Edgar Hanfstaengl

He was significantly the son of a famous Bavarian court photographer who was connected with the circle of Ludwig II and became a close confidant of Duchess Sophie in Bavaria.

At the beginning of the 1860s Edgar set out for Asia, to work as financial clerk to the Clark Tea Wholesaler's Company.

Three days later Sophie met Edgar in his father's photographic studio, where he had recently arrived as senior clerk after his travels abroad.

Possibly they had known each other since childhood, when Franz Hanfstaengl was a readily welcomed guest in the artistic circle of Duke Max.

Erna did not carry out her father's wishes, but instead handed over the letters in February 1980 to the author Heinz Gebhardt, in order 'once (for all) to set the record straight' and he published details of the affair with excerpts from the correspondence in his history of the Hanfstaengel family business.