Carol Victor, Hereditary Prince of Albania (Karl Viktor Wilhelm Friedrich Ernst Günther zu Wied, 19 May 19138 December 1973), was the only son of William, Prince of Albania, and briefly heir to the

Principality of Albania The Principality of Albania () was a monarchy from 1914 to 1925. It was headed by Wilhelm, Prince of Albania, and located in modern Albania in the Balkans, Balkan region of Europe. The Ottoman Empire owned the land until the First Balkan Wa ...

. He held the title of ''Hereditary Prince of Albania''. He was also styled Skënder, in homage to

Skanderbeg Gjergj Kastrioti (17 January 1468), commonly known as Skanderbeg, was an Albanians, Albanian Albanian nobility, feudal lord and military commander who led Skanderbeg's rebellion, a rebellion against the Ottoman Empire in what is today Albania, ...

, the national hero.

Early life

Birth and family

Carol Victor was born on 19 May 1913 in

Potsdam Potsdam () is the capital and largest city of the Germany, German States of Germany, state of Brandenburg. It is part of the Berlin/Brandenburg Metropolitan Region. Potsdam sits on the Havel, River Havel, a tributary of the Elbe, downstream of B ...

Kingdom of Prussia The Kingdom of Prussia (, ) was a German state that existed from 1701 to 1918.Marriott, J. A. R., and Charles Grant Robertson. ''The Evolution of Prussia, the Making of an Empire''. Rev. ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1946. It played a signif ...

, as Prince Charles Victor of Wied (). He was the second child and only son of Prince William Frederick of Wied (1876–1945), son of William, Prince of Wied, and Princess Marie of the Netherlands, and his wife, Princess Sophie of Schönburg-Waldenburg (1885–1936), daughter of Victor, Hereditary Prince of Schönburg-Waldenburg and his wife, Princess Lucia of

Sayn-Wittgenstein-Berleburg Sayn-Wittgenstein-Berleburg was one of several imperial counties and later principalities ruled by the House of Sayn-Wittgenstein. Most of the former county is located in the present district of Siegen-Wittgenstein (in the modern state of North ...

. Through his paternal grandmother he was related with the Dutch royal family. His great-grandparents were King William I of the Netherlands and King Frederick William III of Prussia. He had some remote Albanian ancestry through his mother, being a descendant of Ruxandra Ghica, daughter of Grigore I Ghica,

Prince of Wallachia This is a list of princes of Wallachia, from the first mention of a medieval polity situated between the Southern Carpathians and the Danube until the union with Moldavia in 1859, which unification of Moldavia and Wallachia, led to the creation of ...

Hereditary Prince of Albania

On 7 March 1914, appointed by the Great Powers of Europe, his father William was created Prince of Albania. After his father became Prince, he held the title of Hereditary Prince of Albania. With Albania in a state of civil war since July 1914, Greece occupying the south of the country, the great powers at war with one another, the regime collapsed, and so all of his family left the country on 3 September 1914 originally heading to

Venice Venice ( ; ; , formerly ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 islands that are separated by expanses of open water and by canals; portions of the city are li ...

. Despite leaving Albania his father insisted that he remained head of state. In the spring of 1924, the Albanian parliament debated the form of government and Milto Tutulani, a senator, appointed Prince William, his son Carol Victor or a Briton as a monarch.

Education

Carol Victor first attended the Wilhelmsgymnasium in Munich, after that studied law at Tübingen, Munich, Königsberg and Würzburg universities. His doctoral thesis on criminal procedure was published in Stuttgart in 1936. He was a keen swordsman and enjoyed skiing. In 1937, Swire described him as a young man of great ability, with his father's good nature.

World War II

During the Second World War, Carol Victor served as an officer in the German army in Romania, and in the autumn of 1941 there was speculation that the Germans, who had occupied Kingdom of Serbia, including the Kosovo with Albanian majority, would use him to rally Albanians to the German cause. This worried Mussolini's Foreign Minister, Count Ciano, to such extent that in November 1941, he accused the Germans of aiming to construct a new Albanian state led by Prince Carol Victor, which would be anti-Italian and whose militia would take oath directly to Hitler. There appeared to be little truth to Ciano's fears, and the Germans reassured him they had no such ambition for the prince. At the time of second/third Battle of Cassino he belonged to the 44th Infantry Division. On the death of his father, on 18 April 1945 at Predeal, near Sinaia, in Romania, he succeeded as Head of the Princely House of Albania (Wied) and Sovereign Grand Master of the Order of the Black Eagle although he made no public claim to the throne of Albania. Less than a year his father's death, both his uncles William Frederick (''6. Fürst zu Wied'') and Victor, former German ambassador to Sweden (''1933 -1943'') died. Also in 1945, his uncle Günther (''5. Fürst von Schönburg-Waldenburg''), Sophie's brother, was expropriated without compensation and interned at Rügen island (Sächsische Biografie). His sister, Princess Marie Eleonore of Albania (''Princesha e Shqipërisë'') died in a communist internment camp at Miercurea Ciuc, Romania, on 29 September 1956, without issue.

Later life

In 1952, Carol Victor wrote a bibliographical survey of his ancestor the German explorer, ethnologist and naturalist

Prince Maximilian of Wied-Neuwied Prince Alexander Philipp Maximilian zu Wied-Neuwied (23 September 1782 – 3 February 1867) was a German explorer, ethnologist and natural history, naturalist. He led a pioneering expedition to southeast Brazil between 1815 and 1817, from which t ...

. Later he wrote "Maximilian Prinz zu Wied, sein Leben und seine Reisen" ''in Maximilian Prinz zu Wied, unveröffentliche Bilder und Handschriften zur Völkerkunde Brasiliens'', Josef Röder and Hermann Trimborn (editors), Bonn, Ferdinand Dümmler, 1954), pages 13 – 25. In 1960, Carol Victor left the Munich society ''"Freunde des Balletts"'', of which he was president since its foundation in 1956. The following year he published the book: ''"Königinnen des Balletts: Zweihundert Jahre europäisches Ballett"''.

Marriage

On 8 September 1966, whilst living in

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

, Carol Victor married the English-born widow Eileen de Coppet, whose first husband had been

Captain Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader or highest rank officer of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police depa ...

André de Coppet (1892 - 1953). They had no children; de Coppet was in her forties when the marriage occurred. Carol Victor and Eileen lived later in Cheyne Walk, Chelsea, London. Carol Victor died seven years later without issue in

Munich Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...

.Hugh Montgomery-Massingberd, editor, Burke's Royal Families of the World, Volume 1: Europe & Latin America (London, U.K.: Burke's Peerage Ltd, 1977), page 6. Hereinafter cited as Burke's Royal Families of the World, Volume 1 He was buried at

Neuwied Neuwied (, ) is a town in the north of the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate, capital of the Neuwied (district), District of Neuwied. Neuwied lies on the east bank of the Rhine, 12 km northwest of Koblenz, on the railway from Frankfurt ...

. His widow lived on until 1985. The Princely House of Albania became extinct on his death as he had no children, and no arrangements had been put in place for a successor.