Prince Paul of Yugoslavia

Prince Paul of Yugoslavia, also known as Paul Karađorđević (, English transliteration: Paul Karageorgevich; 27 April 1893 – 14 September 1976), was prince regent of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia during the minority of King Peter II. Paul was a first cousin of Peter's father, Alexander I. Early life Prince Paul of Yugoslavia was the only son of Prince Arsen of Serbia, younger brother of King Peter I, and of Princess and Countess Aurora Pavlovna Demidova, a granddaughter on one side of the Swedish speaking Finnish philanthropist Aurora Karamzin and her Russian husband Prince and Count Pavel Nikolaievich Demidov and on the other of the Russian Prince Peter Troubetzkoy and his wife, Elisabeth Esperovna, by birth a Princess Belosselsky-Belozersky. The House of Karađorđević was in exile with Serbia being ruled by their archenemies, the House of Obrenović. Paul grew up in Geneva and was raised as a lonely and abandoned child in the household of his uncle, Petar Karađorđević. The long and bloody vendetta between the Houses of Obrenović and Karađorđević that started in 1817 ended in 1903 when a military coup d'etat saw the last Obrenović king, Alexander overthrown and hacked to death in his bedchamber. Petar Karađorđević returned to Serbia to become King Petar I. Paul followed his uncle and arrived in Serbia for the first time in 1903. In 1912, he made the decision to attend the University of Oxford, which was most unusual as the Serbian elite preferred to be educated in either Paris or St. Petersburg. Paul was educated at Christ Church, Oxford, where he was a member of the exclusive Bullingdon Club – a dining club notorious for its wealthy members, grand banquets and boisterous rituals. Cultivated like his closest friends Prince George, Duke of Kent, and Sir Henry Channon, his outlook on life was said to be British. Paul often said that he "felt like an Englishman". Channon called Paul "the person I have loved most". For a time, Paul and Channon lived together in a house in London together with another of Channon's lovers Lord Gage. A cultured and easy-going bon vivant who inspired much affection from his friends, Paul when not associating with the British aristocracy collected paintings by Monet, Titian and van Gogh. Despite the fact that it was the Austrian empire that declared war on Serbia on 28 July 1914, Paul only joined the Royal Serbian Army in November 1914, serving for six months before returning to Britain in May 1915.