Princess Ileana of Romania
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Princess Ileana of Romania (1909-1991) was officially the youngest daughter of King Ferdinand and Queen Marie of Romania. Unofficially, there is some doubt about her true paternity. It has been suggested that Ileana's biological father was actually Prince Barbu Stirbey.
In 1931, Ileana married the Habsburg Archduke Anton of Austria. This marriage was encouraged by Ileana's brother, King Carol II, who was jealous of Ileana's popularity in Romania and wanted to get her out of the country. After the wedding, Carol claimed that the Romanian people would never tolerate a Habsburg living on Romanian soil, and on these grounds refused Ileana and Anton permission to live in Romania.
Ileana and Anton had six children:
- Stefan, Archduke of Austria (b. 1932)
- Maria Ileana, Archduchess of Austria (b. 1933)
- Alexandra, Archduchess of Austria (b. 1935)
- Dominic, Archduke of Austria (b. 1937)
- Maria Magdalena, Archduchess of Austria (b. 1939)
- Elisabeth, Archduchess of Austria (b. 1942)
After World War II, Ileana settled first in Argentina and later in the United States. In 1954, her marriage to Anton ended in divorce. That same year, she remarried, this time to Stefan Issarescu in Newton, Massachusetts. This marriage also ended in a divorce, in 1965. Ileana later became an Orthodox nun. Taking the name Mother Alexandra, she served as abbess of the Orthodox Monastery of the Transfiguration in Ellwood City, Pennsylvania, until her death. She visited Romania again in 1990, at the age of 81. In 1959 she suffered a great loss when her daughter Maria Ileana and her husband were killed in Brazil in an airplane accident. Maria Ileana was pregnant at the time, and left an orphaned boy of 1.
In May 2006 Dominic of Habsburg, Ileana's son, got the Bran Castle from the Romanian authorities as inheritance from his mother Ileana. Earlier in time the castle became a symbol of Romania, as being Dracula's castle, although it is not very sure if Vlad Tepes (Dracula) ever visited it. However, Vlad Tepes' father, Vlad Dracul, sieged it.