Karl Kinsky’s father 7th Prince Ferdinand Kinsky accompanied Elisabeth on her first two hunting trips to England. He brought along young Karl who became a close companion of Sisi, Bay Middleton, Earl Spencer and Rudi Liechtenstein. Karl’s mother was a Liechtenstein. Karl became a brilliant rider and he won the Grand National on his own horse Zoedane in 1883. Popular socially he rose to become Austro-Hungarian ambassador to Britain. Kinsky met Winston Churchill’s mother Jennie Jerome, Lady Churchill, in Ireland and they had a passionate affair. They wanted to marry but shortly before Lord Randolph Churchill’s death, his father made him marry Countess Elisabeth von Wolff-Metternich in 1895. Although he became head of the house of Kinsky in 1904 Kinsky continued to live in England. 1n 1914 Kinsky went back to Austria to fight and chose the eastern front rather than face his friends in the west. His horses in England were allocated to friends and those in Ireland commandeered by the government. George Lambton defended Kinsky’s reputation in 1919 and wrote to The Times ‘it afforded him the greatest pleasure to hear that four of his old favourites were carrying two generals, both old friends of his’. He must have died sad in the knowledge he could not return to his adopted land.
Attribution Wenzl Weis [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], via Wikimedia Commons
