September 5-7, 2023 Firearms & Militaria
This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 9/7/2023
Very scarce ALS in English written by Kaiser Wilhelm II while in exile in Holland. 2 pages, 12mo, indelible pencil on either side of black-bordered card datelined Sept. 1, 1921 from Doorn, to "Dear Lady Verena," apologizing for his late response to a letter due to the death of his wife. Very interesting, personal, and somewhat self-pitying letter (given his role in the devastation of a World War,) with statements such as, "in the situation in which your statesmen threw me, my wife, my children, and my country... remember me as a true friend, though now a despised, slandered, belied man bereft of the kindest of wives . . .whose heart was broken by the ruthlessness of your countrymen and their rulers..." He sends his regards to Hugh and rather responds obliquely to her offer of her son "to propagate views which I should wish to be promulgated." Lady Verena is possibly Lady Verena Maud Lowther, 1865-1938, and Hugh may be her brother, Hugh Cecil Lowther, 5th Earl of Lonsdale. The offer to the Kaiser of her son's aid may have been a stretch. He was in a German gas attack in 1915 and in 1916 she arranged his marriage to her lover, Katherine Beaven, to keep her close but avoid scandal. Things did not go well. CONDITION: Very Good.