Why are Caroline of Monaco and Ernst-August of Hanover still married?
While the trial, which opposes Ernst-August of Hanover and his eldest son, opens this Thursday, November 25 in Germany, return to the reasons why Caroline of Monaco has never divorced her prince.
The supposed curse of the grimaldi will not have spared Caroline of Hanover. For a long time now, we have been blowing in the corridors of the Royal Palace, that no member of the main family of Monaco can be happy in love and the eldest daughter of Prince Rainier III and American actress Grace Kelly, is no exception.
Caroline is the first of her siblings to embark on the crazy adventure of marriage in 1978. She is 21 years old and her first husband, Philippe Junot, a French businessman, seventeen more. Two years later, the story ends with a divorce, then the young woman asks the Vatican for the recognition of the nullity of the marriage. This is an escape clause reserved for Catholics – Catholicism being the religion in force on the Rock – in order to put an end to the sacred union of marriage without getting too angry with God … subject, of course, to the agreement of the Church.
Young divorcee without children, Caroline quickly falls under the spell of Stefano Casiraghi. Together they will have three children: Andrea, Charlotte and Pierre but after only seven years of marriage, the Italian businessman died in a tragic motorboating accident off Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat. The Rock is once again plunged into mourning.
Ernst-August, the prince of all excess
For some time after the death of Stefano Casiraghi, the sister of Prince Albert devoted herself mainly to three numerous charities in the education of her children. But, it was without counting on the arrival of Prince Ernst-August of Hanover in his life. At the time of their meeting, the German prince was still married to Chantal Hochuli, a friend of Caroline, whom he would have left to marry the latter. A scent of scandal floats around their union which makes her the new Princess of Hanover and the Duchess of Brunswick-Lüneburg.
Married in 1999, the couple welcome a little girl, Alexandra of Hanover, before separating ten years later. But despite the many incredible setbacks of Prince Ernst-August, Caroline of Monaco has still not divorced her third husband …
There could be different reasons behind this unofficial separation‘which has been going on for over twenty years. Some claim that Caroline does not want to lose her titles, others claim that it is her Catholic faith that keeps her prisoner of her marriage: the princess cannot ask for a second time that her marriage is recognized as null and void at the Vatican.
From the German magazine Bunte, the reason for Caroline’s refusal to divorce her ex-husband is that she simply wants to prevent him from having a other legitimate child. Indeed, since their separation, Prince Ernst-August of Hanover appears regularly with new companies. The latest being Claudia Stilianopoulos, a Spanish artist twenty years younger …
Photo credits: AGENCE / BESTIMAGE