Page 50 - They Also Served

After being named in yet another divorce scandal, Woolston vs. Woolston, Philippe married Archduchess Maria Dorothea of Austria. However, they were ill-suited and spent most of their married life apart, divorcing in 1914. In 1898, the duke narrowly avoided assassination in Geneva after an anarchist vowed to kill the next royal he saw, missed the duke in the crowd, and murdered Empress Elisabeth of Austria instead.
Philippe lived in England until 1900 and thereafter in Belgium. Meanwhile, he took part in numerous expeditions to the Arctic, Greenland and Siberia, further enhancing his reputation as an explorer. On the outbreak of the Great War, at the age of 45, Philippe again tried unsuccessfully to join the French Army, and was also rejected by the Belgium Army. Returning to the UK, he was planning to join the Italian Army when he was knocked down by a London bus and severely injured. Philippe, Duc d’Orléans, pretender to the throne of France, died in 1926.
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