by Martha Pool
For most northshore residents, the term “royalty” conjures up images of Carnival, with kings and queens dressed in all their finery. For Victoria “Vickie” Astrid Whitten Beveridge of Covington, the connotation is much more personal.
Vickie was born in Salzburg, Austria in 1948; both she and her mother were named after Victoria Augusta, the last reigning empress of Germany. Vickie’s mother, Viktoria Whitten, was known formally as Viktoria-Luise Friederike Caroline-Mathilde, Countess zu Solms-Baruth. Affectionately referred to as Toria, she was born of a German noble family in 1921 in Casel-Golzig bei Luckau, Niederlausitz.
Toria passed away in March 2003, leaving not only her daughter, a son and many relatives and friends, but also an important, little-known legacy. While visiting with Vickie and Elizabeth “Ibsie” Gremillion – Toria’s close personal friend – I caught a glimpse of the life and times of a most elegant and fascinating woman.
Toria’s mother, Princess Caroline-Mathilde of Schleswig-Holstein, was the youngest of five daughters and one son of the last reigning duke and duchess of Schleswig-Holstein. She married Toria’s father, Hans Georg Eduard, Count zu Solms-Baruth, at the end of World War I at Castle Gluecksurg, her family home. Toria’s grandfather Solms was one of the largest landowners in Germany, second only to the Duke of Sachsen-Coburg und Gotha, who was also Oberkaemmerer – Lord High Chamberlain – for the last German emperor, Kaiser Wilhelm.
Toria’s father and all of his brothers were officers in the elite German cavalry regiment, Garde de Corpes, under Kaiser Wilhelm. In her soon-to-be-published memoirs, Toria recounts many of the war stories that her father accumulated during World War I. One told of his capturing a British regimental infantry command post with his cavalry squadron. The British colonel was so outraged that he shouted, “And to think it had to be the bloody cavalry!”
For Germany, the outcome of the war was bitterly disappointing. For people like Toria’s grandfather and many others in Germany who had supported the kaiser to the end, it was devastating. In addition to losing the monarchy, their country was in shambles.
Toria’s parents lived in the 200-year-old castle, Schloss Casel, which belonged to the Solms family. It lay on the outskirts of a little village, Casel-Golzig, just south of Berlin. In her memoirs, Toria states, “We always sat out on the terrace after meals, or sometimes for tea in the summer, especially at night. One could hear the roe deer calling each other in the fields, the pheasants with their raucous crow, and the farmers doing their last chores and putting their animals to rest after a long day’s work in the fields. We also often had a little hedgehog family consisting of mother and three or four little ones traversing across the path in front of the terrace.”
Vickie explains that, according to the custom of that time, parents of nobility would choose a husband for their daughter. For Toria, the first choice was a young man from a prominent family. Unfortunately, he went off to war in World War II and was killed in battle. Toria subsequently wedded Prince Friedrich Josias von Sachsen-Coburg und Gotha, whose great-grandfather, Prince Albert, married Queen Victoria. Though Toria’s marriage ended in divorce, Vickie’s half-brother, Prince Andreas, the Duke of Saxe Coburg und Gotha, was born of that union.
Says Vickie, “During the war, the Russians came and took over Casel, where my mother was born and raised. The entire property was taken and used as Russian headquarters. In the ensuing rampage, all of the family’s belongings were thought to be destroyed. The upholstery and bedding were cut up in the search for hidden gold, and the furniture heaped into a huge pile and burned. In a return trip 45 years later, mother visited with some of the local farmers and found out that the people from the village had salvaged some of her family’s belongings from the fire. It was really strange for her to see these pieces again. Though the family’s possessions were never recovered, the estate was reclaimed by the Solms family in the early ’90s.”
When the Russians invaded, Toria literally had to flee with the clothes on her back in the middle of the night with her son, who was only three or so at the time. She was forced to travel several hours to Steinwendt, a beautiful German chalet located outside of Salzburg, Austria that was part of her father’s family estate. Hoping that her nobility would not be discovered, she had given all of her jewels to a maid, who was supposed to take them out of the country for Toria. Neither the maid nor the jewels were ever seen again.
While living at Steinwendt, Toria met Richard Whitten, an American soldier stationed in Salzburg. It wasn’t long before wedding bells were ringing, and the two were married in the grand setting of the chalet – a special place that would hold everlasting significance.
Says long-time friend Ibsie, “I’ll never forget hearing Dick’s mother in New Orleans say, ‘My son is bringing home a German bride!’ ” Newly married as well, Ibsie and her husband had rented an upstairs apartment from Mrs. Whitten. When Toria and Dick arrived from Germany in 1949 with five-year-old Andy and six-month-old Vickie, Ibsie and Toria became fast friends.
Although of royal lineage, Toria was no stranger to the realities of life and the necessity of frugal living. While acclimating to the south, she honed her skills as an excellent seamstress and also played an integral role in the Junior League of New Orleans as the manager of the organization’s thrift shop. A lover of animals, Toria also raised Labrador retrievers, another of her passions.
“My mother was very sensible; she didn’t waste anything. She loved the thrift shop,” says Vickie, “and she loved the people that came there. One thing she would always say is ‘there is no one better than you and you are no better than anyone else. If someone is cleaning floors, they deserve just as much respect as someone wearing a crown.’”
Ibsie recalls a favorite story about Toria. “She had an English accent, because she had been cared for by an English governess. She loved nature and loved to pick anything that grew. One day she had stopped alongside the highway in this gigantic Lincoln she drove, and it happened to have a starter problem. You had to somehow shake it to make it start. So here she is, out on the highway picking flowers, and a very country-looking fellow came along. Toria waved him over and said, ‘I say there, would you wiggle me a bit?’ Isn’t that wonderful? And he did! She was forever wording things in such a way that was, at times, hysterical.”
Vickie speaks of the family’s travels during her father’s many years in the military, and offers another insightful tale. “When we lived on Staten Island, I was with my mother one afternoon, and we were driving to the commissary. She accidentally hit a pheasant that had wandered into our path. I was probably six or seven at the time, and I remember that she immediately pulled over, got out of the car, walked back and picked up this dead bird and put it in the trunk. I remember asking her, ‘What are you doing?’ I couldn’t imagine why she would be putting a dead bird in the car! She matter-of-factly said, ‘Well, I only hit it in the head, and it’s perfectly good to eat.’ So she took it home and proceeded to hang it on the front porch, where it swung for about three weeks – curing, European-style. Then we had it for dinner! Everyone thought it was just wonderful, but I sure didn’t eat any of it!”
Though Vickie’s experience is certainly Americanized, European life was not at all foreign to her. She recalls a tiny village where, as the only American girl in class, she was the only one who could not speak French. She says, “Having attended schools in France, Germany and Austria, I always had a very good ear for language. My mother, raised to speak German, would ask me to translate French for her. I spent my junior year in high school in Salzburg. I didn’t speak any German at all in an all-German school with all-German teachers and students. I learned German, but I had to translate from German to French to English in order to understand what I was doing!”
The family’s path took many interesting and diverse turns throughout the years. Vickie recalls how growing up with brother Andy was like any other sibling relationship. “I always knew my brother was a prince – I would even kid him about it. I remember when he turned 16; for the first time, he was able to go to Europe and spend the summer with his father. That was when I began to realize there was really something different about our lives.”
In succeeding years, Andy attended LSU while traveling back and forth to Germany. At the age of 21 he had to make a decision – whether to be an American or a German citizen. Vickie continues, “If he became an American citizen, he would lose the right to his title and inheritance. He really didn’t have a choice; he was next in line.”
Andy oversees his family estate, which today remains one of the largest in Germany. As the years passed, mother and daughter made several trips to Europe, each time reconnecting with the family’s noble heritage.
In the summer of 2003, on the outskirts of Salzburg, the Whitten family came full circle. On July 11, Vickie and Andy gathered their families at Steinwendt to lay Dick and Toria to rest in the Solms family cemetery – peacefully ending their journey where it had first begun.
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