Lord Leopold Mountbatten

Lord Leopold Arthur Louis Mountbatten (21 May 1889 – 23 April 1922) was a British Army officer and a descendant of the Hessian princely Battenberg family and the British Royal Family. A grandson of Queen Victoria, he was known as Prince Leopold of Battenberg from his birth until 1917, when the British Royal Family relinquished their German titles during World War I, and the Battenberg family changed their name to Mountbatten. Early life Prince Leopold was born on 21 May 1889. His father was Prince Henry of Battenberg, the son of Prince Alexander of Hesse and by Rhine and Julia, Princess of Battenberg. His mother was Princess Beatrice of the United Kingdom, the fifth daughter and the youngest child of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. As he was the product of a morganatic marriage, Prince Henry of Battenberg took his style of Prince of Battenberg from his mother, Julia von Hauke, who was created Princess of Battenberg in her own right. As such, Leopold was styled as His Serene Highness Prince Leopold of Battenberg from birth. In the United Kingdom he was styled His Highness Prince Leopold of Battenberg under a Royal Warrant passed by Queen Victoria in 1886. He was baptised at St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle on 29 June 1889. His godparents were Leopold II of Belgium (his first cousin twice removed, represented by the Prince of Wales, his maternal uncle), the Duke of Connaught and Strathearn (his maternal uncle, represented by Prince Albert of Schleswig-Holstein, his first cousin), Prince Louis of Battenberg (his paternal uncle, represented by the Marquess of Lorne, his maternal uncle), the Marchioness of Lorne (his maternal aunt), the Duchess of Albany (his maternal aunt) and Princess Marie of Erbach-Schönberg (his paternal aunt). His father died of malaria in 1896.