page_title: Sophia of Prussia
section_title: Goudi coup and its consequences
hierarchical_section_title: Sophia of Prussia / Life / Crown Princess of Greece / Goudi coup and its consequences
caption_attribution_description: Schloss Friedrichshof im Kronberger Schlosspark
context_page_description: Sophia of Prussia was Queen consort of Greece during 1913–1917 and 1920–1922.
  A member of the House of Hohenzollern and daughter of Frederick III, German Emperor, Sophia received a liberal and anglophile education, under the supervision of her mother, Victoria, Princess Royal. In 1889, less than a year after the death of her father, she married her third cousin Constantine, heir apparent to the Greek throne. After a difficult period of adaptation in her new country, Sophia gave birth to six children and became involved in the assistance to the poor, following in the footsteps of her mother-in-law, Queen Olga. However, it was during the wars which Greece faced during the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century that Sophia showed the most social activity: she founded field hospitals, oversaw the training of Greek nurses, and healed wounded soldiers.
  However, Sophia was hardly rewarded for her actions, even after her grandmother Queen Victoria decorated her with the Royal Red Cross after the Thirty Days' War: the Greeks criticized her links with Germany.
context_section_description: In Greece, political life remained volatile throughout the first years of the 20th century and the Megali Idea (Greek: Μεγάλη Ιδέα Megáli Idéa, "Great Idea") continued to be a central concern of the population. But in 1908, the Cretan authorities unilaterally proclaimed the attachment of their island to the Kingdom of Greece. But for fear of Turkish reprisals, the Greek government refuses to recognize the annexation, although the island was, de facto, detached from the Ottoman Empire. In Athens, the pusillanimity of the King and government was shocking, particularly to the militia. On 15 August 1909, a group of officers gathered in the "Military League" (Greek: Στρατιωτικός Σύνδεσμος, Stratioticos Syndesmos) and organized the so-called Goudi coup. While declaring to be monarchists, members of the League, led by Nikolaos Zorbas, asked, among other things, for the sovereign to expel his son from the army. Officially, this was to protect the Crown Prince from the jealousies that could arise from his friendship with some soldiers. But the reality was quite different: officers continued to hold the Diadochos responsible for the 1897 defeat.
  The situation became so tense that King George I's sons had to resign from their military posts to save their father the shame of having to expelled them. In September, the Diadochos, his wife and their children also chose to leave Greece and seek refuge in Germany at Friedrichshof, now owned by the Princess Margaret of Prussia. Meanwhile, in Athens, discussions began about dethroning the House of Glücksburg to establishing a republic or replacing the sovereign with either a bastard son of Otto I, a foreign prince or with Prince George, with Sophia as regent.
  In December 1909, Colonel Zorbas, head of the Military League, pressured George I to appointed him Head the government in place of Prime Minister Kyriakoulis Mavromichalis. The sovereign refused but the government undertook reforms which favored the military. The staff was reorganized and supporters of the Diadochos, including Ioannis Metaxas, were expelled. At the same time, French soldiers were called to reorganize the Greek army, which threatened both Sophia and her husband, as they helped develop republican ideas within the militia.
  Despite these reforms, some members of the Military League continued to oppose the government in order to take power. They then traveled to Crete to meet the Head of government of the island, Eleftherios Venizelos, and offered him the post of Prime Minister of Greece. But the Cretan leader didn't want to appear in Greece to be supported by the army and convinced them to arrange for new elections. In March 1910, the king eventually called for elections and Venizelos and his supporters came to power. For the royal family, this was a difficult time.
  However, Venizelos didn't want to weaken the Crown. To show that he didn't obey the army, he restored the members of the royal family to their military duties and the Diadochos thus again became Chief of the Staff. Back in Greece on 21 October 1910, after over a year of exile, Sophia nevertheless remained very suspicious of the new government and the militia. She refused any contact with Venizelos, blaming him as partly responsible for the humiliation suffered by the royal family. The Princess also had problems with her father-in-law, whom she accused of having been weak during the crisis.
caption: Schloss Friedrichshof, former residence of the German Dowager Empress
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