Prince Charles, Count of Flanders (1903-1983)

[Prinsara]

"Eccentric" is giving up your apanage to be a painter. (Or in his mother's famous example, playing your violin in a bomb crater for the acoustics.)

"Weirdo" is making a specialty of disappearing and trying to make people believe you are in another country for some unspecified reason.

I'm very sorry for Charles. He must have felt greatly unloved to harbor as much resentment as he did, but many children feel they aren't the preferred one and it doesn't seem to twist them quite as much. (Even Laurent has managed to be part of the family, just.)

It's also perfectly possible to be a model constitutional regent and not let your nearly-starved-and-murdered brother be accused of treason. It's ironic that whatever Charles did for most of the war is somewhat more open to suspicion.

Leopold made mistakes. Charles capitalized on them. That's an opportunist.

In a royal family, you're in or you're out. You can't decide to be royal only when no one else is around. If Charles really cared about his country and wanted people to appreciate him, he could have used his post-regency leverage to assist Baudouin. He ran off, instead. Again.

It's really questionable whether it's Leopold's shadow or his own that he ended up living in.

 

[Blog Real]

The Prince Charles wears the uniform of a colonel in the Belgian Army, decorated with the Grand Cordon of the Order of Leopold.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipe...lgië_Charles_de_Belgique_Karl_von_Belgien.jpg

 

[CyrilVladisla]

Prince Charles, Count of Flanders walked through Ypres Square for the great ceremony of remembrance at the Menin Gate.
http://www.gettyimages.com/license/3294937

 

[Prinsara]

It's a very strange caption. Was the Prince of Wales meant to be in that photo?

 

[maria-olivia]

Prince Charles Count of Flandres

 

[maria-olivia]

Prince Charles was Regent from 1945 to 1950!

 

[An Ard Ri]

Prince Charles was Regent from 1945 to 1950!

Yes the information all wrong as it was taken in 1928 long before the Count became Regent and the future Duke of Windsor was Prince of Wales!

 

[maria-olivia]

Prince Charles did not attend his Mother's Funerals
King Leopold III did not attend Prince Charles , his Brother's Funerals.

 

[Prinsara]

Prince Charles did not attend his Mother's Funerals
King Leopold III did not attend Prince Charles , his Brother's Funerals.

The first might be responsible for the second.

However, since Leopold only outlived Charles by a few months, isn't it possible he wasn't well enough to go? (Did their sister? Did...anyone?)

Despite being a pair of brothers who make the current William and Harry look like best friends for life, I seem to recall Leopold was sad when he heard Charles was dead. Maybe because they had never been able to work things out.

 

[Blog Real]

Prince Charles funeral:

 

[maria-olivia]

The first part of the Funerals took place at the St jacques Church such as his Brother Leopold III Funerals because as the cathedral was closed for restaurations.
This is the second part in the Church Notre Dame de Laeken . The Royal Ladies of the House of Belgium and Savoie did not attend. He is burried in the Princes gallery of th e Cryypt next to Empress Charlotte of Mexico , born Princesss of Belgium

 

[Prinsara]

On the one hand, if Charles really participated in the Resistance, that ought to be remembered and celebrated by somebody in Belgium today — least of all the RF. The fact that this is so poorly documented and ignored makes me question the veracity of it all.

 

[maria-olivia]

Books and Books are written about the Count of Flanders !

 

[Prinsara]

And how many of them cover exactly what he was doing in the war and by people he didn’t supposedly marry?

And why has the BRF never chosen to celebrate that he supposedly risked his life and instead continued…not to do that?

And why would he work for the Resistance and yet not lift a finger when his brother, sister-in-law, niece and nephews all could have been killed?

I realize Charles was an unhappy, uneasy guy who chose to live in a roundabout way, but there are too many gaps and things don’t seem to add up.

 

[Mbruno]

.

In a royal family, you're in or you're out. You can't decide to be royal only when no one else is around. If Charles really cared about his country and wanted people to appreciate him, he could have used his post-regency leverage to assist Baudouin. He ran off, instead. Again.

I don't think King Baudouin needed any assistance from his father or his uncle, nor do I think the Belgian government would have accepted it. The whole point of Baudouin's reign after all was to turn the page on the trauma of the war years and the subsequent constitutional crisis.

Neither Leopold nor Charles were suitable Heads of State in my humble opinion, but from what I read about it, Charles at least tried to stick with the principles of constitutional monarchy whereas Leopold was repeatedly guilty of acting unconstitutionally. Am I wrong?

The first part of the Funerals took place at the St jacques Church such as his Brother Leopold III Funerals because as the cathedral was closed for restaurations.
This is the second part in the Church Notre Dame de Laeken . The Royal Ladies of the House of Belgium and Savoie did not attend. He is burried in the Princes gallery of th e Cryypt next to Empress Charlotte of Mexico , born Princesss of Belgium

Thanks, Maria Olivia. I noticed in the video which Blog Real posted that the Royal Ladies did not attend the funeral and that caught my attention. Why was that the case?

 

[Marengo]

There are various biographies about Charles. The one by Rien Emmery is the most important one up to date AFAIK.

I am not quite sure what Charles was supposed to have done to get Leopold out of captivity? Prof. van den Wijngaart claims that the actual danger for the family was much less than they perceived -he even called it a fiction.

In the first years after the abdication Baudouin was heavily under the thumb of his father and his stepmother. Up to the point that prime minister Gaston Eyskens wrote a ministerial decree in 1959 ordering Leopold and Lilian out of Laeken. In private he urged the King to get married.

I suppose for Leopold it was easier to blame his brother and politicians for his own misjudgements than to do some introspection. His sons will have been influenced by their father's vendetta. After his return Baudouin refused to enter the royal palace as long as his uncle was still inside of it. In 2013 King Albert aknowledged that Charles played an important role.

 

[Stefan]

The first part of the Funerals took place at the St jacques Church such as his Brother Leopold III Funerals because as the cathedral was closed for restaurations.
This is the second part in the Church Notre Dame de Laeken . The Royal Ladies of the House of Belgium and Savoie did not attend. He is burried in the Princes gallery of th e Cryypt next to Empress Charlotte of Mexico , born Princesss of Belgium

Did the royal laides not attend at all? Or only not the Part in Laeken?

 

[An Ard Ri]

Why was there no standard on his coffin?

 

[Mbruno]

Why was there no standard on his coffin?

The video says that the Belgian flag was removed from the coffin when it entered the Church. I don't understand why, maybe the Belgian or Dutch posters can explain.

I have also noticed that members of the Belgian royal family do not use a royal standard on their coffins, only a Belgian national flag, although the Royal Family does have a banner of arms and a rather elaborate armorial. Maybe someone can explain that too.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belgian_heraldry#Royal_heraldry

 

[Stefan]

I have also noticed that members of the Belgian royal family do not use a royal standard in their coffins, only a Belgian national flag, although the Royal Family does have a banner of arms and a rather elaborate armorial. Maybe someone can explain that too.

Also in the Netherlands only the national Flag is one the coffin. At last this was the case at the funerals of Prince Claus, Queen Juliana and prince Bernhard.

 

[SirGyamfi1]

It was said that Lady Anne Cavendish-Bentinck’s , a cousin of QEQM, her family were friends with the Belgian royals would sometimes host Prince Charles and hopped that their daughter would marry him, but she refused to meet him.

 

[JR76]

It was said that Lady Anne Cavendish-Bentinck’s , a cousin of QEQM, her family were friends with the Belgian royals would sometimes host Prince Charles and hopped that their daughter would marry him, but she refused to meet him.

She allegedly locked herself into her bedroom at Wellbeck and refused to come out.

 

[SirGyamfi1]

She allegedly locked herself into her bedroom at Wellbeck and refused to come out.

I heard about that too. She rather wanted to marry the broke Duke of Leeds, but her parents weren’t favor of that so she never married. If only she married Prince Charles, the Belgian royals would have some very lovely and exquisite jewels to own or get to use, but oh well.

 

[SirGyamfi1]

Prince Charles was a carbon copy of his mother, Queen Elisabeth of Belgium. Wow!

 

[maria-olivia]

The Count of Flanders saved our Monarchy in 1945 to 1950. He was an excellent Regent receiving the President of France Charles de Gaulle and Winston Churchill on State Visit in Bruxelles .
His Mother Queen Elisabeth ,our greatest Queen ever , did not like him.
May I ask how many books you read about the Count of Flanders . I have 3 at home.
He had official State Funerals at Saint Jacques de Coudeberg as the Carthedral was closed. The whole Royal Family , his Sister Marie Josée and the Princes of Savoie did attend, but his Brother Leopold III and Princess Lilian did not !

 

[Prinsara]

He might have been leaning a little bit too heavily into the movie-villain imagery here. https://www.oocities.org/henrivanoene/images/charlesofflanders.gif

Is the giant portrait of Leopold II just so he can say there's someone more hated in the room?

 

[maria-olivia]

Prince Charles was a carbon copy of his mother, Queen Elisabeth of Belgium. Wow!

I do not appreciate your comment . I do the one of Pinsara about his late years.

 

[SirGyamfi1]

I do not appreciate your comment . I do the one of Pinsara about his late years.

I meant when he was a child he looked just like his mother. What’s wrong with that?

 

[Linda_26]

Prince Charles, Count of Flanders, pictured around 1973/1974 with Princess Paola and a young Prince Laurent, who were visiting an exhibition of his artworks:
https://cdn.imago-images.com/bild/st/0085218462/m.jpg