Archduke Franz Karl of Austria

Archduke Franz Karl of Austria
This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Archduke_Franz_Karl_of_Austria".

Archduke Franz Karl

Archduke Franz Karl Joseph of Austria (17 December 1802 – 8 March 1878) was father of two emperors (Austria and Mexico) and the grandfather of Franz Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria, whose assassination helped precipitate the start of World War I.

He was born in Vienna, the second son of Emperor Francis II and his wife Maria Theresa of the Two Sicilies.

On 4 November 1824 in Vienna he married Sophie of Bavaria, a daughter of King Maximilian I of Bavaria by his second wife Karoline of Baden. Franz Karl was an unambitious and generally ineffectual man, although he was a member of the Council that ruled in the stead of his mentally retarded brother Emperor Ferdinand from 1835 to 1848. At the urging of his wife, he renounced his claims to the throne at the time of his brother's abdication in December 1848, allowing their eldest son Franz Joseph to take the throne. Archduke Franz Karl died in Vienna in 1878, six years after the death of his wife.

Issue

content

Monarchical Styles of Archduke Franz Carl of Austria


Reference style	His Imperial and Royal Highness
Spoken style	Your Imperial and Royal Highness
Alternative style	Sir

Name	Birth	Death	Notes
By Sophie, Princess of Bavaria (27 January 1805-28 May 1872; married on 4 November 1824 in St. Augustine's Church, Vienna)
Franz Joseph	18 August 1830	21 November 1916	succeeded as Emperor of Austria married his first cousin Elisabeth, Duchess in Bavaria, and had issue
Maximilian	6 July 1832	19 June 1867	proclaimed Emperor of Mexico executed by a firing squad married Charlotte, Princess of Belgium, no issue
Karl Ludwig	30 July 1833	19 May 1896	married 1) his first cousin Margaretha, Princess of and Duchess in Saxony, (1840-1858) from 1856 to 1858, no issue, married 2) to Maria Annunziata, Princess of the Two-Sicilies (1843-1871) from 1862 to 1871, had issue (three sons and one daughter) and married 3) to Maria Theresia, Infanta of Portugal, (1855-1944), from 1873 to 1899, had issue (two daughters)
Maria Anna Karolina	27 October 1835	5 February 1840	died in childhood, no issue
Stillborn son	24 October 1840	24 October 1840
Ludwig Viktor	15 May 1842	18 January 1919	died unmarried, no issue