Countess Augusta Reuss of Ebersdorf

Countess Augusta Caroline Sophie Reuss-Ebersdorf Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. She was the maternal grandmother of Queen Victoria & a paternal grandmother of Albert, Prince Consort.

Marriage

Her father commissioned a portrait of Augusta as Artemisia by the painter Johann Heinrich Tischbein. Count Heinrich XXIV showed this painting during the Perpetual Diet so potential marriage candidates were aware of his beautiful daughter.

In Ebersdorf on 13 June 1777 Augusta married Francis, Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. Duke Francis before acquired the Artemisia painting for four times the original price because he was deeply in love with Augusta, but he was already obliged to marry his relative Princess Sophie of Saxe-Hildburghausen. Princess Sophie died 7 months after the wedding, so the young Duke was free to wed again.

During her marriage Augusta bore her husband 10 children, though not all survived to adulthood; some of their children played important roles in European history: Victoria, Duchess of Kent, and King Leopold I of Belgium.

Married on 9 August 1830 to Louise of Orléans and his children noted Leopold II of Belgium and Empress Carlota of Mexico. number one king of the Belgians under the produce of Leopold I.

Countess Augusta was the grandmother of many notable monarchs of Europe, including both Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom through her mother Victoria and her husband, Prince Albert through his father Ernst, King Consort of Portugal Ferdinand II through his father Prince Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, and also Empress Carlota of Mexico and her brother Leopold II of Belgium through their father Leopold I who was elected King of the Belgians on 26 June 1831.