Philip, Prince of Eulenburg

Early life and education

Eulenburg was born at Königsberg, Province of Prussia, the eldest son of Philipp Konrad, Count zu Eulenburg (Königsberg, 24 April 1820 – Berlin, 5 March 1889) and his wife, Baroness Alexandrine von Rothkirch und Panthen (Glogau, 20 June 1824 – Meran, 11 April 1902). The Eulenburgs were a Junker family which belonged to Germany's Uradel (ancient nobility) class as they were first recorded as Ministeriales of Saxony in the service of the Margraves of Meissen in 1181, they acquired lordships in Meissen, Bohemia and Lusatia before migrating to Prussia in the 14th century, there being recognized as Barons in 1709 and Counts by 1786. For generations the family had served the House of Hohenzollern; Philipp's uncle Friedrich Albrecht zu Eulenburg served as Interior Minister of Prussia, as did his cousin Botho zu Eulenburg. The Eulenburgs, though "Junkers", were impoverished aristocracy and until 1867 depended entirely upon Philipp von Eulenburg's salary as a captain in the Prussian Army. In 1867 Baron Karl von Hertefeld died without any children or surviving siblings, and in his will left his entire fortune and two gigantic estates at Liebenberg and Hertefeld to his favorite grand niece, Eulenburg's mother. At one stroke, the Eulenburgs become one of the richest families in Prussia, but Captain von Eulenburg was unable to overcome his long years in poverty, and he had a miserly attitude to spending money. Eulenburg had difficult relations with his father, but was extremely close to his artistic mother. She was a great piano-player, and frequently invited over Cosima von Bülow to play the piano for her. Cosima von Bülow in turn became first the mistress and then the wife of the composer Richard Wagner. Through this family connection, Eulenburg was close to the Wagner family and a member of the Bayreuth Circle that existed to further the Wagner cult.

Eulenburg was educated at a French grammar school in Berlin before being educated by a tutor from 1859 onwards. Starting in 1863, he attended the Vitzhumsches Gymnasium in Dresden, Saxony. In 1866 the Austro-Prussian War forced him to leave Saxony, which was now enemy territory. Though he did not relish a military career, he joined the Prussian Gardes du Corps as an officer cadet in accordance with his father's wishes. He then attended the War Academy at Kassel from which he graduated in 1868. During his time at the War Academy, Eulenburg become very close to Count Kuno von Moltke, who would also be exposed as homosexual in the 1907 scandal. In 1867 Eulenburg was promoted to the rank of lieutenant before resigning his commission in 1869 in order to pursue an education in the law. When France declared war on Prussia in July 1870, Eulenburg rejoined the Prussian Army. During the Franco-German War of 1870-1871 he served under the German military governor of Strasbourg and received the Iron Cross. In October 1871, Eulenburg again resigned from the army to resume his legal studies.

Early career

Eulenburg became very close to the French diplomat, writer and racist Count Arthur de Gobineau, whom Eulenburg was later to call his "unforgettable friend". Eulenburg, who was fluent in French, was deeply impressed by Gobineau's book An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races, where Gobineau expounded the theory of an Aryan master-race and maintained that the people who had best preserved Aryan blood were the Germans. A snob who held commoners in contempt, Gobineau believed that French aristocrats like himself were descendants of the Germanic Franks who had conquered the Roman province of Gaul in the 5th century, whereas ordinary French people were descendants of Latin and Celtic peoples. Though domestic French political considerations led Gobineau to claim that the Germans were the best Aryans, this thesis ensured that the book had a favorable reception in Germany. Eulenburg sought out Gobineau to personally thank him for his book, and a friendship between the two men blossomed as a result. Eulenburg first met Gobineau in Stockholm in 1874, and the two immediately struck it off. Eulenburg was later to fondly recall how he and Gobineau had spent hours during their time in Sweden under the "Nordic sky, where the old world of the gods lived on in the customs and habits of the people as well in their hearts." Gobineau in turn was later to write that only two people in the entire world had ever properly understood his racist philosophy, namely Richard Wagner and Eulenburg. Gobineau encouraged Eulenburg to promote his theory of an Aryan master-race, telling him: "In this way you will help many people understand things sooner". The American historian Gregory Blue wrote of an "Eulenburg connection" in promoting anti-Asian racism, observing much of Eulenburg's "Yellow Peril" seemed to be taken straight from Gobineau's anti-Asian writings.

Eulenburg needed no encouragement and spent the rest of his life promoting racist and anti-Semitic views, writing in his 1906 book Eine Erinneruung an Graf Arthur de Gobineau (A Memoir of Count Arthur de Gobineau) that Gobineau was a prophet who showed Germany the way forward to national greatness in the 20th century. In 1885, when the editor of the Bayreuther Blätter, the official newspaper of the Wagner cult, wrote to Eulenburg asking that he allow his letters to Gobineau to be published in the newspaper, Eulenburg wrote back to say that he could not publish his correspondence with Gobineau as their letters "touch on so many intimate matters that I cannot extract much from them which is of general interest". Later, Eulenburg was to complain that all of his letters to Gobineau had been destroyed because "They contain too much of an intimately personal nature". The British historian John C. G. Röhl has written that we cannot know for certain what the Eulenburg-Gobineau letters had to say since both of them burned almost all of their correspondence, but it is possible that they had a sexual relationship that was documented in the letters and motivated their destruction.

Diplomat and artist

Eulenburg joined the Prussian civil service. He served first as a judge at a lower court in Lindow, Brandenburg, before being promoted to a higher court at Neuruppin. After only two years as a judge he transferred to the Auswärtiges Amt (Foreign Office). In January 1881, Eulenburg was appointed Third Secretary at the German embassy in Paris, serving under Second Secretary Bernhard von Bülow, who was to become another of Eulenburg's friends. Eulenburg—by all accounts an extremely sensitive man—was devastated by the death of his two-year-old daughter Astrid from diabetes on 23 March 1881, and asked to leave Paris, stating that he could not stand living in the city where his daughter had died.

After only six months in Paris, he was transferred to the Prussian embassy to the Kingdom of Bavaria, in Munich, where he served seven years. Eulenburg had little interest in his job, and spent most of his time absorbed in the cultural scene in Munich. The then Bavarian King, Ludwig II, lived a secluded life at Linderhof Palace in the Bavarian mountains, receiving no guests and attending no events in Munich. Thus, even diplomats had no opportunity to be received by him or to meet him. Extremely curious to see the famous monarch, the great benefactor of Richard Wagner and builder of "fairytale castles", Eulenburg traveled to Linderhof with a friend, where he stood by the access road until the king passed him on his daily carriage ride. Eulenburg doffed his hat, which Ludwig reciprocated. This was his only contact with the "Fairytale King", who died a mysterious death in a lake in 1886 after being placed under a regency.

During his time in Munich, Eulenburg become convinced that he was too sensitive for a career in politics, and increasingly become interested in the arts. In 1884, Eulenburg published an autobiographical story entitled "Aus der Art Eine märkische Geschichte", concerning a sensitive, artistic young man with a loving mother and a cold father who pushes the young man to pursue a military career when he really wants a career in the arts, something that his mother understands. In his letters to his mother, Eulenburg always identified his "real self" with her, whom he stated could understand him in a way that his father never could. Eulenburg was later to write that of his father: "He was suffused with the prosaic ethos of Prussia, and inevitably he sought to steer me in a similar direction, when so much inspiration lay dormant in my imagination." Of his mother, Eulenburg wrote: "My mother, whom I deeply adored, the ideal figure who filled my whole being with boundless love, fired my inspiration. Music, painting, poetry occupied her thoughts and she practised the arts with talent and with understanding, and they took full possession of me as well."

The Kaiser's great friend

Count Eulenburg was invited to accompany Prince Wilhelm of Prussia on a hunting trip on 19 April 1886. Wilhelm was the eldest son of Germany's Crown Prince Friedrich, and the future Kaiser Wilhelm II. This meeting changed Eulenberg's life. Eulenburg soon became best friends with the prince (who was twelve years his junior), and they remained so for the next 22 years. After meeting him, Eulenburg declared his "boundless love" for the prince. A friendship developed between the two, in which the count, with his worldly wisdom, was to offer the young, impetuous and nervous prince both emotional support and intellectual distraction. Eulenburg also offered him the spiritual warmth that the prince hadn't found with his parents or at the Prussian royal court. During this period, Eulenburg started to share his love of the occult with his new best friend. In August 1887, Eulenburg wrote to Prince Wilhelm about a séance he had recently organized, that "I was overjoyed that we find ourselves in agreement in this area as well, and it has shown me clearly yet again how very lucky I have been to meet Your Royal Highness! To be understood in all things so well, that is true happiness!" In the same letter, Eulenburg warned Wilhelm never to speak in public about their shared interest in the occult as most people would not understand it.

In 1888, the old Emperor Wilhelm I died. He was succeeded by his son Friedrich, who died of throat cancer just 99 days later, to be succeeded by Wilhelm II. As the Emperor Friedrich III lay in his bed dying, Wilhelm demanded that he be appointed regent, a request his mother the Empress Victoria refused. Wilhelm, who had always hated his parents, especially his British mother, wrote to Eulenburg that "the royal escutcheon had been besmirched and the Reich brought to ruin by the English princess who is my mother, that is the most horrible of all!" In March 1888, Eulenburg wrote to his mother: "I am very aware of the fact that it is, and always will be, a question [for me] of either state service or art." Upon Wilhelm's accession to the throne, Eulenburg assumed an unofficial position of immense influence. Among other things, he was instrumental in the appointment of Bernhard von Bülow as head of the foreign office in 1897. Wilhelm II had long desired the appointment of "his own Bismarck" – a powerful chancellor who would enact the Kaiser's will – and Eulenburg was the first to suggest Bülow for this role.

In October 1888, when Wilhelm had decided to appoint Eulenburg the Prussian Ambassador to Bavaria, Eulenburg viewed the appointment as a chance to better pursue his artistic interests. In a letter to his mother, Eulenburg wrote: "I do not let go of the thought expressed here, and in my fairly regular letters to him [Wilhelm II] I return to it! It would be a very wonderful thing for my future to get such an appointment. For apart from the agreeable material aspects, I would hope that no-one would then ask more of me than this, and I could devote myself in peace to the things to which I am really attached."

Conspiracy theorist and spiritualist

Eulenberg was a convinced anti-Catholic bigot who saw the Catholic Church as a sinister force plotting the ruin of Protestant Prussia. He developed an elaborate conspiracy theory.

Since Germany had been unified under the leadership of Protestant Prussia in 1871, Eulenburg, like many other Prussian Protestant conservatives, was convinced that the Catholic Church was out to break up the unified Reich and turn Germany back into a collection of independent states.

Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian throne, was a devout Catholic whom Eulenburg personally disliked. Eulenberg believed that the Mayerling Incident of 1889, when the previous Austrian heir, Archduke Rudolf, killed himself and his mistress, had actually been murder by agents of the Vatican, that Franz Ferdinand was a puppet of the Vatican, and that he was plotting to start a war against Germany in alliance with Russia and France when he succeeded to the Austrian throne. The purpose of this planned religious war was to break up Germany, and establish the supremacy of a Catholic league led by Austria and also Bavaria (as "the Catholic hegemonial power") over Prussia. Eulenburg further believed that elements of the Bavarian government and the Zentrum were also involved in this Catholic conspiracy. To block this alleged Catholic plot, Eulenburg insisted that the Reich government never co-operate with the Zentrum in any way or form, and insure that the pro-Prussian Liberal party stayed in power in Bavaria. This last meant that the Reich government had to avoid extreme conservative policies that would alienate the Bavarian Liberals.

Thus Eulenburg, whose leanings were towards the extreme right, advocated moderate conservative policies. This contradiction was captured in an 1896 essay in which he complained that the "sorest spot of the new German Reich" was that unfortunately the "old Prussian tradition" had to adjust to "the liberalism of the German Philistine" (i.e. the middle class).

Aside from the arts, Eulenburg's major interest was the occult. Eulenburg—while nominally Lutheran—genuinely believed in the reality of ghosts and spirits, and spent much of his time consulting clairvoyants, mediums, and spiritualists in attempts to contact the spirit world. After Eulenburg moved from Munich to Oldenburg in 1888, Count Kuno Rantzau wrote: "I wish Eulenburg all the best, but I am heartily glad that he can now play his spiritist mumbo-jumbo in a different settling." In February 1889, when Eulenburg's sister wrote to him complaining that his spiritualist activities were likely to embarrass the Kaiser, Eulenburg wrote back to say: "Your concern about the Kaiser's spiritualism is quite unnecessary. When he was still Prince Wilhelm, we spoke about these matters -- just as you speak about everything to the person who is your friend. How can the Kaiser now suddenly stop talking about them? ...I cannot help the fact that, by the time I got to know him, Prince Wilhelm already firmly believed in ghosts and other such things; it is a part of his mystical inclination."

Political role and the fall of Bismarck

As the best friend of the new emperor and his closest advisor, many people started to court Eulenburg as a man who could bring access to the Kaiser, most importantly Friedrich von Holstein, the director of the Political Department at the Auswärtiges Amt. He was determined to depose Bismarck as chancellor, and saw Eulenburg as a useful conduit to Wilhelm II. Despite his distaste for politics and his love of the arts, Eulenburg's role as Wilhelm's best friend ensured that he played a leading political role, most notably in the intrigues that brought down Bismarck in 1890.

Even though Eulenburg felt he was too fragile for the world of politics, he felt obliged to become a political player out of his love for Wilhelm II. In response to a letter from Wilhelm in 1890, Eulenburg wrote: "Your Majesty has thrown me into transports of joy with his gracious letter with its rich contents, and I must take the greatest care to control myself so that I do not write four pages expressing my gratitude! Your Majesty knows very well -- without my saying it -- what feelings gripped me when I saw the beloved handwriting!" In the summer of 1889, the anti-Bismarck faction learned that the Chancellor was planning to permit the return of the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer of Catholic priests, who had been banished from Germany during the Kulturkampf. The return of the Redemptorists was seen as an attempt by Bismarck to break up the Kartell of the anti-clerical National Liberals and the Conservative parties. That would make it impossible for the government to pass bills in the Reichstag, and thereby place Wilhelm in a "position of constraint" by making Bismarck indispensable to resolve the crisis.

In fall 1889, Holstein attempted to frustrate this manoeuvre by having Eulenburg arrange for Wilhelm to issue a press statement in favour of the Kartell. When Bismarck ignored the press statement, Holstein had Eulenburg send two telegrams to the Kaiser, who was visiting Constantinople, which led in turn to Wilhelm sending a telegram to Bismarck on 6 November 1889 saying that "under no circumstances and in no way whatsoever can and will His Imperial Majesty permit the return of the Redemptorists to Germany." Checked in this manoeuvre, Bismarck proceed to destroy the Kartell by bringing a new Anti-Socialist Bill, which led to the moderate right-of-the-center parties suffering heavy losses in the elections of 20 February 1890.

With the government unable to pass bills through the Reichstag, Bismarck then launched plans for a coup d'état with the aim of making himself dictator. Bismarck's plans threw the anti-Bismarck faction into feverish plans of their own, and on 11 March 1890 Holstein telegraphed Eulenburg that he was needed in Berlin immediately. On 14 March, Eulenburg passed on a message to Wilhelm warning him of Bismarck's plans, which led to Bismarck being replaced as chancellor on the following day. Röhl wrote that in the great crisis of March 1890, Eulenburg played the role of an emissary more than as a planner, but nonetheless he did play a key role in Bismarck's dismissal.

The Power Broker

In the chancellorship of General Leo von Caprivi, Eulenburg came more into his own as a political player. In April 1891 Eulenburg returned to Munich, this time as Prussian ambassador to the Kingdom of Bavaria. On 15 February 1891, Baron Karl von Dörnberg, one of Eulenburg's friends, died. After his death, Count Kuno von Moltke wrote to Axel "Dachs" von Varnbüler on 31 March 1891: "My old Dachs! I am just getting ready for the journey to Stuttgart. I'm longing for old Philine...have to see her [Eulenburg; his homosexual gay friends always used the terms "her" and "she" to describe him] because of the feeling that now this gap [Dörnberg's death] has opened up in our beloved circle, we must hold on to each other doubly, more firmly...Then I'll move over to Munich with P. on the 8th -- the family will not follow till later". The "Philine" of this letter is clearly Eulenburg because on 8 April 1891, Eulenburg accompanied by Moltke took a train trip from Stuttgart to Munich and on 10 April 1891 he appeared at the Bavarian court as the new Prussian envoy. After arriving in Munich, Eulenburg and Moltke went to see a clairvoyant to learn the future and improve Eulenburg's health. Moltke wrote to Varnbüler afterwards: "Philine writes to me that he feels absolutely dreadful -- in spite of the clairvoyante who felt him in the rectum and gave him such helpful guidelines for his behavior". At the same time, Eulenburg continued his efforts to involve the Kaiser in his spiritism and his attempts to contact the spirit world. On 18 November 1891, Field Marshal Alfred von Waldersee wrote in his diary: "In the highest place it is believed that it is possible to rule alone, to understand everything, to know everything best, while in reality no aim is clearly understood, nothing is properly understood...Is that really too bleak a view? Only today I have the learned the following for the first time. Philipp Eulenburg was earlier strongly urged not to strengthen the Kaiser in his spiritist leanings. During the first North Sea cruise he kept to this, as I was able to observe in detail. Apparently things had already changed by the time of the second cruise. During his last visit to Munich the monarch was brought into direct contact with a female spiritist by Eulenburg, I guess in the Legation hotel. While she was in a trance she was asked by the Kaiser, of whose presence she was allegedly unaware, what he was to make of a friend in Russia -- obviously an allusion to the Tsar. If the lord can be influenced in this way, the well-being of the Fatherland lies irretrievably in the hands of swindlers. Friedrich Wilhelm II and Bischoffwerder!" In December 1891, Eulenburg was delighted when a spiritist was apparently able to tell him of what Wilhelm had written to him in his last letter, which confirmed his belief in the power of the ghosts and spirits whose aid he sought.

A new diplomat in Vienna

In 1893 Eulenburg was appointed the German Empire's ambassador to Austria-Hungary, a position he held until 1902. On 20 March 1894 Eulenburg wrote to Wilhelm II advising him to sack Leo von Caprivi as chancellor and to make his friend Bernhard von Bülow foreign minister with the ultimate aim of making Bülow chancellor.

In October 1894 a meeting at Eulenburg's estate in Liebenberg ended with the Kaiser issuing a telegram announcing to Germany that Caprivi was now dismissed as chancellor. Eulenburg wanted his cousin Botho zu Eulenburg to be Caprivi's replacement, but Friedrich von Holstein was able to persuade Wilhelm not to appoint Eulenburg as chancellor.

However, Eulenburg managed to convince Wilhelm to appoint the aged Prince Chlodwig zu Hohenlohe-Schillingsfürst, who was the German Empire's ambassador to France in 1881 when Eulenburg served in the Paris embassy, as the new chancellor. During this time, Eulenburg repeatedly advised Wilhelm II that the best man to be chancellor was Bülow, whom Eulenburg painted in the most glowing terms; he wrote in February 1895 to Wilhelm saying that "Bernhard is the most valuable servant Your Imperial Majesty possesses, the predestined Reich Chancellor of the future".

Between 1895 and 1897, Eulenburg was at the height of his political power, and devised with Wilhelm a set of far-reaching plans intended to neutralize all opposition from those remaining followers of Caprivi within the Reich and Prussian governments, while at the same time intending to give Bülow enough political experience to take over as chancellor within a few years' time. In the summer of 1896 on the annual summer cruise in the North Sea on board the royal yacht SMY Hohenzollern, Eulenburg and Wilhelm worked out what Röhl called "an astonishingly detailed plan" to assert the "personal rule" of the Kaiser.

The three ministers in the Reich and Prussian governments who offered the most resistance to Wilhelm's plans for "personal rule, namely General Walther Bronsart von Schellendorff, Karl Heinrich von Boetticher and Baron Adolf Marschall von Bieberstein should all be quietly fired while Hohenlohe could stay on as a 'shadow Chancellor'". Bülow would be appointed foreign secretary and would be the man really running the government. After a few years' time, the diplomat Bülow—who did not know much about domestic policy—would gain political experience and be appointed chancellor. In the meantime, having Hohenlohe as the "shadow Chancellor" would ensure that any mistakes Bülow made in domestic policy could always be blamed on Hohenlohe.

Byzantinism

Eulenburg fronted the Liebenberg Circle. This was a group of aristocrats with an expensive taste for art. Most of the Liebenberg Circle had worked as diplomats and their opinions were heard by the Kaiser. Eulenburg's influence was the obstruction of preventative war and any kind of adventure on foreign soil. Eulenburg was in turn criticized by his contemporaries as effeminate. He was accused of being a pacifist. Maximilian Harden published accusations of homosexuality. This scandal would destroy Eulenburg's career in the civil service because the episode supported the preconception of aristocratic decadence among politicians that were socialist middle class.

"Aesthetic anti-semitism": art, race and politics in Eulenburg's worldview

During his time as ambassador to Austria, Eulenburg who was a Wagnerite befriended one of the world's leading Wagnerites, Houston Stewart Chamberlain who was living in Vienna at the time. Besides their shared love of Richard Wagner, Eulenburg, who was an anti-Semite, Anglophobe and an opponent of democracy, found much to admire in Chamberlain's anti-Semitic, Anglophobic and anti-democratic writings. Eulenburg was a völkisch anti-Semite who believed Jews to be an alien race from Asia who were "poisoning" the European Aryan race in all sorts of ways.

In 1895 Wilhelm commissioned a painting from Hermann Knackfuss, depicting a nightmare he had with a Buddha wreathed in fire being carried by an Asian-style dragon threatening Europe. The painting became known as the "Yellow Peril", the name given to the perceived Asian threat to Europe. Eulenburg, who shared Wilhelm's hatred of Asians, was enthralled with the painting; on 29 September 1895 he wrote to the Empress "I am quite under the spell of this truly magnificent work. The idea is uplifting and the execution masterly. When I immerse myself in the contemplation of the picture I am filled with the feeling that all Europe must indeed answer the call of the beloved Kaiser to unite in peaceful harmony for the sake of the cross and the dearest goods, but then the uneasy feeling steals over me that the evil in those men who oppose as an enemy power the good which manifests itself in the Kaiser's being will now cause them to tear down and attack with their ingenious criticism that which has sprung from the high-mindedness and noble heart of the Kaiser". To his mother Eulenburg wrote about the Yellow Peril painting: "The Kaiser has given me a magnificent engraving of the wonderful allegorical picture executed by Prof. Knackfuss from His Imperial Majesty's sketch: the peoples of Europe, represented as female figures, are called upon by St. Michael to defend the cross against unbelief, heathenism, etc. You will like it...It is a beautiful idea in a beautiful form". Eulenburg's "unforgettable friend" Gobineau had been obsessed with the fear of the "Yellow Peril", which he had expressed in his epic 1881 poem Amadis where European civilization is destroyed by a Chinese invasion.

Much of Wilhelm's anti-Asian racism and warnings of the "Yellow Peril" very closely resembles Gobineau's writings on the Chinese, which is not surprising given that Eulenburg had introduced the Kaiser to Gobineau's theories. The American historian Gregory Blue wrote about the "Eulenburg connection", whereby Eulenburg played a key role in introducing the Kaiser to Gobineau's anti-Asian writings. Furthermore, Blue noted that the sketch that Wilhelm had drawn of his nightmare in April 1895 looks very different than The Yellow Peril painting that Knackfuss finished in September 1895, being considerably more disturbing and nightmarish than the finished product and, as much of the imagery in the painting appears to be drawn from Amadis, he argued that the "Eulenburg connection" was at work here, with Eulenburg playing a major, if uncredited, role in generating The Yellow Peril painting.

Scandal

Although he was married, Eulenburg was connected in homosexual liaisons with members of the Kaiser's inner circle, including Count Kuno von Moltke, the military commander of Berlin. Sources say that he continued to have homosexual relationships even while he was married and fathered numerous children. The public exposure of these liaisons in 1906 led to the Harden-Eulenburg Affair that attracted worldwide attention.

With the appointment of Eulenburg's protégé, Count (and later Prince) Bernhard von Bülow, as Chancellor of Germany in October 1900, Eulenburg's influence reached its peak. Although Bülow remained in office until July 1909, Eulenburg's influence declined again after the turn of the century. In 1902, he relinquished his ambassadorship in Vienna and withdrew entirely to his Liebenberg estate. Although Wilhelm II visited him occasionally, it was clear to insiders that Eulenburg's heyday was behind him. The historian Volker Ullrich writes: "In the eyes of the critical public, however, Eulenburg was still considered the head of a secondary government, a »camarilla«, which exerted a corrupting influence on the Kaiser and the Reich's politics ... In the autumn of 1906, when the Bismarck admirer Maximilian Harden began his campaign against Eulenburg and his circle of friends, the discontent over the conditions at the top of the Reich's leadership had reached a climax.

The scandal was caused by the growing power of the Bülow-Eulenburg clique within the Auswärtiges Amt around the turn of the century, at the expense of the Holstein faction. Holstein was known as the "Monster of the Labyrinth", a master of the dark arts of political intrigue with an impressive private intelligence network who had made himself indispensable to successive governments over the years. To get his way, Holstein had often threatened to resign, believing that no government could do without his services, a threat that had always worked in the past. After the debacle of Algeciras Conference (which ended April 1906), Holstein had quarreled with Bülow and submitted his resignation to Wilhelm; much to his intense shock, it was accepted. After learning from one of his spies that Eulenburg had over the course of a lunch with the Kaiser told him to accept Holstein's resignation, an extremely embittered Holstein decided to seek revenge on Eulenburg.

In May 1906, Holstein sent Eulenburg a libelous and very rude letter insulting him, and challenging him to a duel to the death. Eulenburg wrote to Varnbüler soon after saying that: "I had a long, very heated discussion with H.M about Hol[stein] and disagreeable it was for me. He will not forgive me, if he should later hear anything concerning my affairs, that I have said not a word to him about what has taken place". After Eulenburg declined to fight the duel, Holstein decided to destroy Eulenburg by attacking him in his Achilles heel, namely by exposing his homosexuality. To that end, Holstein contacted the crusading journalist Maximilian Harden to inform him that Eulenburg was gay. Holstein had known Eulenburg since June 1886, and had on some point along the line learned of Eulenburg's sexual orientation. After being tipped off by Holstein, Harden started to run a series of articles in his newspaper Die Zukunft charging the "Liebenberg Round Table", a clique of homosexuals obsessed with the occult headed by Eulenburg, were dominating the Imperial court. Röhl wrote that Harden used terribly homophobic language in his attacks on Eulenburg, but the essence of his articles alleging the existence of a "Liebenberg Round Table" at the court was indeed correct. Since 1886, the newly married Wilhelm regularly stayed at Eulenburg's Liebenberg Estate in Brandenburg, officially for hunting, but in reality primarily because of the emotional environment offered by the count which provided him with relaxation and distraction, especially after his accession to the throne. The all-male group was characterized by a fundamental homoeroticism. “Phili” Eulenburg, the passionate singer, was called “the troubadour” by his friends, and the Crown Prince and later Emperor was called “the sweetheart” by the group.

After the fall

Before and during World War I, Prince Eulenburg was strongly in favour of German expansionism. As he aged, Eulenburg had come to embrace the goal of Weltpolitik as a goal in and of itself while at the same time as the Anglo-German naval race continued to express concern about how the Tirpitz Plan was destroying the German budget as the state continued to pour and pour more money into building warships. In an essay he wrote in April 1912 entitled "The German Fleet", Eulenburg wrote that he believed "that the Kaiser nor the German government want the war" (emphasis in the original), which he held to be inevitable. But he wrote that Germany was the principal cause of international tensions, writing that:

Our Battle Fleet – not the British one – has sparked off the naval arms race among the Great Powers, with the result that even Austria is now engaging in the dreadnought gamble. For it is a gamble if even the dreadnoughts which cost millions are rendered obsolescent in the shortest space of time by the invention of new types of ships, and if financially ordered States are ruined and finally driven into wars of desperation by the continued building of such giant ships... That the fact of our building this threatening Battle Fleet will possibly or even probably lead to a decision to pursue a policy of violence. If at the same time the Government preaches peace, then the dictates of logic force me to accuse this Government of the "nation of philosophers" either of stupidity or of deliberate deception.

Eulenburg concluded that the naval build-up advocated by Grand Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz known as the Tirpitz Plan was wasteful in the extreme, arguing that Germany would have been better served by a small cruiser fleet capable of protecting the German merchant marine and coastlines, and allowing the billions of marks spent on the Navy to go to social reforms and the Army instead. Eulenburg argued that the great expansion of the German Navy was unnecessary as Germany was "neither an island nor a boat, but a beautiful green field on the Continent in which the sheep, guarded by the military sheepdogs, get fat while the oxen engage in politics." ("Schaf" (sheep) and "Ochse" (ox) can be used to describe a lack of intelligence in German.)

But at the same time, Eulenburg's rejection of navalism was based on the idea that it was the wrong way to pursue German ambitions. Eulenburg wrote:

Marriage and family

On 20 November 1875, at Stockholm, Eulenburg married Augusta Sandels (Stockholm, 12 May 1853 – Liebenberg, 14 December 1941), daughter of Samuel August, the last Count Sandels (1810-1892), and of his wife, Hedvig Henrietta Emilie Augusta Tersmeden (1829-1899). Count Johan August Sandels was her grandfather. They had eight children:

Philipp Graf zu Eulenburg (Wulkow, 16 November 1876 – Berlin, 28 June 1878)

Astrid Gräfin zu Eulenburg (Berlin, 25 March 1879 – Paris, 23 March 1881)

Alexandrine (Adine) Elise Klara Antonia Gräfin zu Eulenburg (Liebenberg, 1 July 1880 – Friedelhausen, 3 February 1957), married at Liebenberg, 15 June 1910 Eberhard Graf von Schwerin (Weilburg, 11 July 1882 – Giessen, 4 April 1954)

Friedrich Wend 2. Fürst zu Eulenburg und Hertefeld Graf von Sandels (Starnberg, 19 September 1881 – Weeze, 1 August 1963), married at Liebenberg, 21 May 1904 Marie Freiin Mayr von Melnhof (Vienna, 8 April 1884 – Weeze, 3 February 1960)

Augusta Alexandrine Gräfin zu Eulenburg (Starnberg, 1 September 1882 – Starnberg, 28 January 1974), married in London, 4 February 1907 (div 1931) Edmund Jaroljmek

Sigwart Botho Philipp August Graf zu Eulenburg (Munich, 10 January 1884 – k.a. Jasło, Galicia, 2 June 1915), married in Leipzig, 21 September 1909 Helene Staegemann (Hannover, 18 April 1877 – Partenkirchen, 20 August 1923)

Karl Kuno Eberhard Wend Graf zu Eulenburg (Starnberg, 16 June 1885 – Weeze, 4 December 1975), married firstly Saint Helier, Jersey, 27 May 1908 (div 1923) Sophie Moshammer (Munich, 9 April 1891 – Munich, 8 May 1944), married secondly in Munich, 5 November 1923 Geertruida Verwey (Utrecht, 6 May 1901 – Weeze, 28 October 1987)

Viktoria Ada Astrid Agnes Gräfin zu Eulenburg (Starnberg, 13 July 1886 – Starnberg, 23 September 1967), married at Liebenberg, 12 May 1909 (div 1921) Otto Ludwig Haas-Heye (Heidelberg, 16 December 1879 – Mannheim, 9 June 1959) Viktoria is the great-grandmother of Sophie, Hereditary Princess of Liechtenstein.

Works

Among his works are:

Skaldengesänge ("Old Norse songs", 1892)

Rosenlieder ("Rose Songs") – This collection of songs was quite popular in his lifetime and often performed in the salon of Marie von Schleinitz. It was recorded for EMI in 1976 by Cathy Berberian on the LP Wie einst in schöner'n Tagen. A version on CD was released in March 2013 on the EMI Electrola label.

Dichtungen ("Poems," 1892)

Das Weihnachtsbuch ("The Christmas book," 1892)

Erich und Erika und andere Erzählungen für Kinder ("Eric and Erica and other tales for children," 1893)

Abenderzählungen, Märchen und Träume ("Evening tales, stories, and dreams," 1894)

Honours

He received the following orders and decorations: