Júlia Hunyady de Kéthely

Countess Júlia Hunyady de Kéthely (Serbian: Јулија Хуњади де Кетељ; 26 August 1831 – 19 February 1919) was a Hungarian noblewoman and the Princess consort of Serbia as the wife of Prince Mihailo Obrenović III. She remained a widow for seven and a half years after his assassination in 1868, until January 1876 when she married her lover, Duke Karl of Arenberg, Prince of Recklinghausen (1831–1896).

Júlia was born in Vienna as the only daughter of Count Ferenc Hunyady de Kéthely (1804–1882) and his wife, Countess Júlia Zichy de Zich et Vásonkeő (1808–1873), whose family was much older and more influential than that of her husband. As an only daughter, she grew up alongside three older brothers, László (1826–1898), Kálmán and Vilmos (b. 1830).

During her youth, she was one of the favorite dancing partners of Emperor Franz Joseph I. The Emperor showed her special favor, and whenever she found herself in his company, he enjoyed spending time and conversing with her. Their friendship was much spoken of during her lifetime, and it was her brother, Kálmán — a Divisional general who held an official post at court — who was largely responsible for fostering such a close connection with the Emperor.^[2]

From the very first day they met, Júlia made a strong impression on Mihailo — as he did on her. A love soon began to blossom between them, and before long, the question of marriage arose. Earlier, Mihailo had been deeply in love with Princess Maria Josefa von und zu Liechtenstein (1835–1905), but her father refused to give his daughter’s hand to a foreign, Orthodox prince living in exile, whose family had amassed its wealth through trade. For this reason, it was essential from the outset that both families accept the proposed union.

Júlia’s family welcomed the match, while Mihailo’s father, Prince Miloš Obrenović I, was initially opposed — mindful that the young woman was staunch Catholic and Hungarian. However, after some time, he gave his consent. In Serbia, the fact that the bride was of a different faith was not received with much approval. On 1 August 1853, less than a month before her 22nd birthday, she married her first husband Mihailo Obrenović, the deposed ruler of Serbia.

The wedding was held at the Russian Orthodox Cathedral of St. Nicholas in Vienna, officiated by a Russian archimandrite, with the Russian ambassador to Vienna, Peter von Meyendorff, serving as the best man. The princess was magnificently adorned, and the wedding gifts exceeded 40,000 ducats. Her dowry amounted to 3,000 forints annually, which her father pledged to pay in quarterly installments. The couple spent their honeymoon in Bad Ischl. After the wedding, they settled in Vienna for the winter season, traveling across Austria and Europe during the summer months.^[3]

Life in Vienna, however, was generally dull for Prince Mihailo, who preferred spending time on a country estate of his own rather than “wandering through the houses of others.” In search of a suitable summer residence, they took an interest in the estate of Ivanka pri Dunaji, then owned by the elderly Princess Leopoldine Grassalkovich de Gyarak, née Countess Esterházy (1776–1864). On 3 August 1855, Mihailo wrote to his father, noting that “while the old Princess Grassalkovich is alive, nothing can come of the purchase, but if it be God’s will, we may yet succeed, as she is already 82 years old.”

Circumstances soon changed, and by the summer of 1856, he concluded a purchase agreement for 245,000 forints in silver with Andreas von Jurenak (1806–1889), who acted on behalf of the Hungarian treasury as the official responsible for selling the estate. Lacking sufficient funds, Mihailo had to seek assistance from his father, who, for that reason, initially refused to help them with the purchase, arguing that any European spa would suffice for the summer, and that they already possessed a vast estate in Wallachia where they could spend their time. Miloš attributed this particular whim to Júlia, believing she had influenced Mihailo’s desire to acquire an estate in Hungary (present-day Slovakia), yet he was persuaded by his son and ultimately changed his mind, assisting in the purchase of their summer residence. From that moment until his return to Serbia, Júlia and Miahilo would spend most of their time at Ivanka, which were also the happiest years of their marriage. Upon the return of her father-in-law to power, they did not immediately return to Serbia.

Instead, they traveled together to London, where, through the intervention of Lord Malmesbury, they had the opportunity to be formally introduced to Queen Victoria. From there, they continued their journey to Paris and Berlin before finally arriving in Belgrade, where Mihailo was received with a grand and ceremonial welcome. He arrived alone, without his wife, intending to provide, furnish, and prepare the residence to meet all her needs and live up to her standards. On Saturday, 3 July 1859, around noon, the princess set foot on Serbian soil for the first time, and Belgrade was “filled with glory and celebration.” She was received in Zemun, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, by “four distinguished ladies and several others from the illustrious princely family,” followed by two clergymen, three officers, two princely adjutants, three members of parliament, eight citizens of Belgrade, four city guards, one member of the municipal administration, and four gendarmes. Mihailo himself came to Zemun to welcome her and accompany her to Belgrade. Although he received her with warmth and courtesy, his father-in-law’s early doubts about the suitability of the marriage began to manifest. He was increasingly troubled by the fact that Júlia had not yet borne children, and, aware that the end of his own life was approaching, he feared the possibility of leaving no heir. At the same time, he grew uneasy with the considerable influence she exerted over his son, feeling that her presence shaped decisions in ways he could neither control nor approve.^[4]

However, this in no way meant that Miloš, despite his reservations about his daughter-in-law for the reasons previously mentioned, had poor personal relations with Júlia. On the contrary, he consistently showed her attention and affection. Not a single letter to his son exists without kind words addressed to Júlia, and she reciprocated in kind, often addressing him as “father” and writing to him in Serbian. The elder prince not only spoke to and treated Júlia with warmth and courtesy, but he also bestowed gifts upon her. Through his banker in Vienna, he often sent her furs, and on another occasion, in 1859, he sent from Kragujevac a brooch in the shape of a flower, set with the finest diamonds. This brooch had once belonged to his late wife, Princess Ljubica, who had received it from the Turkish Sultan Mahmud II in Istanbul in 1835 and had treasured it until her death.^[5]

On 26 September 1860, following the death of his father, Prince Miloš Obrenović, Mihailo once again assumed the throne as the ruler of Serbia, and Júlia became the Princess Consort. Despite her grace and refinement, she struggled to win the affection of the Serbian people, who remained wary of her Catholic faith and Hungarian origins.^[7] During an official visit in 1863, Princess Julia was graciously received in Paris by Emperor Napoleon III and his wife, Empress Eugénie.^[8]

Prince Mihailo was not a faithful husband and fathered at least one illegitimate child, a son, Velimir Mihailo Teodorović, from a youthful liaison with a seventeen-year-old Styrian girl, Maria Berghaus (1831–1863). Remarkably, it was Velimir who shared a closer bond with Júlia, visiting her more often than his own father. Mihailo, by contrast, spent time with his son mostly in the evenings, playing billiards in the basement of the Old Palace. Mihailo’s final mistress was Katarina Konstantinović, the lively and attractive daughter of his first cousin Princess Anka Obrenović, both of whom resided at the royal court at Mihailo’s personal request.

Katarina Konstantinović had harbored ambitions of eventually becoming Mihailo’s wife, exploiting Júlia’s inability to bear him a child. Mihailo even contemplated a divorce, fully aware of the national outrage such a move would provoke.^[7] In 1867, the distinguished Prime Minister Ilija Garasanin was dismissed from office after expressing his opposition to the proposed divorce and Mihailo’s intended marriage to Katarina. Katarina, unashamed and brazen, openly despised Princess Júlia and made her life increasingly difficult by flaunting her affair with the Prince.^[9]

But, before that, Júlia conducted her own discreet affair with Duke Karl of Arenberg (1831–1896), her first love, with whom she had maintained secret contact throughout her marriage to Mihailo.^[9] Prominently connected to royalty, Duke Karl was a younger son of Prosper Louis, 7th Duke of Arenberg, second cousin to Empress Sissi, by his first wife, Stéphanie Tascher de La Pagerie (1788–1832), who was the niece of Joséphine de Beauharnais, Empress of the French.^[10]

In February 1862, Mihailo discovered that his wife shared her affections with another man — none other than Karl. What made this revelation particularly significant was that their intimate correspondence was not recent, but had been ongoing since 1855, when their official exchange of letters first began. The affair was first uncovered by Anastas Jovanović, who at that time served as the Hofmeister. He intercepted one of Julia’s letters and, with undeniable proof in his hands, faced a dilemma: whether to reveal the matter to the Prince himself. After consulting with others at court, he ultimately decided to present the letter to Mihailo.

The letter, written carefully and in Julia’s own hand, bore no signature. Its characters were disguised under coded names: Arenberg appeared as “Devisemann” (“foreign exchange man”), his stepmother Duchess Ludmilla von Arenberg as “die Gute Dame” (“the good lady”), Julia as “Geschäftsmann” (“businessman”), and Mihailo as “der älteste Mann” (“the oldest man”).

Composed in German, the letter’s language was so intricate that few could understand it fully, save those acquainted with the true nature of the affair. In it, Julia confided that there was nothing left to deliberate — she had pondered this step for seven years and would have taken it regardless of Karl’s presence in her life. She went on to write that otherwise, “My life, and the life of the one (Mihailo) who is most worthy of reverence, would otherwise be ruined.”

Julia acknowledged that Arenberg was right in saying “there is still time to think about the choice of place” where they would live, but added that she herself had a particular fondness for residing “in the capital” or in Venice, so that her mother “might have as little reason as possible for suspicion.” Her mother had written her an unpleasant letter, which Julia had kept, along with her own reply; yet, she confessed with delight that “a single glance from Arenberg smooths away that unpleasantness a thousand times over.”

She closed her letter by expressing her yearning for the moment when she could think of him without sin, send letters to him freely, and receive even a few words in return, lamenting the pain of their separation. The letter ended without a signature, only with the words: “May God be with us.”^[11]

According to Anastas’s report, Prince Mihailo was utterly devastated. He refused not only to read the intercepted letter but even to show it to the Princess. Although he himself had fathered an illegitimate son before his marriage to Julia, during all the years of their union he had remained completely faithful to her — a devotion that made the pain of her betrayal immeasurable. The blow was so profound that he never truly recovered from it.

For three full years after the discovery, Mihailo continued to live with Julia — wounded, humiliated, and in constant inner turmoil, torn between revealing what he knew and keeping silent. He could scarcely believe that his wife was capable of such a thing; the very thought was inconceivable to him. His faith in her had been as absolute as faith in God — and she had desecrated that trust through her actions.

At first, he tried to maintain the same tone and composure in his dealings with her, but in time, this proved impossible. He concealed his knowledge from everyone — not only from close friends but from the public as well — except for those who had been directly involved in uncovering the affair. The public only began to sense that something was amiss in 1865, when Julia and the Prince finally separated. Even then, Mihailo offered no explanation. To him, the matter was of the utmost delicacy, and he sought to resolve it with as much dignity as possible.

When reconciliation proved unattainable, and under increasing pressure from his closest advisors at court, Mihailo ultimately decided to part ways with his wife. Julia’s mother and eldest brother, László, sided with the Prince; through their letters to Mihailo, he learned further details about his wife’s behavior that had until then been hidden from him.

In a letter to Dr. Karol Pacek (1807–1876), who mediated the divorce negotiations, Julia wrote that if her brother were ever to visit her, “she might forgive him, but she would never forget.” Mihailo wished to reach a private settlement, to avoid a public trial that would expose the Princess’s conduct, provoke scandal, and tarnish the reputation of her family and all those connected to her.

Even within Julia’s family, few were fully aware of everything that had transpired before the separation. Mihailo, for his part, was unwilling to reveal the entire truth to László, who had voluntarily come to Belgrade to negotiate a reconciliation and to dissuade them from proceeding with the divorce.

In his frustration, László threatened to challenge Arenberg to a duel. Julia’s reply was chillingly composed:

“If you fall, that will not compel me to return to my husband; but if Arenberg falls, I shall withdraw to a convent.”^[12]

Negotiations for a formal divorce between Prince Mihailo and Princess Julia ultimately failed. Instead, they reached and signed an agreement to live separately. The couple jointly executed a document that included a clause for separate living arrangements. The first point of the agreement explicitly stated that the spouses had only agreed to dissolve their marital cohabitation. The document repeatedly emphasized that this arrangement constituted merely a “separation from table and bed.”

Julia undertook not to cause Mihailo any difficulties should he, with the Church’s permission, wish to enter a second marriage, and she agreed that she would not oppose such a decision. Furthermore, she consented that during her stay abroad, she would no longer use the titles “Princess of Serbia” or “wife of the reigning Prince of Serbia”, but only “Princess Julia Obrenović, née Countess Hunyady.”

By mutual agreement, Julia was granted a house in Vienna valued at 100,000 ducats, along with an annual allowance of 5,500 ducats, and Mihailo would cover the cost of sending her belongings to Vienna. The Princess signed the agreement in November 1865 while visiting her family on an estate in Austria.

A complicating factor for Julia was the difference between the laws of their respective churches. According to the rules of the Serbian Orthodox Church, Mihailo had the right to seek an official divorce and remarry, whereas according to the canon law of the Catholic Church, Julia was permitted only to live separately from her husband; she could not remove her wedding ring while both were alive. She was informed of this by a letter from Bishop Josip Juraj Strossmayer, dated 18 December 1865.

This meant that, under the Canon law of the Eastern Orthodox Church, Mihailo could legally divorce, enter a second marriage, and potentially have legitimate heirs. Julia, however, having not changed her faith upon marrying Mihailo, had no right to a second marriage while he was alive, though she could live separately. This situation was further complicated by the fact that if Mihailo remarried, Julia would be required to relinquish his name and titles, as his new wife would assume the social position previously associated with the Princess. Under Catholic canon law, marriage is indissoluble, and a wife’s use of her husband’s name is considered a continuation of the marital bond.

As the official reason for the separation, Mihailo did not cite Julia’s infidelity, but rather her inability to bear children, which further humiliated her. Ultimately, an agreement was reached: Julia consented to Mihailo entering a second marriage, and neither she nor her family would raise objections, provided that Mihailo returned any letters from Arenberg that might compromise her. Mihailo agreed, and upon receiving a signed written confirmation from Julia, he began discussions regarding a formal divorce with Mihailo Jovanović, Metropolitan of Belgrade, as the matter had been complicated by Strossmayer’s letter, which confirmed that she “could live separately from her husband without sin.”

However, this did not constitute an official divorce, which could only be granted by a spiritual court upon incontrovertible proof — proof Mihailo did not possess once the Arenberg letters were returned. In his case, the situation depended entirely on the interpretation of church law, while for Julia, the matter was unambiguous: she could not be formally divorced in the eyes of her church.^[13]

In a panic over her inability to resolve the situation, Julia tried to secure a divorce through the Arenberg family, who maintained close ties with the Pope and the Vatican. Prior to this, unforeseen incidents had occurred during her stay abroad, in which she was compromised by the presence of Duke Charles. These events led to her refusing to receive both the Belgian heir to the throne, who had already announced his visit, and Viktor Balabin, the Russian ambassador in Vienna.^[14]

In the meantime, before the affair with his cousin Katarina, Mihailo had been seeking to arrange a marriage that would be both politically advantageous and ensure the continuation of his line. As early as 1864, he dispatched envoys to explore the possibility of marrying Princess Jelena Karađorđević (1846–1867), the youngest daughter of the deposed Alexander Karađorđević, former Prince of Serbia. However, her mother, Princess Persida, categorically rejected the proposal. Mihailo renewed his efforts in 1866, but the outcome was the same.^[15]

Over the years, several attempts at reconciliation were made by both sides, into which the Zichy family, the Princess’s maternal relatives, also became involved. Yet whenever one sought to restore peace, the other refused. Mihailo’s stubbornness and Julia’s pride proved irreconcilable — traits that kept them from aligning their wishes with reality. Thus, neither a formal divorce nor a true reconciliation ever took place, lasting unresolved until Mihailo’s tragic death in 1868.^[16]

On 10 June 1868, Mihailo was taking a leisurely stroll through the park of Košutnjak, near the royal summer residence on the outskirts of Belgrade, accompanied by Princess Anka and his mistress, Katarina. In a sudden and violent attack, all three were shot by assassins, leaving Prince Mihailo and Princess Anka dead, while Katarina sustained injuries.

At the time, suspicion fell upon the Karađorđević dynasty, the historic rivals of the Obrenović. Following Mihailo’s death, he was succeeded by Milan IV, his cousin and the son of Princess Anka's brother, Miloš Obrenović (1829–1861). Milan would later ascend as King Milan I of Serbia in 1882.

Júlia received the news of Prince Mihailo’s death in Vienna, and it affected her deeply. At once she gathered her mother, brother, and uncle, and together they departed for Belgrade by steamboat, arriving on 1 June. Dressed entirely in black, with a deep veil covering her face, she appeared sorrowful and grief-stricken. In mourning attire, she went directly to the royal palace to pay her respects before the Prince’s bier.

On 3 June, she attended the funeral service and burial, and on the following day, 4 June, she was present at the memorial service held in the Cathedral Church, which, like the funeral itself, drew a vast crowd of mourners.

At the close of her brief stay, Júlia felt it her duty to leave a letter to the regents of young Milan, her late husband’s minor heir. In it, she wrote:

“It is impossible for me to leave Serbian soil without expressing my deepest and most heartfelt gratitude to the grieving nation which today has buried, together with me, not only its prince but also a great patriot—one who lived always for his fatherland and for every one of its people. Your sympathy has touched me profoundly and does you great honor, for only noble hearts can feel gratitude as deeply as yours. And though I must part from you, my thoughts remain with you, and my sincerest prayer shall ever be that God raise Serbia to flourish in happiness, and that the hopes and dreams your late, prematurely departed prince cherished within his heart for your welfare may be fulfilled.”

Júlia left Belgrade by steamer for Vienna, accompanied by her family, and, as one contemporary account recorded, she was “escorted with the warmest sympathy of all the citizens and people of our land.”

After her husband’s death, she lived first in Vienna, and later in Paris and Brussels. She did not return to Belgrade until 1870, when she came to settle matters concerning part of Mihailo’s estate. On that occasion, she was received with marked courtesy by the reigning prince, who placed his entire palace at her disposal for the duration of her stay. Júlia later recalled that the reception she received in Belgrade was even more gracious than she had imagined: Prince Milan himself, accompanied by his three regents, personally welcomed her at the riverbank. Many Serbian dignitaries paid her visits, and a great number of citizens came to express their respects.^[17]

In the same year as Mihailo’s assassination, Katarina married General Milivoje Blaznavac and would later assume the role of first lady at the court of her cousin, King Milan, during the absence of his estranged wife, Queen Natalie, who had chosen to live abroad. Meanwhile, Júlia continued her longstanding love affair with Duke Karl of Arenberg, ultimately marrying him on 16 January 1876 at Ivanka pri Dunaji, which was a wedding present from her late, former father-in-law.^[18][19] Júlia officially assumed the titles of Duchess of Arenberg and Princess of Recklinghausen, securing her place within European nobility and leaving behind the turbulent chapter of her life in Serbia.

However, even after her second marriage, Júlia never ceased to take an interest in the affairs and people of Serbia, maintaining constant correspondence with her friends and admirers there. She remained deeply devoted to the members of the Obrenović dynasty, following their destinies with genuine affection. When she learned of the death of King Milan in 1901, she sent a beautiful silver wreath to the Krušedol Monastery, bearing the inscription: “To King Milan Obrenović IV, from his sorrowful Princess Júlia.”

What is particularly touching is that, even years after Mihailo’s tragic death, Júlia continued to inquire with care and emotion about his grave, the site of his assassination, the clothes he had worn that day, and the personal belongings found on him. During her stay in Bucharest, she wrote to Nikola Krstić (1829-1902), a professor at the Belgrade Lyceum, member and president of the Court of Cassation, and State Councillor, asking whether a monument had been erected over the Prince’s tomb and whether the place where he was killed had been fenced off to prevent it from being trampled. On another occasion, she asked him whether he had seen the Prince before his death, what he had looked like, and whether they had spoken. She also sought information about the table at which Mihailo had studied as a child. In truth, she showed a profound and enduring interest in everything connected to the late Prince and in all that had once surrounded him.^[20]

Julia outlived her second husband as well, becoming a widow for the second time. Gradually, her beauty began to fade, her strength waned, and her circle of friends grew ever smaller. As old age approached, the memories of her years with Prince Mihailo and of the people she had known in Serbia became ever dearer to her heart. Those people, or their children, had not forgotten her, and whenever they found themselves in Vienna, they visited her with warmth and affection. She, in turn, remembered them fondly and often asked after them.

In 1901, when she was already seventy, she was visited in Vienna by Kosta Hristić, former Minister of Justice, the son of Nikola Hristić, who had served as Prime Minister and Minister of the Interior during Prince Mihailo’s reign. He later described their encounter as follows:

“At the appointed hour, I went to her apartment, located on the first floor of an elegant house on Tuchlauben Street. Once I was announced, a footman opened both doors of a small salon. In the middle of the room stood an elderly, corpulent lady, her cheeks full yet pale, noticeably sagging on both sides. Her legs could barely support her, and she leaned on a cane with a silver handle. She was no longer the radiant beauty of thirty-six years before, the woman we children had gazed upon in awe at Easter, as though she were a living icon. Only her beautiful eyes remained the same, though their brightness had dimmed, veiled now by a mist of melancholy. Her fine eyebrows were still there, but no longer perfectly arched. Her small mouth was still hers, yet now pale and withered; her once pearl-white teeth had darkened, and the dimples that had once graced her face had vanished into soft, sagging flesh. She was no longer Prince Mihailo’s beautiful consort, but rather the aged Dowager Duchess of Arenberg.

Her voice, however, remained as gentle, sweet, and melodious as ever, and her manners as gracious and refined. During the breakfast we shared, she spoke of Belgrade with visible pleasure, occasionally using Serbian expressions—as if to show she had forgotten nothing. In her dining room, on the four walls, hung views of Vienna, Belgrade, Ivanka, and Brussels. She explained that these were the four cities in which she had spent the happiest years of her life.

She spoke of Prince Mihailo with the deepest reverence, praising his noble character and his devoted patriotism. She recalled the bombardment of 1862, when shells began to fall around him, and said she had no intention of leaving Belgrade until Madame Mondain, the wife of the Serbian Minister of War, urged her that the danger had become extreme. She then fled by carriage to Topčider and remembered how women threw their children into her coach, unable to flee on their own. Afterwards, she continued to recount her memories from the days when she was Princess Consort of Serbia.”^[21]

She passed away, childless and alone, in her native Vienna on 19 February 1919 and was laid to rest three days later, on 22 February, in the Vienna Central Cemetery. Her ashes were placed in an urn compartment near the second entrance, marked with the signature KNLH 13. In later years, her remains were transferred to the Mausoleum of the Église des Capucins in Enghien.^[22] Duchess Júlia was 87 years old, having outlived both her husbands and all her brothers and their spouses.^[23]

• List of Serbian consorts

• Marek, Miroslav. "Obrenovic family". Genealogy.EU.