Prince Francis of Teck


Prince Francis of Teck, was the brother of the British queen Mary of Teck, wife of King George V.

Family

Francis Joseph Leopold Frederick, known as "Frank", was born at Kensington Palace and educated at Wellington College, Cheltenham College and the Royal Military College, Sandhurst.
His father was Prince Francis, Duke of Teck, the son of Duke Alexander of Württemberg and Countess Claudine Rhédey von Kis-Rhéde. His mother was the Duchess of Teck, the youngest daughter of Prince Adolphus, Duke of Cambridge and a granddaughter of King George III. Frank was thus styled "His Serene Highness Prince Francis of Teck".

Education

He was expelled from Wellington College, Berkshire "for throwing his housemaster over a hedge to win a bet. All through his life he was an incorrigible gambler. He then went to Cheltenham where he got into more trouble."

Personal life

Prince Francis was a gambler, whose debts led to him being sent to pursue his military career in India.
Prince Francis never married. According to Julia P. Gelardi's Born to Rule, Prince Francis was vigorously pursued by Maud of Wales, his sister's sister-in-law. The two exchanged letters, but it soon became clear that Francis was not interested in Maud. She went on to marry her first cousin Prince Carl of Denmark, becoming Queen of Norway in 1905.
Francis had an affair with society beauty Ellen Constance, wife of Francis Needham, 3rd Earl of Kilmorey, to whom he allegedly bequeathed the Cambridge emeralds, part of the Teck family jewels. To recover these family heirlooms, Francis's sister Queen Mary had his will sealed by a court, and subsequently negotiated with Lady Kilmorey to buy back the emeralds, reportedly paying her £10,000 for them.
The English actress Sarah Miles has claimed to be the great-granddaughter of Prince Francis, through her grandfather, allegedly an illegitimate son of the prince called Francis Remnant, born at Richmond, Surrey, in 1894.

Military career

He attended the Royal Military College, Sandhurst and served in the Lancers and the Royal Rifle Corps before joining the Royal Dragoons in 1890. He rose to the rank of Major, before retiring in 1902.
In 1902 he again visited South Africa, and following the end of hostilities returned to England in June that year on board the SS Kinfauns Castle.

Death and legacy

He died suddenly in 1910 at the age of forty, having caught pneumonia at Balmoral.
On his early death, shortly before his sister's coronation as queen of the United Kingdom, Francis of Teck's will set a legal precedent when it was sealed, to avoid potential scandal. The document remains unpublished, and subsequent royal wills have followed this tradition.
He is buried in the Royal Burial Ground, Frogmore.

Ancestry