Prince Marie Edouard-Xavier Ferdinand Auguste Gaspard de Lobkowicz (18 October 1960 – 27 April 1984) was a French aristocrat, military officer, and murder victim. The eldest son of Prince Edouard de Lobkowicz and Princess Marie Françoise of Bourbon-Parma, he was a member of the

Lobkowicz family The House of Lobkowicz (''Lobkovicové'' in modern Czech, sg. ''z Lobkovic''; ''Lobkowitz'' in German) is an important Bohemian noble family that dates back to the 14th century and is one of the oldest noble families of the region. Over the cent ...

and a descendent of the

House of Bourbon-Parma The House of Bourbon-Parma () is a cadet branch of the Spanish royal family, whose members once ruled as King of Etruria and as Duke of Parma and Piacenza, Duke of Guastalla, Guastalla, and Duke of Lucca, Lucca. The House descended from the Fre ...

the House of Bourbon-Busset. Prince Edouard-Xavier was a trained

paratrooper A paratrooper or military parachutist is a soldier trained to conduct military operations by parachuting directly into an area of operations, usually as part of a large airborne forces unit. Traditionally paratroopers fight only as light infa ...

who served as a lieutenant in the Reserve of the French Army and was a member of the

Sovereign Military Order of Malta The Sovereign Military Order of Malta (SMOM), officially the Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of Saint John of Jerusalem, of Rhodes and of Malta, and commonly known as the Order of Malta or the Knights of Malta, is a Catholic lay religious ...

. On 2 April 1984, Prince Edouard-Xavier went missing. A few weeks later, on 27 April 1984, his body was discovered in the

Seine The Seine ( , ) is a river in northern France. Its drainage basin is in the Paris Basin (a geological relative lowland) covering most of northern France. It rises at Source-Seine, northwest of Dijon in northeastern France in the Langres plat ...

. An autopsy revealed that he had been murdered, with a gunshot wound in the throat and left shoulder blade.

Early life and family

Prince Edouard-Xavier was born at the

American Hospital of Paris The American Hospital of Paris (''Hôpital américain de Paris''), founded in 1906, is a private, not-for-profit, community hospital certified under the French healthcare system. Located in Neuilly-sur-Seine, in the western suburbs of Paris, Fra ...

on 18 October 1960 to Prince Edouard de Lobkowicz and Princess Marie Françoise of Bourbon-Parma. He was a member of the House of Lobkowicz, a Czech princely house. His paternal grandparents were Prince Edouard Josef von Lobkowicz and the American golfer and businesswoman Anita Lihme. His maternal grandparents were Prince Xavier of Bourbon-Parma, Duke of Parma and Piacenza,

Carlist Carlism (; ; ; ) is a Traditionalism (Spain), Traditionalist and Legitimist political movement in Spain aimed at establishing an alternative branch of the Bourbon dynasty, one descended from Infante Carlos María Isidro of Spain, Don Carlos, ...

pretender to the Spanish throne and head of the

, and Madeleine de Bourbon-Busset, daughter of Georges de Bourbon-Busset, Count de Lignières and a member of the non-dynastic Bourbon-Busset line of the

House of Bourbon The House of Bourbon (, also ; ) is a dynasty that originated in the Kingdom of France as a branch of the Capetian dynasty, the royal House of France. Bourbon kings first ruled France and Kingdom of Navarre, Navarre in the 16th century. A br ...

. He was a great-grandson of the Danish-American industrialist C. Bai Lihme and a great-great grandson of the American manufacturer Edward C. Hegeler. Prince Edouard-Xavier was the nephew of

Carlos Hugo, Duke of Parma Carlos Hugo, Duke of Parma and Piacenza (8 April 1930 – 18 August 2010) was the head of the ducal House of Bourbon-Parma from 1977 until his death. Carlos Hugo was a Carlist claimant to the throne of Spain and sought to change the political dir ...

, Princess María Teresa of Bourbon-Parma, Princess Cécile, Countess of Poblet, and Prince Sixtus Henry, Duke of Aranjuez. He was the older brother of Princess Marie-Gabrielle, Prince Robert, and Prince Charles-Henri. After graduating from secondary school in France, he attended the

University of San Francisco The University of San Francisco (USF) is a Private university, private Society of Jesus, Jesuit university in San Francisco, California, United States. Founded in 1855, it has nearly 9,000 students pursuing undergraduate and graduate degrees ...

, graduating with a bachelor's degree in 1983. He had plans of working in finance. Prince Edouard-Xavier was a lieutenant in the Reserve of the French Army and had done active service as a

. A devout Catholic, he was a Knight of Honor and Devotion of the

Disappearance and murder

On 2 April 1984, Prince Edouard-Xavier left his parents' Paris residence for an appointment after receiving a telephone call. Two days later, his parents reported his disappearance to the French authorities. A few weeks later, his car was discovered in the parking lot of the

Gare de Lyon The Gare de Lyon, officially Paris Gare de Lyon (), is one of the seven large mainline railway stations in Paris, France. It handles about 148.1 million passengers annually according to the estimates of the SNCF in 2018, with SNCF railways and ...

. His body, partly decomposed, was discovered on 27 April 1984 in the waters of the

, southeast (upstream) of Paris in

Ivry-sur-Seine Ivry-sur-Seine () is a commune in the Val-de-Marne department in the southeastern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the centre of Paris. Paris's main Asian district, the Quartier Asiatique in the 13th arrondissement, borders the ...

. An autopsy revealed that he was shot in the throat and left shoulder blade, and that his body had been in the water "for some time". His remains remained unidentified for over a week after the discovery, and his family was not notified until 4 May 1984. He was shot with a hunting rifle and his body was tossed into the

Seine River The Seine ( , ) is a river in northern France. Its drainage basin is in the Paris Basin (a geological relative lowland) covering most of northern France. It rises at Source-Seine, northwest of Dijon in northeastern France in the Langres p ...

, weighed down by a large iron bar tied around his waist. An investigation was opened after his death, but no reason was found as to why he had been murdered. The French newspaper ''

France-Soir ''France Soir'' () was a French newspaper that prospered in physical format during the 1950s and 1960s, reaching a circulation of 1.5 million in the 1950s. It declined rapidly under various owners and was relaunched as a populist tabloid in 2006 ...

'' ran a story suggesting that he had been abducted and murdered due to his mother's connections with charitable organizations for Lebanese Christians and because of his father's association with the arms industry.

References

{{Reflist 1960 births 1984 deaths Assassinated French military personnel Austrian princes Czech nobility Deaths by firearm in France French Army officers French people of American descent French people of Austrian descent French people of Czech descent French people of Danish descent French people of Italian descent French people of Spanish descent French people taken hostage French Roman Catholics Kidnappings in France Knights of Malta Edouard-Xavier Murdered royalty Paratroopers People murdered in France University of San Francisco alumni Unsolved murders in France