Births on October 12

Elisabeth of Romania (d. 1956)

Elisabeth of Romania (full name Elisabeth Charlotte Josephine Alexandra Victoria: Romanian: Elisabeta a României, Greek: Ελισάβετ της Ρουμανίας; 12 October 1894 – 14 November 1956) was a princess of Romania and member of the House of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen and by marriage Queen of Greece during 1922–1924.

Raised by her grand-uncle King Carol I of Romania and his wife Queen Elisabeth, she was an introvert and socially isolated. Married to Prince George, the heir to the Greek throne in 1921, she felt no passion for him and underwent the political turmoil in her adopted country after World War I. When her husband became king of Greece in 1922 as King George II, Elisabeth was involved in assisting refugees who arrived to Athens after the disaster of the Greco-Turkish War. The rise of the revolutionary climate, however, affected her health and with great relief she left the Kingdom of Greece with her husband in December 1923. The royal couple then settled in Bucharest, and King George was deposed on 25 March 1924.

In Romania, Elisabeth and George II's relationship deteriorated and the couple divorced in 1935. Very close to her brother, King Carol II of Romania, the princess amassed an important fortune, partly due to financial advice given by her lover, the banker Alexandru Scanavi. After the death of her mother, Queen Marie, in 1938 and the dethronement of Carol II in 1940, Elisabeth took up the role of First Lady of Romania. At the end of World War II, she established close links with the Romanian Communist Party and openly conspired against her nephew, the young King Michael I, earning the nickname of "Red Aunt" of the sovereign. However, her communist links did not prevent her from being expelled from the country when the Romanian People's Republic was proclaimed in 1947. Exiled, the princess moved to Switzerland and then to Cannes, in southern France. She had a romantic relationship with Marc Favrat, a would-be artist almost thirty years younger, whom she finally adopted just before her death in 1956.