Louise was betrothed to
Frederick, Prince Regent of Baden, in 1854, and they married 20 September 1856 at
Neues Palais in
Potsdam. Louise and Frederick disliked the stiffness of the
Karlsruhe court, and gladly escaped to their castle on the island of
Mainau. They were popular in Baden, and everyone spoke with affectionate pride of their grand duke and duchess in
Constance, where the couple had a summer residence.
Later years Louise was a great friend of
Alice, Grand Duchess of Hesse, her sister-in-law's younger sister; i.e., Alice was the sister of Victoria, Louise's brother Frederick William's wife, both sisters being daughters of Queen Victoria. The two often visited each other. In
Queen Victoria's letters, she and Frederick were always referred to with pleasure or sympathy as
good Fritz and Louise of Baden. Though friends as young girls, Louise and her sister-in-law
Victoria, Princess Royal ("Vicky") always had a "none-too-friendly rivalry", particularly when comparing their children: while Vicky's eldest son
Crown Prince Wilhelm was born with a deformed arm, Louise apparently could not resist bragging that her three children were healthier and bigger at the same age. Louise maintained a correspondence with
Florence Nightingale, who believed the Grand Duchess' letters could have been written by "any administrator in the
Crimean War". The Grand Duchess also had a lifelong friendship with
Clara Barton, whom she met during the
Franco-Prussian War.
Widowhood Within two years, four of Louise's closest family members died - her father, brother, younger son and mother. Her sister in law Vicky, now the Dowager Empress Frederick, took sympathy on Louise and persuaded her mother,
Queen Victoria, to confer the
Royal Order of Victoria and Albert, First Class, on her. Louise, as well as the rest of the family, left the palace via a backway and fled to the Zwingenberg palace in the Neckar valley. By permission of the new government, they were allowed to stay at the Langenstein Palace, which belonged to a Swedish noble, Count Douglas. During these events, Louise was said to have kept her calm and never uttered a word of complaint. The government gave the order that the former Grand Ducal family was to be protected, and that Langenstein be exempted from housing returning soldiers due to Louise's daughter, the Queen of Sweden being in their company, Baden did not want to do anything to offend Sweden. In 1919, the family requested permission from the government to reside in Mainau. The new German government replied that they were now private citizens and could do as they wished. The republican government of Germany gave the former Grand Duchess permission to live out the rest of her life in retirement at
Baden-Baden, where she died on 24 April 1923. She was the last surviving non-morganatic grandchild of
Frederick William III of Prussia. ==Issue==