Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of iHeartRadio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Manky listener discretion advised. In January eighteen twenty one, Prince Wilhelm of Prussia went to the theater. But he wouldn't merely be a member of the audience. He would actually be performing in a production based on a poem by Thomas Moore, staged in honor of the Grand Princess Alexandra Fedorovna, in front of an audience of three thousand at the Whitehall of the Royal Castle. Prince Wilhelm and a number of other aristocrats were acting in a romance about the fictional daughter of a seventeenth century Mughal emperor falling in love with another man instead of the king she was arranged to marry. Little did Prince Wilhelm know that life would imitate art, he too, would fall for a forbidden partner that very night. Her name was Princess Elisa van Radswell or Ragevue, a Polish noble woman who happened to be playing a goddess heavenly desire in the production. Wilhelm was enamored with her performance, noting that it had overcome the audience. He wrote in his diary quote magical, idealistic, an ethereal touch hung over the whole, unforgettable Elisa forever. When Alisa and Wilhelm showed up together at her parents' silver wedding, shortly thereafter, people began to suspect that the two were an item. One minister sought out more information about Elisa and discovered that her family was of relatively low rank within the Polish aristocratic hierarchy. Even though Elisa's mother was a Prussian princess, she married into a lower rank, meaning that Eliza was ineligible for the throne. The minister put together his findings in a report titled a Memorandum on the Legally Inappropriate Status of the Marriage of a Royal Prince of Prussia to Princess Radswell, which speaks to the disastrous results of the investigation, with the disapproval of Wilhelm's family codified in writing. A union between Prince Wilhelm and Elisa seemed less of a heavenly romance and more like a tragedy. But that wouldn't be the end of Elisa and Wilhelm's love story. The two would do everything in their power to overcome the odds and stay together, much to the chagrin of Wilhelm's royal family. I'm Dana Schwartz and this is noble blood. Visa and Wilhelm had actually first met as children, although under less than ideal circumstances. It was during a politically tumultuous time, as Napoleon was advancing into Germany and Prussia, culminating in a battle at jennen ousterstad And October eighteen o six. Wilhelm's father, King Friedrich Wilhelm the third, was leading the Prussian forces, but he suffered a crushing defeat, with Napoleon and his troops occupying Berlin. This sent the king's family into a three year exile in Koenigsburg, which was a center of resistance to Napoleon, where they met up with the Radswills, who were also in exile at that time. Eliza was three years old and print Wilhelm was six. While the adults were fretting about their potential return to Germany, the children were enjoying their new found freedom. Contempt Lip Praiary recalled quote. They spent the summer on the Amber coast of the Baltic sea, the winter, tobogganing together, and there were places to play in front of the steined Amerateur and in the old castle. Eliza could not only play with her siblings Wilhelm, Ferdinand and Louise, but also with Prince Wilhelm, his brother, the Crown Prince, who was two years older than he was, and his favorite sister Charlotte end Quote. In eighteen o nine, King Friedrich Wilhelm the third agreed to Napoleon's repatriation claims, so the royal family and the Radswells could end their exile and return to Berlin. But the families would grow even more intertwined after Wilhelm's mother, Queen Louise, died at the age of thirty four. Eliza's mother became something of a mother figure two Wilhelm, who was only twelve at the time of his mother's death. The Radswells moved from Poland to Berlin depending on the season, and when they moved more permanently to Berlin, the love affair between Alisa and Wilhelm began to flourish. Wilhelm was twenty at the time and began cavorting with the seventeen year old Eliza at the palace where Wilhelm's sisters lived.

Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of iHeartRadio and Grimm and Mild from Aaron Manky listener discretion advised. In January eighteen twenty one, Prince Wilhelm of Prussia went to the theater. But he wouldn't merely be a member of the audience. He would actually be performing in a production based on a poem by Thomas Moore, staged in honor of the Grand Princess Alexandra Fedorovna, in front of an audience of three thousand at the Whitehall of the Royal Castle. Prince Wilhelm and a number of other aristocrats were acting in a romance about the fictional daughter of a seventeenth century Mughal emperor falling in love with another man instead of the king she was arranged to marry. Little did Prince Wilhelm know that life would imitate art, he too, would fall for a forbidden partner that very night. Her name was Princess Elisa van Radswell or Ragevue, a Polish noble woman who happened to be playing a goddess heavenly desire in the production. Wilhelm was enamored with her performance, noting that it had overcome the audience. He wrote in his diary quote magical, idealistic, an ethereal touch hung over the whole, unforgettable Elisa forever. When Alisa and Wilhelm showed up together at her parents' silver wedding, shortly thereafter, people began to suspect that the two were an item. One minister sought out more information about Elisa and discovered that her family was of relatively low rank within the Polish aristocratic hierarchy. Even though Elisa's mother was a Prussian princess, she married into a lower rank, meaning that Eliza was ineligible for the throne. The minister put together his findings in a report titled a Memorandum on the Legally Inappropriate Status of the Marriage of a Royal Prince of Prussia to Princess Radswell, which speaks to the disastrous results of the investigation, with the disapproval of Wilhelm's family codified in writing. A union between Prince Wilhelm and Elisa seemed less of a heavenly romance and more like a tragedy. But that wouldn't be the end of Elisa and Wilhelm's love story. The two would do everything in their power to overcome the odds and stay together, much to the chagrin of Wilhelm's royal family. I'm Dana Schwartz and this is noble blood. Visa and Wilhelm had actually first met as children, although under less than ideal circumstances. It was during a politically tumultuous time, as Napoleon was advancing into Germany and Prussia, culminating in a battle at jennen ousterstad And October eighteen o six. Wilhelm's father, King Friedrich Wilhelm the third, was leading the Prussian forces, but he suffered a crushing defeat, with Napoleon and his troops occupying Berlin. This sent the king's family into a three year exile in Koenigsburg, which was a center of resistance to Napoleon, where they met up with the Radswills, who were also in exile at that time. Eliza was three years old and print Wilhelm was six. While the adults were fretting about their potential return to Germany, the children were enjoying their new found freedom. Contempt Lip Praiary recalled quote. They spent the summer on the Amber coast of the Baltic sea, the winter, tobogganing together, and there were places to play in front of the steined Amerateur and in the old castle. Eliza could not only play with her siblings Wilhelm, Ferdinand and Louise, but also with Prince Wilhelm, his brother, the Crown Prince, who was two years older than he was, and his favorite sister Charlotte end Quote. In eighteen o nine, King Friedrich Wilhelm the third agreed to Napoleon's repatriation claims, so the royal family and the Radswells could end their exile and return to Berlin. But the families would grow even more intertwined after Wilhelm's mother, Queen Louise, died at the age of thirty four. Eliza's mother became something of a mother figure two Wilhelm, who was only twelve at the time of his mother's death. The Radswells moved from Poland to Berlin depending on the season, and when they moved more permanently to Berlin, the love affair between Alisa and Wilhelm began to flourish. Wilhelm was twenty at the time and began cavorting with the seventeen year old Eliza at the palace where Wilhelm's sisters lived.

The two were spotted at parties, salons, and receptions, even at times taking trips to the country together. Wilhelm noted in his diary, Alisa has really grown up and become somewhat stronger and more to the point charming. By eighteen twenty, Wilhelm began to visit the Radswells more frequently, which drew even more attention because in March of that year, Elisa was confirmed by the court chaplain and the dean of the cathedral in the Chapel of the Royal Castle, which made Elisa eligible for marriage, putting her relationship with Wilhelm under scrutiny. Some even suspected that King Friedrich Wilhelm had engineered the confirmation so Eliza could become his daughter in law. Wilhelm announced that he was in love with Eliza at the Prussian King's summer residence in June eighteen twenty. When the two returned to Berlin, Wilhelm was seen coming out of the Radswell Palace almost every day. Little did Wilhelm know that the minister was drawing up a dossier against the Union and that many of his friends and family members were working together to try to tear the two of them apart. In late eighteen twenty, Wilhelm saw Eliza while she was on holiday at the Summer Palace, but rather than greeting her warmly as he had so many times before, he ignored her. When Alisa left, he burst into tears. Wilhelm's strange behavior was a result of threats to his relationship with Elisa. From behind the scenes. Wilhelm's family had been discouraging him from pursuing her. His sisters suggested he marry a different princess instead, while his adjunct and took a stronger approach, mandating that it would be impossible for him to marry Elisa without his father's approval. Meanwhile, the king had heard these rumors that his son was involved with Elisa, and he started meeting with his advisers. Some were actually supportive of the union. The King's brother in law, for instance, fought for the two to be together. He argued that there is actually a precedent for the two to be together. Elisa's father, Prince Radswell, had aristocratic ties to the Holy Roman Empire from fifteen fifteen. Moreover, there had been marriages between the princes of Brandenburg and the Radswells for two hundred years. That suggested that the Radswells were high status enough to marry in to the family, as Wilhelm's father was the Elector of Brandenburg in the Holy Roman Empire before it was dissolved in eighteen o six. But some technicalities complicated what seemed like Eliza's blue blood bonafides. The Radswill family had no property within the former boundary of the Holy Roman Empire, meaning that they were not members of the reich Council of Princes, which was an important factor in determining aristocratic rank. Moreover, those previous marriages between the Brandenburgs and the Radswell's occurred when the Princes of Brandenburg had no regal office, making the two families more similar in status back then. By the eighteen twenties, Friedrich the Third was the King of Prussia, which elevated the family into a much higher echelon. The law emphasized that prince were only eligible to marry the daughters of ruling princely houses or sovereigns recognized by the Reich, making a union between Wilhelm and Elisa actually illegal. Moreover, if Wilhelm's older brother, the crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm, died, Wilhelm would succeed to the throne, which meant there was even more pressure on his marriage. The king's closest adviser compiled a list of daughters of twenty nine reigning European royal houses who were not yet married to make it easy for Wilhelm to choose a different wife instead. In February eighteen twenty two, the king sat down with Wilhelm and formally dissuaded his son from pursuing Elisa, arguing that it was against the law. After so many reports and dossiers and interventions from family members, Wilhelm seemed to heed his father's warnings. It's finished. The precious, loving, angelic being is lost to me, he wrote at the time. But in spite of his family's disapproval, he and Elisa continued to meet up at balls and go on secret dates. Whatever was to come, they swore to be friends forever. Wilhelm and Elisa parted, with Wilhelm fleeing to the Rhineland and the Netherlands to escape his romantic woes. He spent his twenty fifth birthday, the day he had once wanted to marry Elisa away from her in Holland. She wrote him a benign, formal birthday message, and if Wilhelm wanted to write her back, he had to send his message to her mother. His sister Charlotte sent him a little portrait of Elisa as a birthday present, which he kept on his desk. After reflecting on his love for Elisa while he was away, Wilhelm returned to Berlin with renewed fervor to stand up to his father and marry the woman he loved once and for all. Wilhelm and Elisa continued to go to the theater together, they took long strolls in the gardens of the palace, and they had long talks at the Raswell's house in Berlin. Wilhelm recorded these conversations in his diary at Length, where he wrote quote no one else in the world but her, and that she was the joy of his life. To win over the rest of his family and the royal officials, Wilhelm commissioned a counter study from two legal experts that affirmed his right to marry Elisa, but that study did not sway the Union's detractors. A collection of ministers and the director of Police rejected it. Another counselor clapped back with not one, but three further dossiers that called a potential marriage between Alisa and Wilhelm a mismarriage that would destroy the hierarchy of the royal family. The Prussian Foreign Minister was asked to make the final judgment on the case, but he declined, arguing that he didn't have enough information to assess the Polish aristocracy that the Radswells belonged to. He suggested that the king be the one to make the final decision, leaving Elisa and Wilhelm's fate in Wilhelm's father's hands. Tensions in the royal household reached a fever pitch as the king hemmed and hawed about his decision. The Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm sided with his brother, tearing apart the various official reports written by government officials who he called court toadies. He even got into a violent spat with his uncle, who had put together a dossier of his own to try to separate Wilhelm and Elisa. In response to all of this commotion, the Radswell family had fled Berlin. The King's hesitation to approve the marriage was deeply insulting to the rads Wills, especially since Eliza's mother and the king were related. The family began to suspect that the king had ulterior political motives for tearing the two apart. In seventeen ninety five, Poland was split between Prussia, the Habsburg Monarchy, and Russia. Elisa's father had wanted to reunify the country and petitioned both the Congress of Vienna and Wilhelm's father to help. Perhaps to unite the country under the leadership of Prussia. Maybe the rejection of the marriage between Elisa and Wilhelm was a signal of the rejection of Polish unification and independence. Elisa and Wilhelm continued corresponding, sending each other flowers, leaves, jewelry, and locks of hair. On Elisa's nineteenth birthday, Wilhelm wrote to her parents quote, Elisa is indispensable for the happiness in my life. Meanwhile, the crown Prince, Wilhelm's older brother wrote a written statement of his own to counter all of the dossiers that were being drawn up to spite his younger brother's relationship. After all, it turned out that the King's new daughter in law from the Crown Prince's marriage to the Princess Elizabeth of Bavaria, was actually descended from a Radswell, but that did little to sway the royal officials, who maintained that Elisa did not come from a high status enough royal family. Wilhelm wrote a letter of his own asking the King for a decision, pleading with him to let him marry Elisa, but he conceded in the letter that he would agree to whatever decision the King made. Elisa also wrote the King a letter that complained of the public humiliation she was enduring as a result of the King's waffling, imploring him to officially condone the marriage. Finally, the King called a family meeting in the Hirshburg Valley, where the royal family and the Radswells met together for the first time since they all were in exile in eighteen o six. The meeting didn't have Wilhelm present, but Elisa made a positive impression on the King, who noted her beauty and friendliness. After years of mounting dossier's and counter dossiers, the King decided to let the couple marry. The plan would be to have Elisa be adopted by a ruling royal house so that the marriage would be legally permitted. The king asked the Russian Czar to adopt Eliza, but he declined. The Habsburgs also declined. That left Prince August of Prussia the infantry general and the wealthiest landowner in Russia. This whole ordeal humiliated the Radswills, since it rhified that their family was so low status that they had to literally let their daughter be adopted out to another family. To add insult to injury, Prince August of Prussia was a known for landerer who had over twelve illegitimate children, which made him an embarrassing choice as an adopted father for Eliza. Still, the couple was elated. Wilhelm hadn't seen Eliza in three years, but he traveled to Poland in February eighteen twenty five, where the two officially got engaged. But the marriage hit yet another snag before it could get off the ground. Crown Prince Friedrich had been unable to produce an air he and his wife had only daughters. This left Wilhelm responsible for the royal succession putting increased pressure on his potential marriage to Elisa, the royal ministers implored him to call off the marriage. Elisa was forced to wait away from Wilhelm, celebrating her twenty second birthday alone in her family's hunting lodge. Meanwhile, Wilhelm traveled with his younger brother Karl to w Weimar to visit the princesses Marie and Augusta von saken Weimar Eisenach. Marie and Augusta had yet to get engaged, and Karl hit it off with Marie instantly, but the princess's mother, sister of the Czar, would only agree to let Karl and Marie get married if Wilhelm did not marry Elisa. Grand Duke Karl august von saken Weimar Eisenach doubled down, sending an ultimatum to the king that Karl and Marie could only be wed if the royal family had no links with the Radswells, who the second Vaimar eisenachs considered to be too low status. With that ultimatum in mind, in June eighteen twenty six, King Friedrich Wilhelm the third wrote a letter to his son that prohibited him from marrying Elisa once in for all. Wilhelm, with no choice, reluctantly accepted the decision. He wrote to the Radswells, the bond of love between Elisa and me has been dissolved. May her friendship with me remain until death. Karl and Marie married in May eighteen twenty eight, and one year later Wilhelm proposed to her sister Augusta. Those two were married in June eighteen twenty nine. Meanwhile, the House of Radswell was suffering setbacks and deaths. In response to an uprising in the Russian heart of Poland led by Elisa's uncle, the Prussian King revoked Elisa's father's role in the Prussian state. Eliza's two brothers, sister in law, father, and godchild all died within a few years. Elisa herself fell ill after caring for her late brother Vadislov, and she died shortly after, on September twenty seventh, eighteen thirty four. Wilhelm would go on to become the King of Prussia in eighteen sixty one after his brother's death. Even after all of those years apart and a marriage to another woman, he still longed for Elisa he kept Elisea's portrait, the one his sister had sent him, on his desk, until his death in eighteen eighty eight, more than fifty years after his love had died. That's the story of Wilhelm and Alisa, but stick around to hear about the band film based on their love story. In nineteen thirty eight, the Forbidden love story between Alisa and Wilhelm was made into a movie titled A Prussian Love Story. The film takes some liberties with the story setting their fateful meeting at Frihenwald, where they spent the day falling in love, before meeting again by chance in Berlin, where Wilhelm listens to Elisa's singing. The rest of the movie follows the King's attempts to break the two apart, albeit in a more dramatic form than a series of dossiers written by various royal officials. The film starred Lyda Barrova, a check actress, as Elisa. At the time she was shooting the film, Barrova had been having an affair with Joseph Gebels, the chief propagandist for the Nazi Party. When Gebels and Barrava began to make their affair public, Gerbel's wife asked Hitler himself for permission to divorce her husband. Hitler rebuked Gebels, forcing him to end his affair with Barrava in August nineteen thirty eight. A Prussian Love Story was set to come out later that year, but the Nazis banned the film because of the purported similarities between Eliza's forbidden love affair with Wilhelm and the actresses with Gerbels. At screenings of her other movies, Paid Shills yelled out get out Minister's Whore when her character appeared on screen. She fled back to Prague that winter. The film wouldn't come out until nineteen fifty, when it was renamed Story of Love. Noble Blood is a production of iHeart Radio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Mankey. Noble Blood is hosted by me Dana Schwartz, with additional writing and research by Hannah Johnston, Hannahswick, Courtney Sender, Amy hit and Julia Melaney. The show is edited and produced by Jesse Funk, with supervising producer rima il Kaali and executive producers Aaron Manke, Trevor Young, and Matt Frederick. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

The two were spotted at parties, salons, and receptions, even at times taking trips to the country together. Wilhelm noted in his diary, Alisa has really grown up and become somewhat stronger and more to the point charming. By eighteen twenty, Wilhelm began to visit the Radswells more frequently, which drew even more attention because in March of that year, Elisa was confirmed by the court chaplain and the dean of the cathedral in the Chapel of the Royal Castle, which made Elisa eligible for marriage, putting her relationship with Wilhelm under scrutiny. Some even suspected that King Friedrich Wilhelm had engineered the confirmation so Eliza could become his daughter in law. Wilhelm announced that he was in love with Eliza at the Prussian King's summer residence in June eighteen twenty. When the two returned to Berlin, Wilhelm was seen coming out of the Radswell Palace almost every day. Little did Wilhelm know that the minister was drawing up a dossier against the Union and that many of his friends and family members were working together to try to tear the two of them apart. In late eighteen twenty, Wilhelm saw Eliza while she was on holiday at the Summer Palace, but rather than greeting her warmly as he had so many times before, he ignored her. When Alisa left, he burst into tears. Wilhelm's strange behavior was a result of threats to his relationship with Elisa. From behind the scenes. Wilhelm's family had been discouraging him from pursuing her. His sisters suggested he marry a different princess instead, while his adjunct and took a stronger approach, mandating that it would be impossible for him to marry Elisa without his father's approval. Meanwhile, the king had heard these rumors that his son was involved with Elisa, and he started meeting with his advisers. Some were actually supportive of the union. The King's brother in law, for instance, fought for the two to be together. He argued that there is actually a precedent for the two to be together. Elisa's father, Prince Radswell, had aristocratic ties to the Holy Roman Empire from fifteen fifteen. Moreover, there had been marriages between the princes of Brandenburg and the Radswells for two hundred years. That suggested that the Radswells were high status enough to marry in to the family, as Wilhelm's father was the Elector of Brandenburg in the Holy Roman Empire before it was dissolved in eighteen o six. But some technicalities complicated what seemed like Eliza's blue blood bonafides. The Radswill family had no property within the former boundary of the Holy Roman Empire, meaning that they were not members of the reich Council of Princes, which was an important factor in determining aristocratic rank. Moreover, those previous marriages between the Brandenburgs and the Radswell's occurred when the Princes of Brandenburg had no regal office, making the two families more similar in status back then. By the eighteen twenties, Friedrich the Third was the King of Prussia, which elevated the family into a much higher echelon. The law emphasized that prince were only eligible to marry the daughters of ruling princely houses or sovereigns recognized by the Reich, making a union between Wilhelm and Elisa actually illegal. Moreover, if Wilhelm's older brother, the crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm, died, Wilhelm would succeed to the throne, which meant there was even more pressure on his marriage. The king's closest adviser compiled a list of daughters of twenty nine reigning European royal houses who were not yet married to make it easy for Wilhelm to choose a different wife instead. In February eighteen twenty two, the king sat down with Wilhelm and formally dissuaded his son from pursuing Elisa, arguing that it was against the law. After so many reports and dossiers and interventions from family members, Wilhelm seemed to heed his father's warnings. It's finished. The precious, loving, angelic being is lost to me, he wrote at the time. But in spite of his family's disapproval, he and Elisa continued to meet up at balls and go on secret dates. Whatever was to come, they swore to be friends forever. Wilhelm and Elisa parted, with Wilhelm fleeing to the Rhineland and the Netherlands to escape his romantic woes. He spent his twenty fifth birthday, the day he had once wanted to marry Elisa away from her in Holland. She wrote him a benign, formal birthday message, and if Wilhelm wanted to write her back, he had to send his message to her mother. His sister Charlotte sent him a little portrait of Elisa as a birthday present, which he kept on his desk. After reflecting on his love for Elisa while he was away, Wilhelm returned to Berlin with renewed fervor to stand up to his father and marry the woman he loved once and for all. Wilhelm and Elisa continued to go to the theater together, they took long strolls in the gardens of the palace, and they had long talks at the Raswell's house in Berlin. Wilhelm recorded these conversations in his diary at Length, where he wrote quote no one else in the world but her, and that she was the joy of his life. To win over the rest of his family and the royal officials, Wilhelm commissioned a counter study from two legal experts that affirmed his right to marry Elisa, but that study did not sway the Union's detractors. A collection of ministers and the director of Police rejected it. Another counselor clapped back with not one, but three further dossiers that called a potential marriage between Alisa and Wilhelm a mismarriage that would destroy the hierarchy of the royal family. The Prussian Foreign Minister was asked to make the final judgment on the case, but he declined, arguing that he didn't have enough information to assess the Polish aristocracy that the Radswells belonged to. He suggested that the king be the one to make the final decision, leaving Elisa and Wilhelm's fate in Wilhelm's father's hands. Tensions in the royal household reached a fever pitch as the king hemmed and hawed about his decision. The Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm sided with his brother, tearing apart the various official reports written by government officials who he called court toadies. He even got into a violent spat with his uncle, who had put together a dossier of his own to try to separate Wilhelm and Elisa. In response to all of this commotion, the Radswell family had fled Berlin. The King's hesitation to approve the marriage was deeply insulting to the rads Wills, especially since Eliza's mother and the king were related. The family began to suspect that the king had ulterior political motives for tearing the two apart. In seventeen ninety five, Poland was split between Prussia, the Habsburg Monarchy, and Russia. Elisa's father had wanted to reunify the country and petitioned both the Congress of Vienna and Wilhelm's father to help. Perhaps to unite the country under the leadership of Prussia. Maybe the rejection of the marriage between Elisa and Wilhelm was a signal of the rejection of Polish unification and independence. Elisa and Wilhelm continued corresponding, sending each other flowers, leaves, jewelry, and locks of hair. On Elisa's nineteenth birthday, Wilhelm wrote to her parents quote, Elisa is indispensable for the happiness in my life. Meanwhile, the crown Prince, Wilhelm's older brother wrote a written statement of his own to counter all of the dossiers that were being drawn up to spite his younger brother's relationship. After all, it turned out that the King's new daughter in law from the Crown Prince's marriage to the Princess Elizabeth of Bavaria, was actually descended from a Radswell, but that did little to sway the royal officials, who maintained that Elisa did not come from a high status enough royal family. Wilhelm wrote a letter of his own asking the King for a decision, pleading with him to let him marry Elisa, but he conceded in the letter that he would agree to whatever decision the King made. Elisa also wrote the King a letter that complained of the public humiliation she was enduring as a result of the King's waffling, imploring him to officially condone the marriage. Finally, the King called a family meeting in the Hirshburg Valley, where the royal family and the Radswells met together for the first time since they all were in exile in eighteen o six. The meeting didn't have Wilhelm present, but Elisa made a positive impression on the King, who noted her beauty and friendliness. After years of mounting dossier's and counter dossiers, the King decided to let the couple marry. The plan would be to have Elisa be adopted by a ruling royal house so that the marriage would be legally permitted. The king asked the Russian Czar to adopt Eliza, but he declined. The Habsburgs also declined. That left Prince August of Prussia the infantry general and the wealthiest landowner in Russia. This whole ordeal humiliated the Radswills, since it rhified that their family was so low status that they had to literally let their daughter be adopted out to another family. To add insult to injury, Prince August of Prussia was a known for landerer who had over twelve illegitimate children, which made him an embarrassing choice as an adopted father for Eliza. Still, the couple was elated. Wilhelm hadn't seen Eliza in three years, but he traveled to Poland in February eighteen twenty five, where the two officially got engaged. But the marriage hit yet another snag before it could get off the ground. Crown Prince Friedrich had been unable to produce an air he and his wife had only daughters. This left Wilhelm responsible for the royal succession putting increased pressure on his potential marriage to Elisa, the royal ministers implored him to call off the marriage. Elisa was forced to wait away from Wilhelm, celebrating her twenty second birthday alone in her family's hunting lodge. Meanwhile, Wilhelm traveled with his younger brother Karl to w Weimar to visit the princesses Marie and Augusta von saken Weimar Eisenach. Marie and Augusta had yet to get engaged, and Karl hit it off with Marie instantly, but the princess's mother, sister of the Czar, would only agree to let Karl and Marie get married if Wilhelm did not marry Elisa. Grand Duke Karl august von saken Weimar Eisenach doubled down, sending an ultimatum to the king that Karl and Marie could only be wed if the royal family had no links with the Radswells, who the second Vaimar eisenachs considered to be too low status. With that ultimatum in mind, in June eighteen twenty six, King Friedrich Wilhelm the third wrote a letter to his son that prohibited him from marrying Elisa once in for all. Wilhelm, with no choice, reluctantly accepted the decision. He wrote to the Radswells, the bond of love between Elisa and me has been dissolved. May her friendship with me remain until death. Karl and Marie married in May eighteen twenty eight, and one year later Wilhelm proposed to her sister Augusta. Those two were married in June eighteen twenty nine. Meanwhile, the House of Radswell was suffering setbacks and deaths. In response to an uprising in the Russian heart of Poland led by Elisa's uncle, the Prussian King revoked Elisa's father's role in the Prussian state. Eliza's two brothers, sister in law, father, and godchild all died within a few years. Elisa herself fell ill after caring for her late brother Vadislov, and she died shortly after, on September twenty seventh, eighteen thirty four. Wilhelm would go on to become the King of Prussia in eighteen sixty one after his brother's death. Even after all of those years apart and a marriage to another woman, he still longed for Elisa he kept Elisea's portrait, the one his sister had sent him, on his desk, until his death in eighteen eighty eight, more than fifty years after his love had died. That's the story of Wilhelm and Alisa, but stick around to hear about the band film based on their love story. In nineteen thirty eight, the Forbidden love story between Alisa and Wilhelm was made into a movie titled A Prussian Love Story. The film takes some liberties with the story setting their fateful meeting at Frihenwald, where they spent the day falling in love, before meeting again by chance in Berlin, where Wilhelm listens to Elisa's singing. The rest of the movie follows the King's attempts to break the two apart, albeit in a more dramatic form than a series of dossiers written by various royal officials. The film starred Lyda Barrova, a check actress, as Elisa. At the time she was shooting the film, Barrova had been having an affair with Joseph Gebels, the chief propagandist for the Nazi Party. When Gebels and Barrava began to make their affair public, Gerbel's wife asked Hitler himself for permission to divorce her husband. Hitler rebuked Gebels, forcing him to end his affair with Barrava in August nineteen thirty eight. A Prussian Love Story was set to come out later that year, but the Nazis banned the film because of the purported similarities between Eliza's forbidden love affair with Wilhelm and the actresses with Gerbels. At screenings of her other movies, Paid Shills yelled out get out Minister's Whore when her character appeared on screen. She fled back to Prague that winter. The film wouldn't come out until nineteen fifty, when it was renamed Story of Love. Noble Blood is a production of iHeart Radio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Mankey. Noble Blood is hosted by me Dana Schwartz, with additional writing and research by Hannah Johnston, Hannahswick, Courtney Sender, Amy hit and Julia Melaney. The show is edited and produced by Jesse Funk, with supervising producer rima il Kaali and executive producers Aaron Manke, Trevor Young, and Matt Frederick. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.