Prince Heinrich XIII and the plot to overthrow the German government

By the time he started spending regular weekends in Bad Lobenstein last year, he was already deeply embedded in the Reichsbürger movement. But his anti-Semitic tendencies and interest in conspiracy theories are well documented.

In January 2019, he gave a talk at the WorldWebForum in Zurich, Switzerland titled “Experience the Rise and Fall of the Blue-Blooded Elite”. In the 15-minute speech, he railed against the Rothschild family and claimed World War I was forced on the German Kaiser by international financial interests – two common anti-Semitic whistles – insisting that democratic Germany modern was just an illusion.

“Since Germany surrendered on May 8, Germany has never been sovereign again,” Prince Heinrich XIII said in his speech, referring to the day of his defeat in World War II. “It was transformed into an administrative structure of the allies in the so-called united economy entity, the Federal Republic of Germany – in other words a commercial structure.”

It was speeches like this that began to alienate him from the parents of the Reuss household. The head of the Reuss family, a distant cousin who, like all male heirs to the Reuss throne, is also named Heinrich, called him a “confused old man” and pointed out that although his coup had successful, he was only 17th in line for the throne.

“That means 16 of us would have to die before it was his turn,” he said, adding that what propelled his distant cousin into his conspiracy world was likely years of bitterness with the German courts.

After German reunification, Heinrich XIII spent years fighting legal battles to regain ownership of mansions and family lodges that had been nationalized in the former communist East Germany. “He never got any land restitution,” said the head of the Reuss family, although the prince did manage to recover some of his family’s furniture and art.

Eventually, Heinrich XIII had to buy back the richly decorated lodge with its sculpted stone boars and a Gothic-looking tower.