ALEXANDER (ALEXANDER OF BATTENBERG) (1857-1893), first prince of Bulgaria, born on April 5, 18S7, was the second son of Prince Alexander of Hesse and the Rhine by his morganatic marriage with Julia, Countess von Hauke, who received the title of princess of Battenberg. Prince Alexander was nephew of the Tsar Alexander II., who had married a sister of Prince Alexander of Hesse. In his boyhood and early youth he was frequently at St. Petersburg (now Leningrad), and he accom panied his uncle during the Bulgarian campaign of 1877. When Bulgaria under the Berlin Treaty was constituted an auton omous principality under the suzerainty of Turkey, Prince Alex ander was elected prince of Bulgaria at the instance of the tsar. He was at that time serving in the guards at Potsdam. He trav elled to Bulgaria via St. Petersburg, and took the oath to the new constitution at Trnovo on July 8, 1879. The new ruler was 22 years of age, and chose his advisers at first from the Russophil conservative side, and, finding the liberals irreconcilable, he sud denly (May 9, 1881) issued a proclamation demanding absolute power for himself for seven years and appointing a Russian gen eral, Ernroth, as head of the administration. This edict was ratified by a Grand Sobranje summoned for the purpose. But Alexander found himself in reality under the tutelage of two Russian generals, Soboleff and Alexander Kaulbars, sent from St. Petersburg. He chafed under the restraint, joined hands with his subjects, and restored the constitution (Sept. 18, 1883). The con sequent breach with Russia was widened in 1885 when Alexander, who had been forewarned of the coup d'etat at Philippopolis which deposed the governor-general of Eastern Rumelia and pro claimed union with Bulgaria, entered Philippopolis on Sept. 21 and assumed the government.
The tsar struck his nephew's name off the Russian army list, and recalled the Russian officers. Alexander strengthened his posi tion by his brilliant defence against the Serbian invasion and the victory at Slivnitsa, Nov. 16-19, and the capture of Pirot. The sultan, in 1886, agreed that Alexander should be governor-general of Eastern Rumelia for five years. The Bulgarians would have liked a more explicit arrangement, and on the night of Aug. 20, 1886, the prince was kidnapped, compelled to abdicate, and handed over to the Russians. In a fortnight he was back at Sofia, but an abject telegram to the tsar had destroyed his prestige with his subjects, and the hostility of the tsar and of Bismarck drove him to abdicate in earnest on Sept. 8, 1886.
He spent the rest of his life principally at Graz, where he died on Oct. 23 See especially E. G. Costi, Furst Alexander von Battenberg (2nd ed. Vienna, 1928) ; also Koch, Furst Alexander von Bulgarien (Darmstadt, 1887 ; English translation, 1887) ; Matveyev, Bulgarien nach dem Ber liner Congress (Petersburg, 1887) ; Bourchier, "Prince Alexander of Battenburg," in Fortnightly Review, Jan. 1894.