King Leopold (I) of Greece

IOTL when Leopold of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (the widower of the UK's Princess Charlotte) became the first King of the Belgians that was only after he had refused an offer of the Greek throne... but what if he had accepted the Greek offer, before the Belgian one was made, instead?

Obviously he wouldn't have become King of the Belgians as well as King of Greece, so who would have filled that position instead of him?

Would he still have married the French princess whom his OTL version did (Louise of Orleans, daughter of Louis-Philippe) or would he have chosen somebody more appropriate to Greece... such as, maybe, a Russian princess if a suitable one was then available?
Being based further from Britain and Germany than IOTL, would he still have managed to bring Victoria and Albert together? (Might they have met and married anyway?)
Would he and his successors have managed to retain the Greek throne, instead of being evicted like the OTL first king (Otto or Othon, a member of the Bavarian Wittelsbachs)?
How would this difference in ruling dynasty affect Greece's foreign affairs and expansion?
Would Britain have relinquished control of the Ionian Islands to Greece at an earlier date than they did IOTL?
His TTL son & heir presumably wouldn't have set up a 'Congo Free State' as Leopold II of Belgium did: How would this difference from OTL affect the pattern of European colonisation in Africa?
 
IOTL when Leopold of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (the widower of the UK's Princess Charlotte) became the first King of the Belgians that was only after he had refused an offer of the Greek throne... but what if he had accepted the Greek offer, before the Belgian one was made, instead?

Obviously he wouldn't have become King of the Belgians as well as King of Greece, so who would have filled that position instead of him?

Would he still have married the French princess whom his OTL version did (Louise of Orleans, daughter of Louis-Philippe) or would he have chosen somebody more appropriate to Greece... such as, maybe, a Russian princess if a suitable one was then available?
Being based further from Britain and Germany than IOTL, would he still have managed to bring Victoria and Albert together? (Might they have met and married anyway?)
Would he and his successors have managed to retain the Greek throne, instead of being evicted like the OTL first king (Otto or Othon, a member of the Bavarian Wittelsbachs)?
How would this difference in ruling dynasty affect Greece's foreign affairs and expansion?
Would Britain have relinquished control of the Ionian Islands to Greece at an earlier date than they did IOTL?
His TTL son & heir presumably wouldn't have set up a 'Congo Free State' as Leopold II of Belgium did: How would this difference from OTL affect the pattern of European colonisation in Africa?

1. As to marriage, a French (thereby Catholic) queen for Greece is not going to happen. It would be a reversal of Otto and Amalia (they'd just got rid of a Catholic queen with a Protestant wife).
Unfortunately, there are no Russian grand duchesses available as yet. Nikolai I's eldest daughters are too young, as are Grand Duke Mikhail's. So, half-Russian might be the way to go (Mecklenburg-Schwerin, Württemberg, Weimar).

2. His proximity to Great Britain and Germany would've had nothing to do with Albert and Victoria's arrangement. AFAIK she simply decided that Albert was the candidate (of whom both the crown prince of Hannover and a prince of the Netherlands) she liked best.

3. Whether he could retain his hold on Greek politics is entirely up in the air. That he was an astute politician cannot be doubted, although he is sometimes eclipsed by Napoléon III and Bismarck. So, he might be able to exercise a hold on Greek politics that Otto, as a callow youth couldn't have (Otto was still a minor when elected).

4. I don't know how Greek expansion would've fared. Leopold had no ambitions (that I know of) to expand Belgian territory. He might prove different in Greece. However, in both cases, he would be unlikely to have much say, since both the Belgian and Greek constitutions, the monarch's powers were severely curtailed.

5. AFAIK, there was talk of the Ionian Islands being returned to Greece by Britain in the event of him being elected as king. Their return was later the reason why the Greeks wished to elect the duke of Edinburgh as king after deposing Othon.

6. I don't know how much Léopold II not colonizing the Congo would affect the scramble for Africa. The Congo is still going to be claimed by some European power, or it might not even be claimed as a whole. I can see Britain taking the eastern parts for their "Cape-to-Cairo Corridor". Maybe France, Portugal and Germany annexing parts of the border regions to their colonies. Or a European power (IDK who) might decide they want the whole region.

And just because Leopold II's not colonizing it, doesn't necessarily butterfly away King Leopold's ghost. Part of the reason he was as avaricious about it IIRC was due to the fact that he had little power in Belgium, while he was lord and master of the Congo and acquired immense wealth from the ivory, rubber, gold etc, found there.
 
L II doesn't get the congo if he doesn't have Belgium to use as a stepping stone. He isn't the same person if you change his mother and the place of his birth, so you can't say things go the same as OTL.

OTL, the scramble was touched off to a large extent by L II and his exploitation of the congo, so change up L II/congo, you change up the scramble.

you can't even say the congo happens one way or another without L II. Even by contemporary standards, the guy was a monster in his treatment of the natives. The whole reason the area was available, was because no one thought it was worth the effort, and the only reason he wanted it was because it was the best of the places left available. We like to think of the scramble as being the division of africa, but in reality, most of the die had already been cast and all the worthwhile toeholds were already occupied. The scramble was for the last of the (mostly useless) toeholds, and turning the toeholds into footprints. Without a couple of catalysts, of which L II/congo was one, the scramble is more of a liesurely amble. and without L II's ruthlessness to make it profitable, the congo probably ends up ignored for a lot longer, much like Portugal's efforts in the interior.
 
Also, with a Saxe-Coburg as King of Greece, presumably the Powers don't choose another Saxe-Coburg (as they did IOTL) to rule its near-neighbour Bulgaria.
 
By the way, can anybody here tell me why Leopold turned down the Greek offer IOTL? If it he did that in anticipation of the Belgian possibility, which he preferred, then maybe the POD for this thread would have been a more stable situation in the Netherlands so that Belgium needing a king too didn't seem likely...
 
By the way, can anybody here tell me why Leopold turned down the Greek offer IOTL? If it he did that in anticipation of the Belgian possibility, which he preferred, then maybe the POD for this thread would have been a more stable situation in the Netherlands so that Belgium needing a king too didn't seem likely...

There was an earlier thread about this subject with some interesting ideas. DrakeRlugia even pointed a reason for Leopold's refusal:
https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=220537
 
There was an earlier thread about this subject with some interesting ideas. DrakeRlugia even pointed a reason for Leopold's refusal:
https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=220537
Thank you for that link. Interesting, yes.

You also have to remember Leopold originally rejected the throne because of the borders they decided on. He didn't like the Aspropotamos-Zitouni borderline and wanted the Arta to Volos border that would've also given Greece Samos and Crete. When the borders were decided upon (not to mention his adviser painting a gloomy picture of Greece), he decided to reject it.
So we'd need different borders or the new country and/or Leopold listening to a different advisor? Hr'rmm...
 
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