Evelyn , Princess Blücher Evelyn Fürstin Blücher von Wahlstatt ( 10 September 1876 – 20 January 1960 ) , diarist and memoirist , wrote a standard account of life as a civilian aristocrat in Germany during World War I . Early life . Princess Blücher was an English woman , the daughter of Frederick Stapleton - Bretherton of a Catholic landed gentry family by Isabella , daughter of William Bernard Petre , 12th Baron Petre . They settled in Rainhill , Lancashire , living in what was then " Rainhill Hall " , now Loyola Hall . She was also the granddaughter of Bartholomew Bretherton ( 1806 - 1874 ) , a jockey , who rode many times in the Grand National as an amateur rider , winning the race in 1840 . On 19 August 1907 , she married Gebhard Blücher von Wahlstatt , the fourth Fürst ( Prince ) Blücher ( 1865 – 1931 ) , an Anglophile descended from the great Prussian General - Field - Marshal Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher ( 1742 – 1819 ) , the first Prince , who had contributed notably to the allied victory at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815 . Her sister , Gertrude Stapleton - Bretherton , married Vice - Admiral Kenneth Dewar ( 1879 - 1964 ) who was in the Battle of Jutland . World War I . After leaving the Channel Islands , where the family had taken the lease of Herm , the smallest of the habitable islands , she spent the War years with the Prince in Germany , where he commanded a hospital train for the Silesian Order of Malta . Here she kept a diary , describing life in Berlin and at the family estate of Krieblowitz ( now Krobielowice ) in Silesia ( now Poland ) , from the point of view of an English exile among the deeply conservative Prussian nobility . This became the basis for her account of the war published as " Princess Blucher , English Wife in Berlin : a private memoir of events , politics and daily life in Germany throughout the War and the social revolution of 1918 " ( Constable , 1920 ) . It remains a well - known source of information on life in Germany during World War I . It describes the last weeks of the German Empire , with the decline of the old order , the fall of the monarchy , and the appalling social conditions that led to Spartacist uprising s and the German Revolution as the country became a failed state : There is intense cold here , such as has not been known for more than half a century . There are shivering throngs of hungry care - worn people picking their way through snowy streets . . . We are all gaunt and bony now , and have dark shadows around our eyes . Our thoughts are chiefly taken up with wondering what our next meal will be , and dreaming of the good things that once existed . Her memoirs were translated into French and German and reprinted many times , becoming a minor classic . With Maj . Desmond Chapman - Huston , she edited her husband ' s " Memoirs of Prince Blücher " , describing his life and family , with an account of his great ancestor , Marshal Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher . In later life , Princess Blücher returned to England , where she lived near the Brompton Oratory in Kensington . She died in Worthing in 1960 and is buried , next to her husband , in the cemetery of St Bartholomew ' s Church , Rainhill , Lancashire . External links .