Eugénie was born to King
Oscar I of Sweden and
Josephine of Leuchtenberg as their fourth child and only daughter. She was named after her maternal grandfather,
Eugène de Beauharnais. She later wrote of her childhood: "During the years of my childhood I never had a girl of my age for a friend or playmate. Nor did I ever have a doll, but exclusively played boy's games with my brothers." She particularly enjoyed the summers at
Tullgarn Palace. Her closest friend was
Prince Gustaf, Duke of Uppland, her favorite among her siblings. She was later to say, that during her childhood, she had the wish to be a boy just like her brothers were. Princess Eugénie was placed under the supervision of her senior lady in waiting Karen Anker, and educated with her siblings by the royal court chaplain dr J. G. Lundberg Anker and Lundberg were both dominant personalities, which is regarded to have formed the consciously submissive character of Eugénie. Early on, she had a great interest in the arts, and was active as a composer, painter, sculptor and writer. The year of 1852 signified a great crisis in her life. This year, the royal family fell ill during a visit to
Oslo. Her favorite brother and closest friend,
Prince Gustaf, Duke of Uppland, died, which had a great effect on her emotional life. She herself had
pneumonia, and her health never truly recovered from this. For the rest of her life, she suffered from chest problems and had some trouble walking, and in 1861, she is described as prematurely aged by suffering. In 1871,
Fritz von Dardel commented that she was yellow and thin, though somewhat less grave like than before. In 1860, her doctor
Magnus Huss recommended that she would benefit from the climate of
Gotland. She visited the island the summer of that year, and from 1861 onward, she spent every summer at her own villa Fridhem outside
Visby, where she did feel somewhat better. The winters, she still resided in her apartments at the royal palace in Stockholm, but was forced to confine herself to the smaller rooms of the palace, which could be entirely heated, during the cold season: she referred to the winter season as her "winter imprisonment". The crisis of her destroyed health and the death of her brother gave Eugénie a great interest in religion. As the daughter of a Protestant and a Catholic, she was tolerant and predominately an ecumenical Christian, who focused on Christianity as a whole and did not wish commit herself to a particular branch of Christianity and disliked division and discord between the different Christian branches. She was inspired by the teachings of
Thomas a Kempis, and supported the revival movement of
Carl Olof Rosenius, which had been recommended by her lady in waiting Josephine Hamilton. During the winter of 1878–79, the preacher
Granville Waldegrave, 3rd Baron Radstock was invited to preach for her. In parallel, Princess Eugénie developed an increasing interest in charity after her crisis, a philanthropy that grew by the years as her health forced her to give up her interests in the arts. She inherited a fortune upon the death of her mother in 1876. However, she spent little money on herself:
Count Lewenhaupt noted, for example, that during her stay overnight at his estate, she had eaten nothing but cooked carrots and some boiled water. She freely gave away her money, to such an extent that her brother the king gave instructions to the governors in the cities his sister visited to "protect" his sister from "insolent beggars". Most of her money was spent on her charity projects, so much so that her brother Oscar II asked her to save the family something of the inheritance after their mother. She respected his wish in her will of 1885, where she left two thirds of her fortune to her nephews, and the rest to be divided upon her charities. Princess Eugénie died after a long period of illness on 23 April 1889, just before her 59th birthday. ==Artist==