Prince Maurice of Battenberg

Maurice was born on 3 October 1891. His father was Prince Henry of Battenberg, the son of Prince Alexander of Hesse and by Rhine and Julie Therese née Countess of Hauke. His mother was Princess Henry of Battenberg (née Princess Beatrice of the United Kingdom), the fifth daughter and the youngest child of Queen Victoria and Albert, Prince Consort. As he was the child of a morganatic marriage, Prince Henry of Battenberg took his style of Prince of Battenberg from his mother, Countess Julia Hauke, who was created Princess of Battenberg in her own right. As such, Maurice was styled as His Serene Highness Prince Maurice of Battenberg from birth. In the United Kingdom, he was styled His Highness Prince Maurice of Battenberg under a royal warrant passed by Queen Victoria in 1886. He was baptised in the Drawing Room at Balmoral on 31 October 1891. His godparents were the Duchess of Connaught and Strathearn (represented by Queen Victoria), the Princess of Leiningen (represented by Princess Christian of Schleswig-Holstein), the Duke of Clarence and Avondale (represented by Sir Henry Ponsonby), Prince Francis Joseph of Battenberg (represented by Sir Fleetwood Edwards) and the Hereditary Grand Duke of Hesse. The youngest of his four siblings, Maurice most resembled his father, who died when he was only four, the same age his mother was when her own father died. He was his mother's favourite out of his brothers. He was educated at Lockers Park Prep School in Hertfordshire. His elder sister Victoria Eugenie of Battenberg married Alfonso XIII of Spain and was Queen Consort of Spain between 1906 and 1931. ==Later life==

Maurice attended Wellington College and was a member of Benson House. Maurice was made a Freemason in the Old Wellingtonian Lodge No. 3404 (the Lodge of the Old Wellingtonians) on 21 June 1912 and was installed Master of the Twelve Brothers Lodge, No. 785 Southampton on 22 April 1914. , Belgium. , memorial to Prince Maurice and his brother Leopold After attending the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, Maurice was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the King's Royal Rifle Corps on 4 March 1911. He was promoted to lieutenant effective from 13 February 1914. He served in World War I, and was killed in action at Zonnebeke, in the Ypres Salient, on 27 October 1914. The battalion war diary notes that his funeral took place on 31 October 1914 and records that, "Denison, Gough, the Sgt Major, Sgt O'Leary and a few others went down to poor Maurice's funeral in Ypres". It bears the inscription: GRANT HIM WITH ALL THY FAITHFUL SERVANTS A PLACE OF REFRESHMENT AND PEACE. A memorial tablet to him and his brother Leopold is in Winchester Cathedral. ==Honours==

• KCVO: Knight Commander of the Royal Victorian Order ==Ancestry==