Marriages
At the age of 24, Marie Adelheid wed, in the castle in which she was born at Drogelwitz, Prince Heinrich XXXII Reuss, J(unior) L(ine), a man seventeen years her senior, who was her cousin in the fourth degree (their shared ancestor being King Frederick William II of Prussia) and in the sixth degree (both being descendants of George II of Great Britain). He belonged to a dynasty which reigned over two German principalities (Reuss) until abdication in 1918 of the one reigning Prince over both principalities. By tradition, the princes of his house used "Reuss" as a surname without any nobiliary particle such as "von" (of) or "zu" (at), and all the males bore the sole given name of Henry (Heinrich), distinguished each from the other by Roman numerals.
Heinrich XXXII was a son of Prince Heinrich VII Reuss J.L. (1825-1906) and his wife, Princess Marie of Saxe-Weimar, through whom he had, between 1894 and 1909, been near in the order of succession to the Dutch throne that was occupied by Queen Wilhelmina since 1890.
Soon after the wedding on 19 May 1920 the marriage began to break down: Marie Adelheid would give birth to a son, Prince Heinrich V, on 26 May 1921 and, in order to marry the father before she delivered the child, she divorced Heinrich XXXII at Guben on 18 February and on 12 April married his younger brother, Heinrich XXXV Reuss J.L. (1887-1936) who, to be eligible for the elopement to Bremen, had divorced his wife of 10 years, Princess Maria of Saxe-Altenburg (1888-1947), on 4 March. When Heinrich V was two years old, on 23 June 1923, his parents obtained a divorce in Berlin. Thereafter, Marie Adelheid used the title Princess Reuss zur Lippe.
Marie Adelheid married a third and final time to commoner Hanno Konopath (born surnamed "Konopacki"), a Nazi government official, on 24 February 1927. This marriage also ended in divorce nine years later in 1936, but not before it generated important contacts for her in the German regime.
