Philip Christoph von Königsmarck

Philip Christoph von Königsmarck or Philipp Christoph Königsmarck, (4 March 1665 [cite web | url=http://www.today-in-history.cn/on-this-day/march-4-in-history |title=Today in History » March 4 in history |accessdate=2007-06-29 ] – 2 July 1694)cite book |title=Great Mysteries of the Past |pages=page 37 |year=1991 |publisher=Reader's Digest |location=New York |isbn=0-89577-377-5 ] was a Swedish count [cite web |url=http://www.family-ancestry.co.uk/history/georgian_england/george_i |title=Family Ancestry Georgian England George I |accessdate=2007-06-29 ] and soldier. He was the lover of Sophia Dorothea, Princess of Celle, the wife of George I of Great Britain.cite web |url=http://www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/usbiography/monarchs/georgei.html |title=George I Feature Page on Undiscovered Scotland |accessdate=2007-06-29 ] It is alleged that two of those involved in his death made confessions years later [ [http://books.google.com/books?id=GiQEAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA227&dq=Disappearance+of+COunt+Konigsmark&ei=D32LR5mfDoXYiwHX1oTEBQ#PPA221,M1] ]

On the morning of July 2, 1694, after a meeting with Sophia, he disappeared and his body was never found. He was probably murdered at the instigation of George I, who paid a courtier a large sum of money to do so. It is most likely his body was dumped in a river, possibly the Leine.

Königsmarck was grandson to the Swedish Field Marshal Hans Christoff von Königsmarck and nephew to the Swedish Field Marshal Otto Wilhelm von Königsmarck. His sister Aurora von Königsmarck was later mistress to August II of Poland, with whom she had the son Maurice de Saxe, the brilliant French military commander. His brother [http://www.exclassics.com/newgate/ng40.htm Charles John Königsmarck] (Karl Johann von Königsmarck) is alleged to have hired three assassins to kill Thomas Thynne, Esq. - husband of heiress Elizabeth Seymour, Duchess of Somerset, whom Königsmarck had been wooing - on February 12, 1681. The assassins were hanged on March 10, 1682; their alleged hirer was acquitted.

Most of the letters between Königsmarck and Sophia Dorothea were published by W.H. Wilkins, "The love of an uncrowned queen" (2 parts, 1900).

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