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Birth
 Mayerling IncidentBirths, Marriages, Deaths
(Redirected from The Mayerling Incident)
 This article is about the Mayerling incident. For other uses, see Mayerling (disambiguation).
The Mayerling Incident refers to the series of events leading to the apparent murder-suicide of Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria and his lover Baroness Mary Vetsera. Prince Rudolf was the only son of Emperor Franz Josef I of Austria, and therefore heir to his father as Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, and King of Bohemia. Rudolf's mistress Mary was the daughter of Baron Albin Vetsera, a diplomat at the Austrian court. The couple's bodies were discovered at Mayerling, Rudolf's hunting lodge, in Lower Austria on January 30, 1889.
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By 1889, it was known by many people at the Court, including both his wife Stephanie, and his father Franz Joseph, that Rudolf and Mary were having an affair. Rudolf's marriage to Stephanie had resulted in the birth of one daughter, Elisabeth, and was not particularly happy. Rudolf had no male heir. It is rumoured[who?] that the reason why Stephanie was unable to have any more children was that she was infected by Rudolf with venereal disease.
On the morning of January 30, 1889, Vetsera and Rudolf were found dead at Rudolf’s hunting lodge, Mayerling. The death of his only son devastated Franz Joseph I. As Rudolf had no son, the next male heir was Franz Joseph's brother, Karl Ludwig and his issue.
The initial official explanation for the incident was that Rudolf had suffered heart failure; Vetsera was not mentioned and her body was secretly buried. However, the official story did not hold up well, and it later was admitted that Rudolf had committed suicide. Many stories were floated about the pair’s death, with the most widely accepted being that the two lovers had carried out a suicide pact after Franz Joseph demanded they separate. Rudolf shot his mistress in the head, then sat by her body for several hours before shooting himself. A special dispensation from the Vatican was obtained, declaring Rudolf to be in a state of “mental imbalance” in order for Rudolf to be buried in the Imperial Crypt.
Mainstream historians generally dismissed the idea that there was more to the Mayerling Incident than a simple murder-suicide. However some[who?] have argued that the official story may be incorrect.
Notably, it has been rumoured[who?] that Empress Zita, (1892 - 1989), widow of the last Emperor, Karl (r: 1916-1918) and last surviving Crowned head from The Great War, claimed that the Crown Prince was murdered, and the crime was disguised as a double suicide. The responsible party were Austrian security officials, in response to the Prince’s suspected pro-Hungarian sympathies, or French agents because he refused to participate in the deposition of his pro-German father. No evidence has been discovered to support either of these theories.
The idea that the Prince was killed for political reasons, with Vetsera’s death used to cover up the crime, is one of more popular theories surrounding Mayerling.[citation needed]
This theory rests in part on the idea that the affair between Vetsera and Prince Rudolf was an open secret in the Imperial Family. Indeed, Rudolf’s wife, Princess Stéphanie, was carrying on her own affair.[citation needed] Thus, the Emperor’s demand that the couple separate was not a serious concern for the two, making a lover’s pact unnecessary.
A resulting re-examination of files about the death of the Crown Prince revealed major discrepancies between the claimed manner of the deaths and the factual evidence.[citation needed] At one point it was claimed that six shots were fired from the weapon, which did not belong to Rudolf. The initial report stated that only one shot was fired, instantly killing the Crown Prince, which raises the question of how the remaining five bullets were fired. This information suggests that Rudolf had engaged in a violent struggle before his death. However, an examination of the Papal Dispensation issued to allow Rudolf’s Christian burial asserts that only one shot was fired.[citation needed]
However, this theory[citation needed] has one major problem. By ruling Rudolf’s death a suicide, the Imperial Family was required to petition the Pope for permission to bury Rudolf in the family crypt. Critics of the conspiracy theory claim that the Imperial Family would have seized on any shred of evidence that might have indicated Rudolf did not kill himself in order to avoid the scandal of petitioning the Pope.[citation needed]
The following is from The Secrets of the Hohenzollerns by Dr. Armgaard Karl Graves, published in 1915 (Graves claims to have been a German spy who reported directly to Kaiser Wilhelm II):
"...Prussian diplomacy had gained such an ascendancy over the House of Habsburg and the affairs of Austria, that Austria has been and is a staunch ally and supported by Germany in all its aims and ambitions. This alliance is developed to such an extent that even an heir apparent to the Austrian empire unless acceptable to and identified with Prusso-Germanic interests finds it impossible to ascend the throne.
"Erherzog Rudolph, the archduke, next in succession, was mysteriously killed at Mayerling, an obscure little hunting lodge in upper Austria. Much has been written and many conjectures made about the cirumstance of this lamentable tragedy. The real reason, so vast in its importance, has of necessity never been divulged.
"On a blustery and cold January night in 1889 His Royal Highness and the Baroness Marie Vetzera (Vetchera) were familiarly seated around a plain but daintily spread supper table in the hunting lodge of Mayerling. They were attended by Max and Otto K----, two brothers much trusted in the archducal household. Supper was nearly finished and the Prince, who was very fond of a certain brand of champagne, had just given the order to Otto for another couple of bottles, when the deep baying of the Prince's favorite deerhound gave notice of the approach of strangers. A dull thud and agonized yelp of the dog made the Prince jump up and stride toward the door, which was guarded by Max. Pushing the servant aside, His Royal Highness pulled the door open. Three men muffled up to their eyes in great coats forced their way into the room. In a trice the leader of the trio pinioned Max to the wall. The Archduke, who had jumped back startled and was reseating himself behind the supper table, demanded the reason for this intrusion, when the smallest of the three, supposedly the brother of the Baroness Vetzer, laid hold of a bottle of champagne and brought the weapon down with terrific force on his unprotected head, completely crushing the skull. The Baroness, who apparently had recognized one of the three intruders, was hysterically screaming and uttering dire threats and vengeance against the perpetrators of this foul deed. As she stood there, gripping the edges of the table, the third, standing at the door, raised his Stutzen (a short hunting gun in great favor in the Austrian Alps), and fired point blank at the unfortunate woman, almost blowing her head to pieces.
"The commotion brought Otto from the wine cellar, and, taking in the situation at a glance, he threw himself fiercely upon the intruders, ably assisted by his brother Max, who also began attacking his captor. They managed to dispose of one of the assailants when again the gun rang out, sending Max to the floor with his chest almost torn to ribbons. The next moment Otto received a Hirsch-fanger (a hunting dagger) between his shoulders. Dragging their wounded conspirator with them, the two assassins disappeared into the night. From that day to this there have never been any arrests made or any one held to account for this dastardly deed.
"Otto, who was left for dead, on regaining sufficient strength decently covered the bodies with table cloths and napkins, and left a short pencil written account of the occurrences pinned on to his brother's clothes. He also disappeared in the night; for he well knew the consequences attached to an even entirely innocent witnessing of such a royal family tragedy. Old, gray and bent, Otto is living to this day the quiet life of a hermit and exile not five hundred miles from New York City. Money would never make Otto talk, but some day the upheaval in Europe may provide an occasion when this old retainer of the House of Habsburg may unseal his lips; and then woe to the guilty.
"Rudolph of Habsburg had to the full the proud instinctive dislike to, and rooted disinclination against, the ever increasing Germanic influence in and over his country. He died. [footnote 1]
"1 The above account of the tragedy of Mayerling, notwithstanding the 'proof' of the Crown Prince's supposed suicide contained in the letters alleged to have been written by him to his confidant and friend Ambassador Szoegyenyi and to the 'Duke of Braganza,' is the correct one, and will be proved when the venerable head of the House of Habsburg shall have passed away. The Author."
Apart from the straightforward lover’s pact cited in the official report, a lover’s quarrel has also been postulated.[citation needed] It has been said[who?] that Vetsera was murdered by Crown Prince Rudolf, who then killed himself; that they both committed suicide; that they killed or murdered one another, and that she may have been pregnant at the time of her death. One variant[citation needed] states that Mary died during a botched abortion and the grief-stricken Rudolf killed himself.[citation needed]
Examination of the bodies[citation needed] indicated that Mary had likely died several hours before Rudolf, implying that he had killed her (or she had killed herself) and sat next to the body until he finally shot himself.[citation needed]
Rudolf's final letter to Princess Stephanie also supports the suicide hypothesis. In it, Rudolf bids farewell to her and his friends, saying that only death can save his good name. This letter raises at least as many questions as answers, since Rudolf does not give a reason why he must kill himself, nor is there any mention of Mary Vetsera.
Also in the funeral the Crown Prince wore gloves and it was not allowed to his mother to see his hands, since it was said they presented defensive wounds.
Given the age of the case, the delicate nature of the Rudolf and Mary’s deaths (both politically and personally), conflicting initial reports[citation needed] and conflicting official versions, the mystery of the Mayerling Incident will likely never be solved. Much of the evidence was destroyed or concealed at the time, for fear of scandal, hampering later inquiries. All the major players in the Incident have died, most without publicly commenting on the tragedy.
A major obstacle to all of these theories, alternative and official, is the question of why any of these stories would be suppressed. The apparent suicide of the heir to the throne was at least as damaging as any other story, thus it would be illogical to conceal one painful or damaging truth with another.
In December 1992, the cemetery at Heiligenkreuz was vandalized and Mary Vetsera's remains were stolen.[citation needed] Upon recovery they were examined to ensure that they were the correct remains. The findings again contradicted the official reports that she had been shot; her skull showed no evidence of bullet wounds or shrapnel. Instead, the evidence indicated that she had been beaten to death.
Rudolf's death may have brought ruin to his parents' marriage, changed the imperial succession, and perhaps contributed in a small way to the end of the ancient house of Habsburg in 1918. The mysterious death of Archduke Rudolf, Crown Prince of Austria and Hungary, immediately caused a dynastic crisis. Since he was the only male heir to Franz Joseph, Rudolf’s uncle Archduke Karl Ludwig, became heir-presumptive, a role inherited after his death in 1896 by his son Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and then, after the latter's assassination, by Karl Ludwig's grandson Archduke Karl, who would ultimately succeed his grand-uncle as Emperor in 1916. The removal of the liberal Rudolf made Franz Joseph's conservative policies easier to pursue.
 Grieving emperor and empress at the deathbed |
 Tomb of Mary Vetsera at Heiligenkreuz |
The Mayerling affair has been dramatized in:
