a lifetime and that withstood separation during the war and Bernhard's many extramarital affairs and illegitimate children. The astute Queen Wilhelmina left nothing to chance: court lawyers drew up a prenuptial agreement that specified exactly what the German-born prince could and could not do, and what money he would receive from the royal estate. The couple's engagement was announced on 8 September 1936.
The wedding announcement divided a country that mistrusted Germany under Adolf Hitler. Prior to the wedding, on 24 November 1936, Prince Bernhard was granted Dutch citizenship and changed the spelling of his names from German to Dutch. They married in The Hague on 7 January 1937, the date on which Princess Juliana's grandparents, King William III and Queen Emma, had married fifty-eight years earlier. The civil ceremony was held in The Hague Town Hall and the marriage was blessed in the Great Church (St. Jacobskerk), likewise in The Hague. The young couple moved into Soestdijk Palace in Baarn.
Their first child Princess Beatrix was born on 31 January 1938, and their second Princess Irene on 5 August 1939.
Read more about this topic: Juliana Of The Netherlands
Famous quotes containing the word marriage:
“Where there’s marriage without love, there will be love without marriage.”
—Benjamin Franklin (1706–1790)
“A funeral is not death, any more than baptism is birth or marriage union. All three are the clumsy devices, coming now too late, now too early, by which Society would register the quick motions of man.”
—E.M. (Edward Morgan)
“We have seen that men are learning that work, productivity, and marriage may be very important parts of life, but they are not its whole cloth. The rest of the fabric is made of nurturing relationships, especially those with children—relationships which are intimate, trusting, humane, complex, and full of care.”
—Kyle D. Pruett (20th century)