Evening star., 1948-09-18

Count Folke Bernadotte, United
Nations mediator for Palestine who
was assassinated yesterday in Jeru-
salem, was a nephew of King George
V. of Sweden and a great-grandson
of Jean Baptiste Jules Bernadotte,
one of Napoleon's marshals, who
became King Charles XIV of Swe-
den.
Before becoming King Marshal
Bernadotte had married Desiree
Clary, the daughter of French
banker at Marseilles and sister of
Joseph Bonaparte's wife. On the
introduction of the French EN-
pire he became one of the 18 mar
shals OF France. He vas elected
successor to the Swedish throne
on the sudden death of the crown
prince.
Charles XIV kept the throne after
Napoleon's downfall and won great
popularity with the SWedes by show
ing leniency to Swedish war prison.
ers. The first Bernadotte had the
same tireless energy characteristic
of his descendants.
It was Count Folke Bernadotte, as
head of the Swedish Red Cross, who
flew often to Germany and Britain
during the last war to arrange the
exchange of wounded prisoners of
war, many of them via Sweden
Some $500 political prisoners OF
the Nazis probably owe their lives
to his intervention on their behalf.
Took Capitulation Offer
AS the German Reich of Adolph
Hitler was breaking up under the
final pressure of the Allied wal
drive, the count brought to the
Allies capitulation offer from
Heinrich Himmler. But the West
ern Allies insisted the Germans
must surrender to all the Allies
including the Russians, and this
the Nazis finally did. The count
told the story of the negotiations in
a book called The Curtain Falls.
The count was fluent in English
German and French as we'll as his
own native tongue. He spoke Es-
tonian, reminder of the time he
was being considered as possible
king for the hypothetical union OF
Baltic States.
Son of Nonroyal Mother.
Born on January 2, 1895, he
missed being a prince of the royal
house because he happened to be
the son of a nonroyal mother.
His father was Prince Oscar Carl
August, second son of King Oscar
II and a brother of the present
Swedish King. Prince Oscar re-
nounced his rights to the throne
when he married Ebbs Henriette
Munck. a lady of noble but non
royal blood.
The Swedish press credited his
organlzational talents to his work ir
the United States, where he took a
job as an errand boy in a New York
bank and familiarized himself ster
by step with each of its branches.
In his early years the count was
widely regarded as a playboy. In
1923, wearing the sky-blue and sill
yer uniform of his regiment, he
married Estelle Romaine Manville
daughter of the American asbestos
magnate, at Pleasantville, N. Y. Al
a ceremony reputed to have cost
s75 900, Is detectives guarded the
wedding presents, which included
as from bridegroom to bride, a platl-
mum and diamond crown which she
was to wear on presentation at the
Swedish court. Miss Manville was 9
cousin of the oft-married Tommy
Manville.
After his marriage the counts life
was tinged with duty. He looked
after Sweden's interests in the Chi.
cago Century of Progress Exhibitor
and he was commissioner genera
for Sweden at the New York Worlc
Fair in 1939-40.
Aide de Camp Six Years.
Meanwhile he had put in 81,
years as aide de camp to the Grown
Prince of Sweden and had becom,
active In the Red Cross. It was IL
this world that his faculties ant
talents found their appropriate
medium.
/ In 1943 he had the administrativ.
supervision of the exchange vis
sweden of disabled prisoners of war
an exchange described by the ther
British Foreign Secretary. Anthon,
Eden, as "a major humanitarian
effort"
Count Bernadotte visited prisonel
of war camps and was known fol
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