Cecil Rhodes: Man and Empire-Maker (Illustrated Edition) (Dodo Press) - Tapa blanda

Cecil John Rhodes (1853 - 1902) was a Britishborn South African businessman, mining magnate, and a politician. He was the founder of the diamond company De Beers, which today controls 60% of the world's diamonds and at one time, 90%. In the last years of his life, Rhodes was stalked by a Polish princess named Catherine Radziwill (1858-1941), born Rzewuska, married into a noble Polish- Lithuanian dynasty called Radziwill. Radziwill falsely claimed to people that she was engaged to Rhodes, or that they were having an affair. She asked him to marry her, but Rhodes refused. She eventually got revenge by falsely accusing him of loan fraud. He had to go to trial and testify against her accusation. He died shortly after the trial in 1902. She wrote a biography of Rhodes called Cecil Rhodes: Man and Empire-Maker which was published in 1918. Her accusations were eventually proven false.

Princess Catherine Radziwi?? (1858-1941) was a Polish princess from the Polish-Lithuanian aristocratic Radziwi?? family. She was born as Countess Ekaterina Adamovna Rzewuska. She married Prince Wilhelm Radziwi?? at age 15 and moved to Berlin to live with his family. It was speculated that she was the author of a book gossiping about the German Emperor William II and Berlin society in 1884 under the pen name Paul Vasili. She stalked the English-born South African politician Cecil Rhodes and asked him to marry her, but he refused. She then got revenge by forging his name on a promissory note. She was convicted of forging Rhodes' signature and spent time in a South African jail for her crimes.