Countess Irene Wedell of the Danish estates Frijsenborg and Wedellsborg has passed away. The Countess was 77 years.
In 2003, she was the co-founder of the Danish Pattaya Fund and a strong supporter of the Catholic father Brennan and his work for street children in Pattaya, Thailand.
Irene Wedell also had other positions of trust within the social and humanitarian work.
The Countess was one of the most famous and highest ranking members of the Danish nobility – and a dear friend of Queen Margrethe and the royal family. Thus, she was in 1997 the first woman ever to receive the royal courtesy title of “Kammerdame” – the female equivalent of a “Kammerherre” (Chamberlain). This year, she didn’t attend Queen Margrethe’s 70th birthday in April, and some weeks later she told the press that she suffered from cancer in the liver.
On 18 January 1958 she married Count (Lensgreve) Charles Bendt Mogens Tido Wedell, who was 24 years her senior. For a long time they thought they would never get any children (heirs might be a better word), so it was a huge relief when – at 42 – she finally gave birth to Bendt and Christiane. When Count Tido Wedell passed away in 1982, she was – at only 50 years of age – put in charge of the single largest estate in Denmark with nearly 10,000 hectares of land and forestry.
Countess Wedell remained in charge of the the big estate until she was 70 years old, at which point her son officially took over.
The late Countess Wedell was born on 19 October 1932 as a daughter of Baron Johan Otto Valdemar Raben-Levetzau (1904-1992) and Ida Marie Ingeborg Konow (1903-1993). Both her grandfathers have been Minister of Foreign Affairs (Count F.C.O. Raben-Levetzau and vice-admiral Henri Konow). It is also worth mentioning that her mother-in-law was Queen Alexandrine’s Mistress of the Robes.
