8. Alexander Zoubkov Took Princess Victoria For All She Was Worth
Queen Victoria’s granddaughter, Princess Victoria, was born into a life of unimaginable privilege. After growing up under her prestigious grandmother’s wing, which included spending long periods of time with her at the famous Balmoral Estate in Scotland, she married Prince Adolf of Schaumburg-Lippe, brother of Germany’s Kaiser Wilhelm. Everyone in the British royal family approved of this marriage, none more so than Queen Victoria herself. The union was short-lived, though, and Victoria found that courtly life on the continent did not suit her. She decided that the next time she married, it would be for love.
In fact, Victoria went so far in the opposite direction of marrying another nobleman that she fell for a broke Russian waiter named Alexander Zoubkov. No member of her family was present at the wedding, which they undoubtedly disapproved of, and for good reason. What Zoubkov lacked in money and class, he made up for in wiles. He took Victoria for all she was worth so that when Victoria died in 1929 at the age of 63, she was wholly destitute and alone. She died in a dingy room that she had shared with the woman who had once been her servant. Doctors claimed that she did not even try to fight the disease that took her life, as she had nothing to live for anymore.