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36. Count Julius Cäsar Karl Oskar Erdman von
W a rte n s le b e n
GER
Born: 17 July 1872, Starnberg, Bavaria
Died: 3 February 1930, Dresden
IOC member: No. 36
Co-opted (postal vote): 11 April 1902
Resigned: 31 December 1913
JoH SPECIAL: The biographies of all IOC-Members
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 6 Absent: 4
Picture: p. 51
After law studies at the Universities of Munich and
Erlangen he obtained a doctorate from the University
of Erlangen for his thesis entitled “The Sale of the
Estates of the Nobility”. Well connected and influential,
he was nominated for the IOC by Coubertin and Count
TalleyrandPerigord in 1902. He was also a member of
the Executive Board of the German Motor Yacht Club
(1907-1913).
Following the sudden death of von der Asseburg, he took
over the organization of the 1909 IOC session in Berlin
with less than two months notice. The Session was a great
success and although von Wartensleben ceded the honour
of staging the 1912 Games to Stockholm he secured the
1916 Games for Berlin.
Buchanan/Lyberg
Count Julius Cäsar Karl Oskar Erdman von Wartensleben
SOH Archive
37. Count Henri de B a i l l e t - L a t o u r
BEL
Born: 1 March 1876, Brussels
Died: 6-7 January 1942, Brussels
IOC member: No. 37
Co-opted (postal vote): 31 January 1903
Count Henri de Baillet-Latour ISOH Archive
Replacing Robert Reyntiens
IOC President:
28.05.1925-07.06.1933 and
07.06.1933-06/07.01.1942
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 29 Absent: 4
Attendance at Meetings
Present: 32 Absent: 0
Poshumously elected IOC Honorary President in April 1953
Executive Board Member No. 3
Picture: p. 51
The son of the Governor of Antwerp Province and the
Countess Caroline d’Oultrement de Duras he was bom
to a life of wealth and privilege and his close childhood
friend was the boy who was to become King Albert I.
On completing his studies at the University of Leuven,
he travelled extensively carrying out diplomatic missions
on behalf of the Belgian Government. A dedicated horseJ o u r n a l o f O ly m p ic H i s t o r y 1 7 ( D e c e m b e r 2 0 0 9 ) N u m b e r 3
Hazen Hyde ISOH Archive
43
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INTER NA TION A L SOCIETY OF
OLYMPIC HISTORIANS
JoH SPECIAL: The biographies of all IOC-Members
man, he kept a large string of racehorses and his elec­
tion as President of the Jockey Club of Belgium gave
him almost as much satisfaction as his Presidency of the
IOC.
Elected to the IOC in 1903 at the early age of 27, he
married Countess Elisabeth de Clary the following year
and in 1905 he successfully organized the Olympic
Congress in Brussels. He played a major role in winning
the 1920 Games for Antwerp and became President of
the Organizing Committee. Appointed a member of the
first IOC Executive Board in 1921, he became President
of the NOC in 1923, an organization which he had been
instrumental in founding in 1906.
In 1925 he succeeded Coubertin as IOC President and
after being re-elected in 1933 he remained in office until
his death. His Presidency included the 1936 Berlin Games
with all its attendant problems and, to his credit, BailletLatour took a strong line with Hitler on sonic matters.
However, some feel that with his experience of inter­
national diplomacy he should have been more cautious in
accepting the assurances of the National Socialists, par­
ticularly on the Jewish question.
A personal letter to Avery Brundage reveals some of
his inner feelings on the subject. Baillet - Latour wrote:
“I am not personally fond of Jews and of the Jewish
influence, but I will not have them molested”. Around
the same time J. Sigfrid Edstrom, who was to succeed
the Belgian aristocrat as IOC President, expressed similiar sentiments - “Jews have taken a too prominent posi­
tion in certain branches of life and have - as the Jews
very often do when they get in the majority - misused
their position”. With private thoughts like these prevail­
ing in the higher echelons of the IOC it is little wonder
that Games went ahead as Hitler had planned.
The charitably minded put Baillet-Latour’s attitude to the
Jewish question down to naivity but his behaviour during
the German occupation of Belgium is more difficult to
excuse. He was on exceptionally good terms with the
occupying forces and when his prized horses were con­
fiscated for the German war effort, he angrily complained
to German IOC member Karl Ritter von Halt and in due
course the horses were returned. A strange priority when
his countrymen were suffering appalling privations.
The major Olympic matter of the war involved BailletLatour and again his extraordinarily close relationship
with the Germans was revealed. Carl Diem was among
the Nazi emissaries who visited Brussels and presented
the IOC President with a plan for, what was effectively, a
German take-over of the IOC. Under the new proposals,
Germany and her allies would appoint their own IOC
members thereby ensuring an Axis controlled Committee
and Baillet-Latour, having been promised that he could
retain the Presidency, raised no objections. The German
demands put Baillet-Latour in an impossible position but
because of the war, he was able to avoid calling a full
meeting of the IOC to discuss the German proposals. It
was not so much his actions - or lack of them - but more
44
his apparently close friendship with the German hierachy
that led to him being branded a collaborator in many
quarters.
Count Baillet-Latour died during the night of 6-7 January
1942 at his home in Brussels and Adolf Hitler sent a
message of condolence to his widow who was living
with her brother at Schloss Teplitz-Schönau in Bavaria.
On her way to her husband’s funeral Countess BailletLatour stopped in Berlin where she was joined by the
German IOC member, Karl Ritter von Halt, and Carl
Diem, who was officially representing the International
Olympic Institute. In addition to von Halt, the other IOC
members present at the service were Gaston de Trannoy
(Belgium) and Albert, Albert, baron Schimmelpenninck
van der Oye (Netherlands) who laid the wreath.
Baillet-Latour died at the age of 65 and was still griev­
ing for his son and only child who had been killed in
a transatlantic plane crash a few months earlier while
serving as an assistant military attaché with the Belgian
Government in exile in London.
Buchanan/Lyberg
38 . James Hazen H Y D E
USA
Born: 6 June 1876, New York
Died: 26 July 1959, Saratoga Springs
IOC member: No. 38
Co-opted: January 1903
Resigned: 31 December 1908
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 0 Absent: 4
Picture: p. 51
The son of the multi-millionaire founder of the Equitable
Life Assurance Company he served as a director of
his father’s company. His profligate ways with the
stockholders funds led to a major scandal and after a
Congressional investigation he only escaped prosecution
by fleeing to Paris. He sold his share holding in Equitable
Life to Thomas Fortune Ryan for US $25 million, a phe­
nomenal sum in the early 1900s, and settled in France
where his only son, Henry, was born in 1915. Henry
Hyde served with distinction in World War II working
in Europe for General William ‘Wild Bill’ Donovan
who headed the clandestine Office of Strategic Services
(OSS). Knowing nothing of the reasons for Hyde being
in France, Coubertin saw the free-spending Harvard grad­
uate as a source of much-needed funds and invited him
to join the IOC. At the time, Hyde was only 26-yearsold and is the youngest-ever American member of the
IOC. The incumbent American members of the IOC,
Stanton and Whitney, knew more of Hyde’s reasons for
being in Paris than Coubertin and were outraged by his
appointment. In his Olympic Mémoires Coubertin says
J o u r n a l o f O ly m p ic H i s t o r y 1 7 (D e c e m b e r 2 0 0 9 ) N u m b e r 3
that Hyde’s appointment was only ‘temporary’ but this
would seem to be a stance he adopted after he had heard
the protests of Stanton and Whitney. Hyde was event­
ually ‘persuaded’ to resign but he remained in Paris for
26 years where he continued to give financial support to
many institutions and the Alliance Française, which he
founded, remains a testament to his generosity. Having
made his home in France, he took an active part in Parisian
life and was accorded the rare honour for a foreigner of
being invited to join the French Academy of Moral and
Political Sciences.
Buchanan/Lyberg
May and then in June of that year he became an IOC
member. He was the leader of the German Olympic team
in 1906 and 1908. .
In anticipation of Berlin being awarded the 1912 Games,
he laid plans for the building of a suitable stadium but
his sudden death in 1909 ended his involvement in the
project. One of his legacies to German sport was the cre­
ation of the first central sports forum in Berlin and after
his death the NOC created the ‘Asseburg Memorial’ in
1909. A member of the board of the Union Club, Berlin,
he married Countesss Marie-Agnes of Solms-Baruth in
1879.
Buchanan/Lyberg
39. Count Albert de B e r t i e r DE S a u v i g n y
GER
FRA
Born: 1 January 1847, Castle Meisdorf, Aschersleben
Born: 11 June 1861, Paris
Died: 31 March 1909 Berlin
Died: 5 May 1948, Coeuvres
IOC member: No. 40
IOC member: No. 39
Co-opted: 9 June 1905
Co-opted (postal-vote): 30 November 1903
Replacing Prince Salm-Horstmar
Resigned: 31 March 1920
Attendance at Sessions
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 4 Absent: 0
Present: 7 Absent: 3
Picture: p. 54
Picture: -
The de Sauvigny family was raised to the nobilty on 16
May 1668 and later joined with another noble family, the
de Berbers. A member of the family was one of the first
victims of the French Revolution.
Count Albert de Bertier de Sauvigny was an enthusi­
astic supporter of the sporting and educational ideas of
his cousin, Baron de Coubertin, who was two years his
junior. This support, coupled with the family connection,
led to de Bertier de Sauvigny being appointed the fourth
IOC member for France in 1903.
He was an active participant in rowing, fencing, riding
and archery and in 1900 he wrote the classic work Tir
à l ’Arc. He was also the author of many other works
on wide-ranging historical matters which included the
‘History of a Small Community during World War I’.
He served as Mayor of this community for more than 35
years.
His business interests were in the financial field and he
was President of the Board of a major insurance group.
Because of the family relationship, he was chosen to
place the urn containing Coubertin’s heart in its final
resting place at Olympia in 1938.
Buchanan/Lyberg
40. Count Egbert Hoyer von der A s s e b u r g
A Prussian cavalry General and one of the advisers of
Kaiser Wilhelm II, he enjoyed a rapid rise in the German
sporting hierarchy. In February 1905 he became VicePresident of the NOC, he was appointed President in
J o u r n a l o f O ly m p ic H i s t o r y 1 7 ( D e c e m b e r 2 0 0 9 ) N u m b e r 3
41 . Richard C o o m b e s
AUS
Born: 17 March 1858, Hampton Court, England
Died: 15 April 1935, Bellevue Hill, Sydney
IOC member: No. 41
Co-opted: April 1905
Resigned: 28 July 1932
Member
for
Australasia
1905-1919
and
for
Australia
1919-1932
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 0 Absent: 23
Picture: -
English-born Dick Coombes was a champion athlete
and a keen cyclist and oarsman before he emigrated to
Australia in 1886 at the age of 28. After a spell as a jack­
aroo he became a journalist with the Sydney newspaper
the Referee and played a crucial role in the development of
organized sport in Australia. He founded the New South
Wales AAA, the Queensland AAA, the Australian AAU
and he was one of the founders of the Australian Olympic
Federation. As President of the Amateur Walking Union
of Australia he drafted the rules which were widely
adopted. He also founded the Australian Coursing
Union and was captain of the Sydney Rifle Club and he
made an immeasurable contribution to Australian sport.
Coombes was a hard worker for the Olympic cause but
because of the cost and time involved he seldom returned
45
JoH SPECIAL: The biographies of all IOC-Members
T*SÖh ]
]i s o h ]
JoH SPECIAL: The biographies of all IOC-Members
Count Egbert Hoyer von der Asseburg ISOH Archive
to Europe and was never able to attend an IOC Session
The 1919 Session was particularly significant m that sep­
arate representation for Australia and New Zealand was
agreed. Thereafter, Coombes represented only Australia
on the 1OC while Arthur Marryat became the first member
to represent New Zealand exclusively.
One of his infrequent visits to Europe took place in 1911
when he returned to London as manager of the Australian
team which took part in the Festival of Empire which
had been organised to celebrate the coronation of King
George V. Inspired by the Festival, Coombes, already a
dedicated Imperialist, campaigned for Great Britain and
her white Dominions and Colonies (Australia, Canada,
New Zealand and South Africa) to send a combined team
to the 1912 and 1916 Olympic Games. His work as a
journalist with the Referee newspaper provided an excel­
lent forum from which to promote his ideas and, initially,
his proposal for a British Empire team received consider­
able support before being vetoed by Coubertin. In his
later years he suffered financial hardship and his many
friends in the Australian sporting world subscribed to a
benefit which raised £200. After 27 years service to the
IOC he resigned for health reasons at the age of 74.
Buchanan/Lyberg
42. Prince Alexander von S o l m s B r a u n f e l s
AUT
Born: 4 November 1855, Bodjebrad, Bohemia
Died: 3 June 1926, Nieder-lngelheim am Rhein
IOC member: No. 42
Co-opted: 9 June 1905
Resigned: 28 May 1909
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 0 Absent: 4
Prince Alexander von Solms Braunfels ISOH Archive
Henrik August Angell ISOH Archive
46
Picture: p. 54
After studying at the Agricultural University in Vienna,
he pursued a military career and served as a Colonel in
the Royal and Imperial Anny during World War I. He was
President of the Austrian Automobile Club (1903-1909)
and was a Privy Councillor and Chamberlain to the
Emperor. In 1898, he married Esperance, the daughter
of Baron Erlanger, who received a castle and estate at
Oberwaltersdorf as a wedding present. They had three
children and after the war, when the nobility lost their
privileges, the family moved to Nieder-lngelheim am
Rhein.
He was one of the pioneers of ballooning, he made his
first flight in 1881, and was the patron of a shooting
organization in Baden (1900-1913) in addition to being
one of the men behind the building of a Sport Palace in
Baden. Having joined the Austrian Jockey Club in 1878,
he became Vice-President in 1910 and was President
from 1913 to 1916.
J o u r n a l o f O ly m p ic H i s t o r y 1 7 ( D e c e m b e r 2 0 0 9 ) N u m b e r 3
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time to reach this decision as he served the IOC for 19
years before resigning. In 1920 when he was appointed a
Grand Officer of the Legion d’honneur he was described
as an ‘Envoy extraordinaire and plenipotentiare’. He
resigned his ambassadorial post in 1919.
Buchanan/Lyberg
PER
Born: 1840, Lima
Died: 1922-1930, Paris, France
IOC member: No. 44
Co-opted: November 1903
Resigned: 7 June 1922
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 2 Absent: 13
Picture: -
45. Lord William Henry Grenfell
D e s b o r o u g h of T a p l o w
43. Henrik August A n g e l l
NOR
Born: 22 August 1861, Luster
Died: 26 January 1922, Oslo
IOC member: No. 43
Co-opted: October 1905
Resigned: 23 May 1907
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 0 Absent: 2
Picture: p. 54
An Army Colonel, he first met Coubertin at the 1905
Session in Brussels and was invited to join the IOC a few
months later. He remained a member for less than two
years and did not attend either of the Sessions held during
his mandate. He founded the Norwegian Ski School in
1903 and wrote several books on the history of skiing.
He was also one of the early pioneers of organized ath­
letics in Norway.
The IOC archives accord him the title of ‘Count’ but
as there are no ranks of nobility in Norway it must be
assumed that this was a foreign title.
Buchanan/Lyberg
44. Carlos Gonzalez de C a n d a m o
Appointed Ambassador to France and Great Britain in
1900 he lived in Paris and competed as a fencer at the
1900 Games. In 1903 he accepted Coubertin’s invitation
to become the first Peruvian member of the IOC and,
although an enthusiastic supporter of Olympism, he felt
that his European domicile inhibited him from represent­
ing Peru adequately on the IOC. Evidently, he took some
J o u r n a l o f O ly m p ic H i s t o r y 1 7 ( D e c e m b e r 2 0 0 9 ) N u m b e r 3
GBR
Born: 30 October 1855, London
Died: 9 January 1945, Panshanger, Hertfordshire
IOC member: No. 45
Co-opted (postal vote): 30 June 1906
Resigned: 5 April 1912
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 5 Absent: 2
Picture: p. 56
One of the most influential figures in the history of
British sport. He was President of the British governing
body of six different sports (athletics, cricket, fencing,
four-in-hand coaching, lawn tennis, wrestling) and he
also served as the first President of the British Olympic
Association (1905-1913). In this latter office he made his
greatest contribution as the organizing genius behind the
1908 Olympic Games.
His talents as an active sportsman were equally wide­
spread. A brilliant all-rounder at Harrow School, he ran
in the 3 miles (1876) and rowed in the eight (1877-78)
against Cambridge when he went up to Oxford
University. At Oxford, he was uniquely President of both
the Univeristy Athletic Club and the University Boat
Club and he succeeded Cecil Rhodes as master of the
University Draghounds. He won a team fencing silver
medal at the 1906 Olympic Games and was punting
champion of the River Thames for three successive years
(1888-1890). He stroked an eight across the English
Channel, swam across Niagara Falls twice, climbed the
Matterhorn three times by different routes, was a noted
big game hunter in India and the Rockies and deep sea
fishing off the coast of Florida was another of his many
sporting interests.
Amid this frenzy of activity he still found time to under47
JoH SPECIAL: The biographies of all IOC-Members
His connection with the Olympic movement began in
1899 when he was a member of a committee whose aim
was to secure Austrian participation at the 1900 Games
and in 1905 he became a member of the IOC. Although
he never attended an IOC Session he devoted con­
siderable effort in trying to oust Jiri Guth of Bohemia/
Czechoslovakia from the Committee. He frequently
wrote to Coubertin complaining that as Czechoslovakia
was no more than a province of Austria they had no right
to seperate recognition on the IOC. Many of Braunfels’
letters threatened resignation if he did not get his way and
when Coubertin refused to take any action he finally did
tender his resignation from the IOC at the Berlin Session
in 1909. Braunfels proposed the President of Vienna AC,
Gustav Magg, as his successor but as Magg died later
that year the proposal came to nothing. No doubt the IOC
were pleased to see the end of a man who made no posi­
tive contribution to the Olympic Movement and whose
role was mainly that of a ‘troublemaker’.
Buchanan/Lyberg
]i s o h ]
JoH SPECIAL: The biographies of all IOC-Members
Lord William Henry Grenfell Desborough of Taplow ISOH Archive
take a host of civic commitments and at one time he served
on no less than 115 (sic) committees simultaneously.
He was elected as a Liberal Member of Parliament in
1880, 1885 and 1895 but he resigned in 1896 rather than
support Gladstone’s Irish Home Rule Bill. He entered
Parliament for a fourth time in 1900 when he stood as a
Conservative.
In 1887, he married Ethel Anne Priscilla Fane and they
set up home at Taplow Court near Maidenhead where
they entertained many of the leading figures of the time.
Particularly welcome guests were an intellectual group
known as ‘The Souls’ whose members included Arthur
Balfour who was Prime Minister (1902-1905). Balfour
had a permanent room at Taplow Court and had been an
Honorary Member of Coubertin’s Founding Congress of
1894.
Tragically for ‘Willie’ Grenfell, who became Lord
Desborough in 1905, all three of his sons died pre­
maturely: the eldest, Julian, the poet and the second son
were both killed in action in 1915 and his youngest son
died in a motor accident in 1926. Two daughters sur­
vived, the elder married Sir John Salmon, Marshall of
the RAF, and the younger became Viscountess Gage.
The reasons for Lord Desborough’s resignation as a
member the IOC and as Chairman of the British Olympic
Association in April 1913 have never been made clear.
Buchanan/Lyberg
46. Dimitar T z o k o v
BUL
Born: 27 February, Svishtov
Died: 30 September 1926, Mayfair, London
IOC member: No. 46
Co-opted (postal vote): 30 June 1906
Dimitar Tzokov ISOH Archive
Demissionaire: 8 June 1912
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 0 Absent: 6
Picture: p. 56
Dom Antonio Maria de Lancastre ISOH Archive
48
Educated at Robert College, Constantinople and the
Faculty of Law at the University of Paris, he entered
the Diplomatic Service and was an attaché in Belgrade,
Bucharest, Constantinople, St.Petersburg and Athens.
He was holding the office of Permanent Secretary of the
Foreign Office in Sofia when, in September 1903, he was
appointed to the newly-created post of Bulgarian Agent
to Great Britain. In 1911 the Agency was raised to the
rank of a Legation and Tzokov presented his credentials
as the first Bulgarian Minister to the Court of St. James.
On his retirement in 1914 he left London before the out
break of war in which his sympathies were entirely with
the Allies. After the war, during which he lived in Paris,
he frequently visited London where he died from angina
pectoris while staying with friends.
J o u r n a l o f O ly m p ic H i s t o r y 1 7 ( D e c e m b e r 2 0 0 9 ) N u m b e r 3
999
His membership of the IOC ended in 1912 when he was
declared demissionaire for failing to attend the required
number of Sessions.
Buchanan/Lyberg
49. Manuel de la Q u i n t a n a , j r .
ARG
Born: 17 October 1866, Chivicoy
Died: 9 May 1920, Buenos Aires
IOC member: No. 49
POR
Born: 11 September 1857, Lisbon
Died: 30 October 1944, Lisbon
Radiated: 11 June 1910
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 0 Absent: 2
Picture: p. 58
IOC member: No. 47
Co-opted (postal vote): 30 June 1906
Resigned: 4 July 1912
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 0 Absent: 6
Picture: p. 56
After medical studies in a number of European cities he
became an acknowledged expert on tuberculosis and was
decorated by many foreign governments. He was the
personal physician to King Carlos of Portugal who made
him the Duke of Lancastre but he chose not to use the
title. Works such as the Portugese Social Register and the
Medical Register make no mention
of his title.
Buchanan/Lyberg
48. Torben G r u t ( n é H a n s e n )
DEN
Born: 23 August 1865, Copenhagen
Died: 29 August 1952, Copenhagen
IOC member: No. 48
Co-opted: 31 December 1906, Replacing Niels Holbek
Resigned: 4 July 1912
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 3 Absent: 3
Picture: -
Completely unknown in Danish sporting circles he was
a surprising choice as an IOC member. Coubertin had
simply asked the military attaché at the French Embassy
in Copenhagen for his recommendation and from the
several names put forward Grut was chosen. Eugen Stahl
Schmidt, who had founded the Danish Sports Federation
in 1896, complained in a letter to Coubertin that the
claims of Fritz Hansen, the President of the Danish
Olympic Committee, had been ignored but Coubertin
stood by the appointment of Grut.
Bom Hansen, he changed his name to Grut in July 1882.
An aide-de-camp to King Christian IX (1924-1926) and
Chief of Staff of the Engineer Corps, he retired from the
army with the rank of Major-General and died in the
military hospital in Copenhagen.
Buchanan/Lyberg
J o u r n a l o f O ly m p ic H i s t o r y 1 7 ( D e c e m b e r 2 0 0 9 ) N u m b e r 3
After he had been an IOC member for little more than
one year, Quintana, who lived in Paris, wrote two letters
to Coubertin in the autumn of 1908 (10 September &
18 October) advising him that, due to ill health, he was
returning to Argentina for a long stay. In view of his
imminent departure, Quintana felt that he should resign
from the IOC and recommended to Coubertin that Tomas
de Anchorana, who also lived in Paris and was described
as a ‘perfect gentleman from one of the best families’,
should take his place.
In his letters, Quintana told Coubertin of his intention to
start an NOC on his return home but before he could do so
he became the centre of the first major scandal among the
IOC membership. At the 1910 Session in Luxembourg
it was drawn to the attention of members that Quintana
‘used his position as an IOC member for personal benefit’
and the proposal that he be radiated was carried unani­
mously. The minutes of this Session show that the matter
was raised by Sir Harold Vincent (GBR) but as Vincent
had died two years before the 1910 Session this is clearly
incorrect.
To celebrate the Centenary of Argentina’s Independence,
Quintana played a major role in the staging of a major
international sports meeting in Buenos Aires in 1910 to
be known as the ‘Centennial Olympic Games’. Not only
did he use the word ‘Olympic’ without the approval of
the IOC he also contravened all Olympic rules by paying
handsomely for the Italian Dorando Pietri, of 1908
Olympic marathon fame, to compete in the meeting.
Interestingly, this proved to be Pietri’s last marathon
race and he recorded the fastest time of his career. These
breaches of the rules resulted in Quintana being expelled
from the IOC.
Well connected and wealthy he owned two ocean going
racing yachts one of which, Edelweiss, set an Argentinian
record in 1913 by crossing the Atlantic in 53 days.
Buchanan/Lyberg
50. Thomas Thomassen H e f t y e
After serving as military attaché in Paris where he first
met Coubertin he returned to Oslo to take up an appoint­
ment as Director of the Telephone and Telegraph Office.
He was elected President of the Norwegian Olympic
49
JoH SPECIAL: The biographies of all IOC-Members
47. Dom Antonio Maria de L a n c a s t r e
Co-opted: 23 May 1907, Replacing José Zubiaur
1i s o h 1
Committee in 1906 and although he resigned from the
IOC on being appointed Minister of Defence in 1908 he
continued as NOC President until 1912. He later served
as President of the Norwegian Rambling Association
from 1918 until his death in a train accident in 1921.
Buchanan/Lyberg
NOR
Born: 10 April 1860, VestreAker
Died: 19 September 1921, Trondheim
IOC member: No. 50
JoH SPECIAL: The biographies of all IOC-Members
Co-opted: 23 May 1907, Replacing Henrik Angell
Resigned: 13 July 1908
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 0 Absent: 1
Picture: -
Manuel de la Quintana, Jr. ISOH Archive
51. Count Géza A î l d r a s s y
HUN
Born: 22 July 1856, Pest
Died: 29 August 1938, Budapest
IOC member: No. 51
Co-opted: 23 May 1907, Replacing Ferenc Kemény
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 10 Absent: 14
Picture: p. 58
Count Géza Andrâssy ISOH Archive
Prince Scipione Borghèse ISOH archive
50
After studying law at the Universities of Budapest and
Geneva he undertook a study tour of the United States
in 1881. He was the owner of the Andrâssy Iron Works,
which he subsequently sold, and was one of the leading
figures of the European social set before World War
I. An intimate of Crown Prince Rudolph and a good
friend of England’s King Edward VII he was a Member
of Parliament (1891-1897; 1910) and sat in the Upper
House from 1898 until his death. He never allowed par­
liamentary commitments to interfere with his social and
sporting pleasures and in addition to introducing polo to
Hungary he was an enthusiast of horse racing, motoring
and sailing.
As President of the exclusive Hungarian Athletic Club he
led the group which engineered the ousting of the plebian
Kemeny from national and international sports adminis­
tration.
Because of Hungary’s role in World War I, in which he
served as a Colonel in the Hussars, Andrâssy was sus­
pended by the IOC in 1919 but unlike his fellow Hungarian
member, Gyula Muzsa, he was not reinstated at the 1921
Session. The matter was discussed at the 1922 Session in
Paris when although Andrâssy was readmitted to the IOC
it was minuted that when a Hungarian seat became vacant
it should not be assumed that Hungary would automati­
cally be entitled to continue to hold two seats. During
his years as President of the NOC (1905-1927) Andrâssy
J o u r n a l o f O ly m p ic H i s t o r y 1 7 ( D e c e m b e r 2 0 0 9 ) N u m b e r 3
organised the 1911 IOC Session in Budapest with notable
success. He married Countess Eleanora Kaunitz who pre­
deceased him.
Buchanan/Lyberg
52. Prince Simon Andrejevich T R U B E T Z S K O I
RUS
Born: 23 July 1861, St. Petersburg
Died: 8 February 1923, Baden, Switzerland
IOC member: No. 52
Co-opted: 30 April 1908, Replacing Prince BelossleskyBelozersky
Resigned: 11 June 1910
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 0 Absent: 3
Picture: -
A member of the Court of the Tsar from 1905, he missed
both IOC Sessions during his two year mandate. He
sponsored several sports clubs in St. Petersburg and was
a member of the
Organizing Committees for the All-Russian Olympiads
at Kiev in 1913 and Riga in 1914.
Buchanan/Lyberg
53. Prince Scipione Luigi Marcantonio Francesco
Rodolfo B o r g h è s e
ITA
Born: 11 February 1871, Migliarino, near Pisa
Died: 14 March 1927, Florence
IOC member: No. 53
Co-opted (postal vote): 13 June 1908
Resigned: 30 November 1909
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 0 Absent: 2
Picture: p. 58
The Borghèse family were one of the oldest and most dis­
tinguished in Italy and counted Pope Paul V (1552-1621)
among their number. Fabulously wealthy, they owned
many of the finest properties in Italy, including the
Borghèse Palace in Rome with its famous gallery of
pictures. Scipione Borghèse inherited his full share of
titles, he held four Princedoms, four Dukedoms, four
Marquisates, and was a French Duke and a Spanish
Grandee.
He achieved international fame as the winner of the first
Peking-Paris motor rally in 1907. The race which was
promoted by the Parisian daily newspaper Ee Matin began
in the Chinese capital on 10 June 1907 and 61 days later
J o u r n a l o f O ly m p ic H i s t o r y 1 7 ( D e c e m b e r 2 0 0 9 ) N u m b e r 3
Prince Borghese, accompanied by his chauffer-mech­
anic, Ettore Guizzardi, and the journalist, Luigi Barzini,
drove his 40 horse-power Itala into Paris on 10 August.
They had driven approximately 7,500 miles (12,000 km)
and taken three days just to cross the formidable Gobi
desert.
After these experiences, his election to the IOC the fol­
lowing year must have seemed rather prosaic but he only
remained a member for little more than one year and made
no significant contribution to the Olympic movement.
Apart from his motor racing, Prince Borghese led a full
life. After a brief period of military service, he entered the
diplomatic service but soon gave up full-time diplomacy
although he continued to undertake special missions
before rejoining the Colours in World War I serving as
an artillery captain on the Udine front. He also served ?s
a Member of the Italian Parliament. He had the means
to indulge his passion for exploring and in 1900 crossed
Asia from the Persian Gulf to the Pacific, penetrating vir­
tually unknown areas of Northern Persia and Turkestan.
He also enjoyed a reputation as a superb Alpine climber
and was remarkable for never using the services of a
guide.
He was estranged from his wife, Princess Anna Maria,
the former Duchessina de Ferrari, although she con­
tinued to live on the family estate on the Isola del Garda
where she dispensed her memorable hospitality and
indulged her passion for horticulture. An imperious
and somewhat eccentric woman, the Princess was well
known in the high society of London and Paris before
she died in mysterious circumstances in November 1924.
She had gone into the grounds to plant some acoms she
had received from America on a ledge overhanging the
lake. In the evening her favourite wolf-hound was found
at the waterside sitting beside her gloves, handbag and
trowel and it was presumed that she had fallen into the
lake at its deepest part. The Prince hastened home from a
family wedding in Hungary and led the searches for his
wife’s body but it was never recovered. Two years later
he married a widow, Teodora Chilesotti (née Martini) but
after only seven months of marriage Prince Borghèse
died of a heart attack.
Buchanan/Lyberg
54. Count Albert-Joseph G a u t i e r V i g n a l
MON
Born: 26 May 1854, Nice, France
Died: 18 October 1939, Lausanne Switzerland
IOC member: No. 54
Co-opted (postal vote): 13 June 1908
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 18 Absent: 11
Picture: p. 60
51
JoH SPECIAL: The biographies of all IOC-Members
l IS O H l
E /9
j ISO H I
INTERNA TION A L SOCIETY O F
OLYMPIC HISTORIANS
JoH SPECIAL: The biographies of all IOC-Members
A member o f the French nobility whose family settled in
Monaco around 1820 where they quickly became estab­
lished as leading figures in the business, social and sport­
ing life of the Principality.
Count Gautier Vignal was a close friend of Coubertin and
was the founder of the Monégasque Olympic Committee,
serving as President from its formation in 1907 until
1920 His main sporting interests were fencing and pistol
shooting and he did much to promote Monte Carlo as
an international centre for these sports. In 1905 he was
the founding President of the Tournoi International
d ’Epée de Monaco which was for many years one of the
leading international fencing tournaments. He also held
high office in a number of fencing organizations includ­
ing the Presidency of the Fencing Federation of the
Côte d’Azur and he was a member of the International
Fencing Federation (FIE). He was rewarded for his work
in developing Monte Carlo as an international sporting
center when the IOC held their annual Session there in
1927. An influential businessman, he was President of
the Nice Electricity Company, which had been founded
by his father, and his many other appointments included
directorships of a number of banks. He was also the
Consul General for Romania and his decorations from
eight foreign countries included the French Legion
d’Honneur.
Buchanan/Lyberg
Count Albert-Joseph Gautier Vignal ISOH Archive
55. Johan Tidemann S v e r r e
NOR
Born: 7 October 1867, Fredrikstad
Died: 6 June 1934, Oslo
IOC member: No. 55
Co-opted: 13 July 1908, Replacing Thomas Heftye
Resigned: 22 April 1927
Attendance at Sessions
Present: 10 Absent: 5
Picture: p. 60
Johan Tidemann Sverre ISOH Archive
52
A Lieutenant-Colonel and aide-de-campe to Crown Prince
Gustaf of Sweden, he led the Norwegian delegation at the
1906, 1908 and 1912 Games. He made a significant con­
tribution to the development of sport in his country, found­
ing the Students’ Rowing Club and serving as President
of the Norwegian Gymnastics Federation (1911-1914)
and the Norwegian Olympic Committee (1914-1916).
Although he was the third Norwegian member of the
IOC, he was the first one to attend a Session.
Buchanan/Lyberg
J o u r n a l o f O ly m p ic H i s t o r y 1 7 ( D e c e m b e r 2 0 0 9 ) N u m b e r 3