Crown Prince Rudolf
August 21, 1858 - January 30, 1889
The entire nation celebrated the crown prince's birth in 1858 - he was the son of Kaiser Franz Joseph I, and his birth secured the royal lineage.
At the age of six, Rudolf's education was meant to prepare him for the rigors of imperial duty. Though his relationship with his mother, Empress Elizabeth, was strained, the two would share liberal views. Rudolf grew up close with his older sister Gisela until her marriage to Leopold of Bavaria. The Crown Prince would marry Princess Stéphanie of Belgium in 1881, though their match was as ill-fated as his parents'. Unhappy with his family life, he began an affair with Marie Freiin von Vetsera, a 17-year-old girl, in 1888. Both shared a pessimistic outlook on life and exchanged letters where they planned to “save their love from this world.”
The Mayerling Incident — January 30, 1889
Unhappy with his marriage to Princess Stéphanie of Belgium, Prince Rudolf became involved in a number of affairs. He eventually met Mary Freiin von Vetsera, a 17-year-old baroness, with whom he started a three-month-long relationship. In 1889, at the Imperial hunting lodge of Mayerling, Austria, Rudolf and Vetsera enacted a suicide pact. In a letter to her mother, Vetsara unambiguously stated that she plans to commit suicide with Rudolf and will be "happier in death than life."
The death of Rudolf would put a permanent strain on the relationship between the Kaiser and Empress Elisabeth. It would also create an opening for the throne, one meant to be filled by the Kaiser’s nephew, the ill-fated Archduke Franz Ferdinand. The hunting lodge was converted into a convent for nuns by the Kaiser and would later go on to become a museum and popular tourist attraction in Mayerling. The Crown Prince was buried in the Imperial Crypt in Vienna.