Maximilian de Beauharnais, 3rd Duke of Leuchtenberg

Maximilian Joseph Eugene Auguste Napoleon de Beauharnais, 3rd Duke of Leuchtenberg, Prince Romanowsky (2 October 1817 – 1 November 1852) was the husband of Grand Duchess Maria Nikolayevna of Russia and first cousin of Emperors Napoleon III of the French, Francis Joseph I of Austria, and Elisabeth of Austria. He was a grandson of Napoleon I's first wife, the Empress Josephine, by her prior marriage to Alexandre de Beauharnais.

A student of Moritz von Jacobi, he is known as one of pioneers in galvanoplasty and an expert in copper and bronze metalworks generally, as well as an art collector. He was the proprietor of the first locomotive works in Russia.

Childhood Portrait of Duke Maximilian von Leuchtenberg by Franz Napoleon Heigel in 1836. He was born as the second son of Eugène de Beauharnais, Duke of Leuchtenberg and Prince of Eichstätt and Princess Augusta Amalia Ludovika Georgia of Bavaria. His maternal grandparents were Maximilian I, King of Bavaria and his first wife Marie Wilhelmine Auguste, Landgravine of Hesse-Darmstadt.

His maternal grandmother Marie Wilhelmine Auguste was a daughter of Georg Wilhelm of Hesse-Darmstadt, younger son of Louis VIII, Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt.

He was a brother of: Auguste de Beauharnais, Prince consort of Maria II of Portugal; Amélie de Beauharnais, Empress consort of Pedro I of Brazil; Josephine of Leuchtenberg, Queen consort of Oscar I of Sweden. Prince Maximilian was born in the kingdom of his maternal grandfather, King Maximilian I of Bavaria. After the fall of the First French Empire and the restoration of the Bourbons in Paris in 1814, Maximilian's father fled France and found refuge with his wife's family in Munich.

Victims of Bavarian protocols, which constantly reminded them that they were inferior to the Wittelsbachs, the Beauharnais family still benefited materially from their exile. With his fortune, Prince Eugène acquired several castles and estates, including the Leuchtenberg Palace in Munich and land situated in the Canton of Thurgau in Switzerland. The French prince also recreated his art collection in Bavaria, and his children grew up among high-quality works of art. but Muscovites disapproved, shocked to see one of their princesses married to a French prince whose father had participated in taking their city in 1812. His father-in-law Nicholas I granted to him on 14 July 1839 the Russian and Finnish style Imperial Highness, a rank he was entitled to as a descendant of the extended dynasty of Napoleon I of France. His father was an adoptive son of Napoleon. He was named major general of the Russian Army and Colonel in Chief of the Hussars Regiment of Kiev. He also received an annual income of 100,000 rubles. The tsar gave Maria an income of 700,000 rubles as well as a sum of 2 million payable in treasury bonds at 4%. For their lodging, the tsar had built and furnished, at his own cost, one palace in St. Petersburg and another near the capital. Knight of St. Andrew, 1838 Knight of St. Alexander Nevsky, 1838 Knight of the White Eagle, 1838 Knight of St. Anna, 1st Class, 1838 Knight of St. Hubert, 1839 Grand Cross of the Southern Cross Knight of the Red Eagle, 1st Class Grand Cross of the Tower and Sword Knight of the Rue Crown, 1841 Sweden-Norway: Commander of the Sword Grand Cross of the Württemberg Crown

Ancestry