Armgard von Cramm


Baroness Armgard of Sierstorpff-Cramm, known as Armgard von Cramm was the mother of Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld, Prince consort of Queen Juliana of the Netherlands.

Early life

Armgard was born at Bad Driburg, Kingdom of Prussia, as the fourth child and fourth daughter of Baron Aschwin of Sierstorpff-Cramm, and his wife, Baroness Hedwig of Sierstorpff-Driburg. By birth, she belonged to the ancient German Cramm family.

Marriages

Armgard married on 24 October 1905 at Hanover to Count Bodo von Oeynhausen, an officer in the 8th Hussars in Paderborn, son of Count Erich von Oeynhausen and his wife, Therese von Lenthe. They divorced in 1908 and had no children.
Armgard married secondly, after the death of her ex-husband, on 4 March 1909 at Oelber, Brunswick to Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld, a younger son of Ernest II, Count of Lippe-Biesterfeld, regent of the Principality of Lippe, and his wife, Countess Karoline von Wartensleben. The marriage was at first considered morganatic, as Armgard's family didn't belong to one of the reigning or former reigning families. Thus, she was created "Countess of Biesterfeld" on 8 February 1909.
They had two sons:
On 24 February 1916, her marriage was declared equal and she was made "Princess of Lippe-Biesterfeld" along with the style Serene Highness by her brother-in-law, Leopold IV, Prince of Lippe, and this title was extended to her two sons in order to produce a new branch of the Lippe family.

World War II

After the death of her husband in 1934, Armgard moved into Reckenwalde palace with her sons and managed an estate in Wojnowo, Lubusz Voivodeship, Province of Brandenburg, together with her new partner, Alexis Pantchoulidzew, an exiled Russian nobleman. Alexis accompanied Armgard to the wedding of Bernhard to Princess Juliana.
During World War II Armgard and Alexis were observed by the local Gestapo. Her apolitical past and the service that the monarchist and anti-Stalinist Colonel Pantchoulidzew later rendered in the war to the German Reich Railway, would have shielded her from Nazi authorities. The SS demanded in September 1944 in Recke, one of Armgard's properties, Schloss Woynowo Walde for military purposes. Armgard and Alexis gave an account of the withdrawal in 1945 of the Wehrmacht behind the Oder-line on their estate at Neumark.
Wim Klinkenberg and some other writers have accused Armgard of sexual promiscuity, intrigue, conspiracy, and – as with her son Aschwin – of Nazi sympathies. In March 2004, her son Bernhard tried to rectify this image with an open letter to The Times.

Life in the Netherlands

She lived from early 1952 with her partner Alexis Pantchoulidzew in House Warmelo at Diepenheim. Alexis went on to be the Netherlands' sole representative at the 1956 Summer Olympics, competing in dressage. Alexis Pantchoulidzew died in 1968.
Armgard was a convert to Roman Catholicism like her granddaughter Princess Irene, but decided against attending Irene's controversial wedding to Carlos Hugo, Duke of Parma, which neither the Dutch royal family nor any Dutch diplomatic representative attended. The family nevertheless gathered at Armgard's home for the television coverage of the wedding.

Death

Armgard died on 27 April 1971 in House Warmelo in Diepenheim, at the age of 87.