The Hohenzollern family was expropriated by the Soviet occupation forces in the post-war period. A legal dispute with the federal government over compensation and property issues has been smoldering for years. Now there is a surprising ending.
In the long-standing dispute with the federal government over unresolved questions of ownership and compensation payments for 4,000 works of art, the head of the House of Hohenzollern, Georg Friedrich Prince of Prussia, has announced a waiver. The great-grandson of Crown Prince Wilhelm of Prussia told the newspaper “Welt” that withdrawing the demands was his personal decision, which he made “regardless of possible chances of success”.
The proceedings involved around 1.2 million euros in compensation, which the Hohenzollern leader Georg Friedrich Prince of Prussia is demanding from the state of Brandenburg for property expropriated from 1945. Brandenburg refused compensation, while the noble family sued. This belongs to the German high nobility, the current head of the family is great-great-grandson of Wilhelm II, the last German emperor. The noble house was expropriated by the Soviet occupying power between 1945 and 1949.
According to the “Welt” report, the question of “whether my great-grandfather Crown Prince Wilhelm of Prussia ‘encouraged the National Socialists’ through his behavior” is relevant when assigning the works of art. With the end of the process, he wants to clear the way for an “unencumbered debate,” said the Hohenzollern boss. He has “no problem at all with critically examining the history of my family”.
It was absolutely right to “take a critical look at Crown Prince Wilhelm”. It is “not clearly verifiable” that he gave the National Socialists advantages, “even if he himself should have wanted it”. But he was “clearly looking for proximity to the Nazi regime”. As a person who has “ingratiated himself with right-wing extremism,” he “cannot be a tradition in our house.”
The Prince of Prussia also described it as a mistake to have taken legal action against historians and journalists in the past. He regrets not having “sought personal conversations in which many things could have been clarified” earlier and more often. He therefore decided to “end all open proceedings, which has since been implemented”. However, he also wanted to make it clear: “I never tried to restrict scientific work. If that’s how it felt, I’m sorry.”
For Thursday, Georg Friedrich Prince of Prussia announced a historians’ podium at the federal press conference to continue the debate about his family and to present a digitized source collection on the political work of Crown Prince Wilhelm of Prussia to the public. The historian Lothar Machtan compiled the latter on behalf of the Prince of Prussia.