Prince William delivered quite an emotional talk during the 75th anniversary memorial for Holocaust survivors. During the ceremony, the Duke of Cambridge honored his late great grandmother, Princess Alice of Battenberg, who was Prince Philip's mother and Queen Elizabeth's mother-in-law.
The Duke of Cambridge read a letter penned by one of relatives whom Princess Alice helped in their most time of need. It detailed Princess Alice's "incredible courage" and her brave efforts during the Second World War to help the Jews against the Nazis.
Princess Alice saved a Jewish family who were trying to evade the Nazis. She hid them in her home in Athens for weeks and made sure not to rouse any suspicions.
According to the personal account written in the letter, which Prince William read to the public, Princess Alice had two small rooms in the third floor of her apartment where the family stayed. They acknowledged that their family would have ceased to exist if not for the royal's courage in face of risk.
Princess Alice and her family was exiled from Greece not just ones but two times. The royal family was restored in 1935 but Prince Philip's mother was diagnosed with schizophrenia and stayed in a Switzerland sanatorium before World War II.
Upon her recovery, Princess Alice decided to devote her time to charity. When the war was over, she dedicated her life to the Greek Orthodox church as a nun and formed the Christian Sisterhood of Martha and Mary. Meanwhile, her three daughters have married while her youngest child, Prince Philip lived in England with his uncles, the Mountbatten.
Princess Alice lived most of her time in Greece until the empire fell again in 1967. Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip took her in to live in Buckingham Palace until her death two years later.
Her remains were interred at the Windsor Castle but in 1988, Princess Alice was transferred to her final resting place in a Russian Orthodox convent in Jerusalem.
Posthumously, Princess Alice was honored as one of the Righteous Among the Nations as a non-Jew who risked her life to save the Jews at the time of the Holocaust.
Over the years, her family have been visiting this tomb. More recently, Prince Charles replaced the aging sign on her burial place during his trip to Jerusalem las Jan. 24.
The Prince of Wales also said that Princess Alice is a great source of pride for the royal family.
