Sofie Luise of Mecklenburg-Schwerin (1685–1735)

Sofie Luise was born on 6 May 1685 as the 4th and youngest child and only daughter of Friedrich, Duke of Mecklenburg-Grabow, and his wife Christine Wilhelmine of Hesse-Homburg. Sofie Luise's father died before her 3rd birthday. Her eldest brother, who was 10 years her senior, succeeded their childless uncle as Duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin in 1692.

Sofie Luise
of Mecklenburg

On 28 November 1708 Sofie Louise became the 3rd wife of Friedrich I (1657–1713), the 1st King in Prussia. Friedrich had just one surviving son from his earlier marriages and still hoped to get additional sons with his young wife. He was a little man with a little hump, unimpressive in appearance, asthmatic, sickly and weak. At 50, Friedrich was no longer capable of making love, and the marriage remained childless.

Worse, the marriage was a disaster. Sofie Luise proved to be a fanatic, puritan Lutheran and a complete nuisance. Gradually, she showed herself to be mentally unstable, and the King estranged from her. Soon, she was over the hill and required watching. During periodic fits of violence Sofie Luise had to be kept under restraint.

W.H. Nelson describes: 

Ultimately, she did him in. One morning, escaping from the attendants who guarded her, she ran amok though the palace corridors, until she reached the King's bedroom, into which she crashed, quite unexpected, dressed only in her white undergarments. Frederick woke up with a start, for she had literally crashed right through the glass door to his room; he was confronted with an apparition in white, blood streaming over her clothes, a frightening spectre. In fact, he took her to be just that: He thought she was the "White Lady", the ghost of Countess Agnes von Orlamünde, the Hohenzollern family spook, who often appeared to announce death to the family members. He keeled over, never rose again, and died a few days later.

Sophie Louise was returned to the care of her widowed mother, Christine Wilhelmine of Hesse-Homburg. She lived in Grabow, Neustadt and castle Schwerin, where she died on 29 July 29 1735. She is buried in the St. Nicholas Church.


King Friedrich I 

Sources: Nelson, W.H.: The Soldier Kings, The House of Hohenzollern, J.M. Dent & Sons Ltd, 1970; Juten, W.J.F.: Het Groothertoogelijk Huis Mecklenburg, Gebr. Juten, 1901-1902; Midford, N.: Frederick The Great, Hamish Hamilton, 1970; Williamson, D.: Debrett's Kings and Queens of Europe, 1988; Die großen Dynastien, Südwest Verlag München, 1978.