Left: The painting. Right: The painting in its frame.
Prince Sigismund of Prussia (1864-66), by Georg Koberwein (1820-1876). After Hills & Saunders (1852-2019)(photographer). Signed and dated 1867. 2.3 x 41.7 cm (support, canvas/panel/stretcher external). RCIN 403631. Reproduced by kind permission of the Royal Collection Trust/ © His Majesty King Charles III). [Click on the images to enlarge them.]
This was a case when Koberwein really needed to base his portrait on a photograph, because the little boy had died of meningitis not long after his family's visit to England in the previous year. His mother took it very hard indeed, to the extent that in the end even Queen Victoria, who had tried to console for some weeks, rebuked her, telling her it was wrong to say she would "give up everything" ... to get little Siggie back" (qtd. in Pakula 239). Still, the Queen mourned as well, of course, and this likeness was to be a precious keepsake for her.
Queen Victoria treasured the memories of all her lost grandchildren. In 1877, she commissioned a terracotta group for her private chapel at Windsor, showing an angel holding three infants close to her, on her lap, while two not much older children stand beside her, leaning into her. One of the older ones would have been Prince Sigismund. The inscription reads. "Of such is The Kingdom of Heaven, Dalou Fecit 1878" — the sculptor was Aimé-Jules Dalou (1838-1902). Another child would soon follow, separately — Princess Alice's daughter Marie, who died in 1878, at the age of four. — Jacqueline Banerjee.
Bibliography
Angel and Children, 1878. Royal Collection Trust. Web. 14 October 2024.
The Four Eldest Children of Crown Prince and Princess Frederick William of Prussia. Royal Collection Trust. Web. 14 October 2024.
Pakula, Hannah. An Uncommon Woman: The Empress Frederick, Daughter of Queen Victoria, Wife of the Crown Prince of Prussia, Mother of Kaiser Wilhelm. New York: Touchstone, 1997.
Created 14 October 2024