Grand Duke Of Luxembourg Adolphe

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Duke of Nassau by birth, who was the first monarch of Luxembourg from the House of Nassau-Weilburg. He was a son of Wilhelm, Duke of Nassau (1792–1839) and his first wife Princess Luise of Saxe-Hildburghausen. Adolphe's half-sister, Sophia of Nassau, was the wife of Oscar II of Sweden. Adolphe became Duke of Nassau in August 1839, after the death of his father. He supported the Austrian Empire in the Austro-Prussian War of 1866. After Austria's defeat, Nassau was annexed to the Kingdom of Prussia and he lost his throne on 20 September 1866. The Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, which had been linked to the Netherlands in personal union since 1815, passed to Adolphe on 23 November 1890 through family connections in accordance with the Nassau Family Pact. On 31 January 1844, Adolphe married firstly in St. Petersburg to Grand Duchess Elizabeth Mikhailovna of Russia, niece of Emperor Nicholas I of Russia. She died less than a year afterwards giving birth to a stillborn daughter. On 23 April 1851, he remarried in Dessau to Princess Adelheid-Marie of Anhalt-Dessau. They had five children, of whom only two lived to the age of eighteen and became prince and princess of Luxembourg. He died on 17 November 1905, aged 88, in Schloss Hohenburg, Lenggries. Link to Wikipedia biography