The royals were out in full force at the Formula One race this weekend, with Harriet Sperling joining her new beau's cousins and aunt ahead of the race Lady Spencer of Alresford and the Marquess of Milford Haven have become grandparents once again, as their daughter, Lady Tatiana Mountbatten, welcomes a second child with her husband, Alexander ‘Alick’ Dru (standing left to right) Princess Helena Victoria of Schleswig-Holstein Duke of York; (seated left to right) Princess Victoria Eugenie of Battenberg Duchess of York holding Prince Edward of York Prince Arthur of Connaught (hand on chin) and Prince Alexander of Battenberg before her wedding to King Alfonso – he noticed her because of her nearly white platinum hair The Princess Royal’s son is the director of a maritime firm, which many have interpreted as a nod to his mother's love of sailing But it was at Buckingham Palace that the next chapter in Victoria Eugenie’s life would unfold King Alfonso XIII of Spain was on an official visit to meet King Edward VII and the palace was holding a banquet in his honour The King was one of Europe’s most eligible bachelors with much of the court assuming that he would marry Victoria Eugenie’s cousin as during the state dinner King Alfonso asked his hosts the name of the girl with the almost white hair Despite sitting between Queen Alexandra and Princess Helena the King of Spain had been taken by Victoria Eugenie – and her platinum blonde tresses Throughout their intercontinental courtship it soon became clear that Alfonso’s mother she did not consider the Battenbergs to be royal and Maria Cristina feared introducing the genetic disease into the Spanish royal bloodline The first two of the Queen’s complaints were dealt with (Victoria Eugenie agreed to convert and was shipped off to Versailles to receive instruction in the Catholic faith) but the third would haunt her family for the rest of Ena’s days On 13 May 1906, an estimated 400,000 people gathered to watch the royal procession outside the Church of Saint Jerome the Royal. Spain’s most aristocratic houses attended, with godparents including Infante Carlos of Bourbon-Two Sicilies. The Minister of Grace and Justice registered the marriage in an official register, and, with that, Victoria Eugenie became the Queen of Spain. A portrait of Queen Victoria Eugenie of Spain from 1927 Crown Prince Hussein and Princess Rajwa welcomed Princess Iman on 3 August 2024 Queen Victoria Eugenie of Spain arrives in London for the wedding of Princess Alexandra Despite her troubled standing and torrid home life, Queen Victoria Eugenie dedicated her life to uplifting the poor. Her work with the Red Cross was honoured in 1929, when the city of Barcelona erected a statue of her in a nurse’s uniform When a swathe of republican sentiment led to the declaration of the Second Spanish Republic in 1931 She would go on to split her time between the UK and Viellie Fontaine Ousted from Italy – due to her affiliations with the Allied Powers in the midst of World War Two – Victoria Eugenie returned to Spain in 1968 for the baptism of her great-grandson who would go on to become King Felipe VI of Spain The once Queen of Spain died in Switzerland on 15 April 1969 at the age of 81 It would be 16 years until her remains were re-interred in the Spanish Royal Vaults Queen Victoria tells the young royal: ‘Do not cry nobody should know about your emotions.’ In the coming months surely many will know her story for the first time © 2025 Country & Town House.All rights reserved Have a go at the first technical challenge from season 15 Great British Bake Off returned last week for its 15th edition with a new line-up of bakers competing in the tent in the hopes of impressing Paul Hollywood and Prue Leith each episode sees the contestants attempting a technical challenge whereby they must make a specific bake with little guidance the 2024 participants were tasked with creating an identical set of eight mini battenberg cakes This marked the show’s first ever ‘Taste and Bake’ challenge where the contestants were given a few minutes to taste a battenberg cake Don’t worry: Paul has now shared the mini battenbergs recipe Although it will require some baking expertise with the difficulty level marked as ‘needs skill’ Recipe from thegreatbritishbakeoff.co.uk Δdocument.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Subscribe to Country & Town House in print or the app to make sure you get the very best of property, interiors, style, food and travel every month. Country & Town House is an introducer appointed representative of Wealthify Limited which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Country & Town House acts as an introducer appointed representative for the purpose of promoting Wealthify products and introducing customers to Wealthify © 2025 Country & Town House. All rights reserved. titled ‘Bubakins’ after her nickname for her son Episode four of The Crown season three shed light on a little known figure from royal history, Princess Alice of Battenberg, the mother of the Duke of Edinburgh. Titled ‘Bubakins’ for the Princess’s nickname for her only son, it showed the end of her life, and how she came to be a nun living in Buckingham Palace before her death in 1969. Princess Alice with her grandchildren Princess Anne and Prince Charles in 1955 On the anniversary of her death, Tatler looks over the life of one of Europe's most tenacious royals Princess Alice with the Duke of Edinburgh in 1967 On 8 September 2018, George, the Marquess of Blandford and future 13th Duke of Marlborough, married his childhood sweetheart, Camilla Thorp, now the Marchioness of Blandford, at Blenheim Palace. Now, revisit Tatler’s exclusive feature from the January 2019 issue A keen philanthropist and charity worker Princess Alice spent much of World War II working for the Red Cross organising shelters for orphaned children and bringing in medical supplies from Sweden on the pretext of visiting her sister Louise there a woman called Rachel Cohen and her two children Cohen’s husband had offered help to the then King of Greece and in return he had promised to return the favour in any way he could As one of only two members of the Greek Royal Family still residing in the country It is this story which Prince William recalled movingly during a speech to mark Holocaust Memorial Day he read an extract from Heroes of the Holocaust 'In the early days of German occupation conditions deteriorated rapidly as food ran out when an estimated 300,000 people died…Conditions were particularly severe in Athens and its port and setting up a nursing system for poor areas of the city It was at this time that Princess Alice gave refuge to a Jewish widow and two of her five children to save them from deportation to the death camps 'This was an extremely risky undertaking in the close-packed streets of Athens where there was always the danger of spies and gossip….On 15 October 1943 Rachel Cohen and Tilde moved into Alice’s home The staff were told that Mrs Cohen was the former governess to her children…Michel not least the position of the house – the front door faced the residence of the local Archbishop which always had a German guard on duty outside She was sometimes interviewed by the Gestapo and used her deafness to an advantage pretending not to understand their questions or what they were talking about the entire Cohen family survived the war.’ having lived one of the most remarkable lives of great tragedy and charity work in the Royal Family’s history makes for an unlikely film star – unless the film is based on the work of that other peculiarly British creation and then it seems as inevitable as the accompanying mug of stewed tea Though the man himself is not “much drawn to” battenberg its appearance is a convenient shorthand for a world rapidly vanishing in a puff of Yardley’s lavender Indeed, in his review of the The Lady in the Van, Mark Kermode fingered battenberg as “something which as far as I can tell exists only in Alan Bennett dramas ...” – and was almost immediately hit by a barrage of outrage from fans of the pink and yellow chequerboard also known as a church- or chapel-window cake Despite what is often claimed, these are unlikely to represent the four Battenberg princes, or to have been created to celebrate the marriage of one to our very own Princess Victoria – the food historian Ivan Day has satisfactorily dispelled this myth including a domino cake and a neapolitan roll Day suggests the simplification occurred when “large industrial bakers such as Lyons” got in on the battenberg game – “I suppose a four-panel battenburg [a common 19th-century spelling] is much easier to make on a production line” and a delicious final resting place for marzipan still hanging around after Christmas A slightly wobbly version of Mary Berry’s battenberg Photograph: Felicity Cloake/The Guardian(I must apologise to some of the people mentioned who are in no way responsible for the drunken appearance of their cakes – one of the most important things I learned this week was that battenberg assembly cannot be rushed I promise they were judged on flavour and texture The cake itself is fairly non-contentious; classically The only previous experience I have with battenberg is an hour’s tutelage in the kitchens of London’s Corinthia hotel some years ago with renowned pastry chef Claire Clark who taught me the real meaning of that oft-repeated instruction: beat the butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy Not for her a mere creaming together – the hotel’s giant mixer was working for at least five minutes until the stuff in there looked more like overwhipped marge Although I love the flavour and moisture they give the cake they do add weight to what should be a featherlight crumb Heston Blumenthal uses vegetable oil instead of butter which makes his cakes so very moist they collapse after my cack-handed assembly – but also rather bland because he’s chucking all sorts of other ingredients in there (of which more later) but a simpler recipe relies on all its component parts pulling their weight in the taste department He also rests the batter overnight in the fridge but I don’t find those baked immediately have a problem with toughness I like the idea of a contrast between the flavour of the two cakes as well as the colour – to have them both tasting the same feels like a bit of a swizz Geraldene Holt goes for a delicate combination of vanilla and rose his own fruit cup and freeze-dried berries but I do like the tang of the fruit in the pink one – and the fact that they tint the cake without the need for food colouring Collister adds chopped glace cherries to the pink cake I’m worried they will weigh the cakes down and stop them rising to the occasion so I decide to redeploy the chopped almonds around the edge instead Linda Collister’s battenberg includes chopped almonds Photograph: Felicity Cloake/The GuardianThe bakingAs a brief glance at my pictures will make clear battenberg is a cake that requires patience and precision neither of which appear in my top 10 qualities Clark explains that when she was teaching at Le Cordon Bleu it was her exam cake of choice for weeding out “the cooks from the perfectionists” The best way to ensure a neat-ish finish is to invest in a special tin although I am now the proud owner of such an item it’s probably not the best investment unless you’re batty about battenberg Holt suggests dividing the tin with baking parchment and Blumenthal cooks them in two separate loaf tins while Berry recommends baking them both together and then cutting them down the middle As the cakes are likely to require trimming in any case this seems by far the simplest option to me – although I must confess to also being motivated by a hatred of any faffing around with greaseproof paper D- for this version of Claire Clark’s exam cake of choice Photograph: Felicity Cloake/The GuardianThe jamTraditionally apricot although I prefer Duff’s raspberry with the almonds but no one likes Blumenthal’s stridently bitter marmalade or the camomile-flavoured sugar he sprinkles over it If you’re not simply looking for a way to use up the festive leftovers this is a recipe it’s worth making a batch of marzipan for – it takes less than five minutes Grease and base line a roughly 18 x 28cm tin Beat together the butter and sugar until pale and voluminous – a good five minutes in a food mixer if you have one being careful to knock as little air out as possible until it drops slowly from a spoon (add a little milk if it’s too thick) Gently fold a few drops of almond essence into one and the raspberry powder or food colouring into the other plus a drop of milk to bring it back to the same dropping consistency Carefully spoon the uncoloured mixture into one half of the tin and level the top then spoon the pink one into the other half and do the same allow to cool for a couple of minutes then turn out on to a rack whisk the ground almonds and sugars together in a bowl and then stir in the egg yolk followed by the amaretto and just enough egg white to make it into a smooth adding more almonds if it begins to feel sticky then trim the edges to neaten and cut into four equal strips Cut these in half unless you particularly want one large cake dry surface to a large rectangle about 3mm thick Spread each piece of cake with jam on all sides and sandwich together in alternating pairs Which other old-fashioned teatime treats deserve a revival I’m throwing my considerable post-Christmas weight behind the seed cake and the garibaldi biscuit The cake has been described as dangerously sugary but a healthier version can still hit the spot The Guardian’s journalism is independent. We will earn a commission if you buy something through an affiliate link. Learn more. An afternoon tea fixture and Bake Off favourite, nothing sets middle English appetites aflutter like battenberg cake It is said to have been created to mark the wedding of Princess Victoria of Hesse-Darmstadt to the Prince of Battenberg in 1894 – and the nation loves it The Guardian’s journalism is independent. We will earn a commission if you buy something through an affiliate link. Learn more. With its distinctive chequered pattern – pink and yellow almond sponges stuck together with apricot jam, all hugged by a layer of marzipan – it is easy on the eye and the palate. Perhaps a little too easy: its gargantuan 62% sugar content recently resulted in it being called a public health risk According to Kawther Hashem, a nutritionist at Queen Mary University of London, a 50g portion of battenberg could contain as much as seven teaspoons as sugar (30g) – the entire recommend daily intake of sugar for adults while there are problematic sugar levels in many bakes – 5.5 teaspoons of sugar in your average 50g serving of bakewell tart or brownie for example – the battenberg’s marzipan component pushes it into dangerous territory We spoke to the baker Lily Jones, AKA Lily Vanilli, to ask how to reduce the sugar in a battenberg recipe if you are looking for a readymade alternative You could also try making your own without any sugar at all Jones’s recipe calls for 120g almond flour and 55g stoneless sticky medjool dates Put both into a food processor and blitz on a high speed until you have an evenly combined marzipan Wrap it in clingfilm and keep it in the fridge until you are ready to use it that contain only sugars that occur naturally in the fruit they are a bit more expensive – but remember you are no longer buying Mr Kipling and this homemade battenberg will be exceedingly better for you You could also break from tradition and make a strawberry coulis Hull and half 200g of strawberries and heat them with 1 tsp of lemon juice in a heavy-based pan for 4 to 5 minutes Allow this to thicken over a low heat – it will continue to thicken as it cools so remove from the heat just before achieving the desired thickness strain through a sieve and you are ready to go Battenberg recipes often call for icing sugar to roll out the marzipan so that it doesn’t stick to the rolling pin Jones suggests rolling it between two pieces of clingfilm you’ve made a sugar-free marzipan and swapped super-sweet jam for a coulis … but what about the sugar content in the sponge itself As Jones says: “The tricky thing with reducing sugar in a batter is that it does so much more than sweeten – it builds the crumb and forms the basis of the cake’s structure as well as giving it moisture.” You can get away with cutting up to 10% of the sugar in a standard recipe without affecting its structure siftedA good pinch of sea salt200g ground almonds6 egg whites200g unsalted butter melted and cooled½ tsp pink food colouring150g sugar-free apricot jam or strawberry coulis500g Lübecker marzipan (or homemade almond and date marzipan) Whisk together the flour and icing sugar in a bowl with the salt and ground almonds Whip the egg whites until stiff peaks form until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clear Cool completely before sticking the coloured sponge sections together into a chessboard pattern using the jam or coulis which should be heated gently so that it can be brushed on to the sponge Roll out the marzipan between two pieces of clingfilm and trim down to a rectangle of 20cm x 30cm Brush more jam over the smoothest side of the marzipan then place the sponge on it and wrap the marzipan around the long sides Tom Battenberg is hanging up his trumpet-sort of You can't just pick upa trumpet a couple times a week and play like my dad does I'm not talking about the years he invested as a kid and young adult learning the instrument or the hours he spends practicing whatever pieces he'll be performing at a given concert I'm talking about the daily routine of keeping his "lip" in shape Even if his next performance was weeks away-a theoretical situation when it comes to my always-busy dad-he'd still warm up almost every day Anyone who's been part of our family or has ever lived next door knows my dad's warmup routine It lasts about 20 minutes and is exactly the same every time It's been more than 30 years since I lived under his roof you might think it was a cool demo of what a trumpet can do many of them early in the morning when you were still trying to sleep That dedication to keeping his lip in shape is part of what has made my dad such a successful player for so many years Being a musician has always been his passion and No So I was surprised a few years ago when he told me something I thought I'd never hear: He was planning to hang it up He had looked at the calendar and realized that the stars were going to align on July 30 2016-his 75th birthday and the final Picnic with the Pops show for the summer capping his 50th year with the Columbus Symphony Retiring on the day those other milestones clicked into place sounded like a cool plan When my dad started at the symphony in 1966 and mostly music teachers at area elementary The orchestra only performed concerts once every three or four weeks The pay scale was $10 for a rehearsal and $15 for a concert Rehearsals were held at night because everyone had day jobs It's a long way from there to the symphony of today with its 26-week season and 50 or so full-time musicians many of whom came to Columbus from other cities after winning auditions The pay is much higher-a minimum of $168 per rehearsal/concert-and so is the prestige as evidenced by 2001's sold-out show at New York City's famed Carnegie Hall The symphony hasn't been my dad's only gig He also has been principal trumpet player for the ProMusica Chamber Orchestra since it debuted in 1978 He's led a jazz combo since the 1960s and the High Street Stompers Dixieland band since the '80s and I pulled roadie duty for the jazz combo or Stompers music stands or anything else our preadolescent bodies could carry my dad was best-known for directing the OSU Jazz Ensemble The ensemble won national and international awards toured both coasts and Europe multiple times released a bunch of records and regularly played to full houses at Weigel Hall and Mershon Auditorium it seemed like I couldn't tell anyone in Columbus that my last name was Battenberg without the reply being As that July 30 Picnic with the Pops concert approached I made plans to fly with my family from San Diego-our home for the last 10 years-to Columbus for the big birthday/retirement party No way would I miss my dad's final performance or the last chance for my 4-year-old daughter my dad mentioned that his retirement plan had … evolved The thought of mothballing the horn in its velvet-lined case apparently was too final He emailed and said the 50-year milestone still marked a good stopping point with the symphony And what the heck-if the symphony called and asked him to fill in on occasion I decided I just can't quit playing cold turkey," he said My family will still come to Columbus for the big birthday/semi-retirement party It might actually be good to hear that daily warmup routine again Erik Battenberg is a former staff writer for Columbus Monthly Everything you need to make the colourful British bake which will make for a perfect at home tea party Viewers tuned in tonight for the return of The Great British Bake Off Great British Bake Off judges and hosts Prue Leith Noel Fielding and Matt Lucas welcomed a new batch of bakers to the famous tent Rolling up their sleeves and flouring their surfaces, The Great British Bake Off contestants showed off their skills in a bid to be crowned this week's star baker and keep their spot in the competition they were tasked with making a traditional Battenberg cake with their own spin if you fancy making the quintessential British bake or are feeling more like a Star Baker and want to make a Battenberg with a twist Battenberg - also spelt Battenburg - is a light sponge cake held together with jam displays a distinctive two-by-two check pattern often alternately coloured pink and yellow This recipe from bbcgoodfood.com makes two cakes each cut into 10 slices and can be frozen (use half the recipe for one cake) Heat oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4 and line the base and sides of a 20cm square tin with baking parchment (the easiest way is to cross 2 x 20cm-long strips over the base) vanilla and almond extract in a large bowl Beat with an electric whisk until the mix comes together smoothly and bake for 25-30 mins – when you poke in a skewer then transfer to a wire rack to finish cooling while you make the second sponge Then scrape it all into the tin and bake as before Barely trim two opposite edges from the almond sponge use a ruler to help you cut 4 slices each the same width as the sponge height Take 2 x almond slices and 2 x pink slices and trim so they are all the same length Roll out one marzipan block on a surface lightly dusted with icing sugar to just over 20cm wide then keep rolling lengthways until the marzipan is roughly 0.5cm thick then lay a pink and an almond slice side by side at one end of the marzipan alternating colours to give a checkerboard effect Trim the marzipan to the length of the cakes Carefully lift up the marzipan and smooth over the cake with your hands but leave a small marzipan fold along the bottom edge before you stick it to the first side then crimp edges using fingers and thumb (or mark the 10 slices using the prongs of a fork Assemble second Battenberg and keep in an airtight box or well wrapped in cling film for up to 3 days If you're feeling ambitious and want to do something different, you could follow these tips from Olive Magazine for an orange and lemon Battenberg which is sure to add a little zest to a traditional Battenberg Instead of using almonds and pink food colouring replace with the following for the sponge: The Great British Bake Off is on Tuesdays on Channel 4 at 8pm. If you’re looking for more to watch check out our TV guide. Bake Off 2020 signature challenge explainedHow do you make Battenberg Bake Off 2020 signature challenge explainedEverything you need to make the colourful British bake Great British Bake Off judges and hosts Prue Leith Rolling up their sleeves and flouring their surfaces, The Great British Bake Off contestants showed off their skills in a bid to be crowned this week's star baker and keep their spot in the competition This recipe from bbcgoodfood.com makes two cakes If you're feeling ambitious and want to do something different, you could follow these tips from Olive Magazine for an orange and lemon Battenberg The Great British Bake Off is on Tuesdays on Channel 4 at 8pm. If you’re looking for more to watch check out our TV guide. you are agreeing to site title privacy policy This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. 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Subscribe to BuzzFeed Daily NewsletterCaret Down24 Side-By-Sides Of The "Great British Bake Off" Bakes Vs One of the most terrifying show stoppers on Bake Off dynamic trumpeter with the Columbus Symphony he will retire as the leader of the section the highest brass "voices" in the orchestra "Trumpets are so important for the orchestra and for a player to be on his game for 50 years is remarkable," said William Conner CEO of the Columbus Association for the Performing Arts The orchestra will no doubt miss his enduring talents "Tom can play every style," said Andrew Millat The orchestra has a fine young trumpet player coming on board In recognition of his achievements as an artist the Greater Columbus Art Council this month named Battenberg the eighth recipient of the Raymond J Hanley Award - which includes a no-strings-attached grant of $12,500 in memory of the former council president The retirement of Battenberg - along with that of pops conductor Albert-George Schram - will command attention Friday and Saturday during the final Picnic With the Pops concerts of the season The tall and lanky brass player will take center stage at each performance for a couple of pop or jazz solos probably including his arrangement of the George Gershwin tune "Embraceable You." family and colleagues will help celebrate his lengthy run - and wish him a happy 75th birthday on Saturday "The last concert of my 50th year will be on my 75th birthday," Battenberg said "I started playing piano when I was in the third grade but I really took a liking to the trumpet when my mom took me to a parade and the trumpets were in the first row a native of Kettering in Montgomery County and a graduate of Fairmont West High School and Ohio State and Arizona State universities ascended the trumpet section of the symphony twice being named acting principal before earning the title in 2009 beginning with Evan Whallon and continuing through Music Director Rossen Milanov who refers to his playing as "always exceptional." pitch and musical personality," Milanov said "He's one of the most respected musicians in the orchestra and has celebrity status among brass players in town." Battenberg has also taught classes at Ohio State University (from 1966 to 1992) formed and led the High Street Stompers Dixieland Band he has played principal trumpet for the ProMusica Chamber Orchestra and spend more time with their family (Battenberg has two sons and a granddaughter from his first marriage) he originally planned a full retirement but later had second thoughts So he intends to continue with ProMusica for at least one more year and fill in as needed as a second or third trumpet player with the symphony "It takes a lot of maintenance to keep the lip going." Battenberg has weathered both highs and lows with the symphony he got to play under guest conductor Igor Stravinsky; and he "had the thrill of playing with the orchestra in New York's Carnegie Hall." After a strike in 2008 eliminated a summer lineup and part of the next regular season and after the season was reduced from 48 to 26 weeks and musicians took pay cuts "I thought it all might end," Battenberg acknowledged whom he calls a wonderful musician and "relaxed and laid-back conductor." especially during the time that Kridler spent as CEO of CAPA and interim orchestra manager support and friendship of musicians and conductors alike," Kridler said he impresses and endears himself at the same time I think of the purity of his musical line as kind of like the classic jazz tune 'Straight conductor of the Columbus Symphony Chorus and minister of music at First Community Church has also worked extensively with Battenberg "I've been in hundreds of rehearsals and concerts with him over the years and I think I heard him make a bloop once - just once over all that time - in a rehearsal you know he's going to lead the brass section and it's going to be excellent." Which is largely the legacy Battenberg said he prefers to leave "I hope I will be remembered as a musician who performed at a consistently high level a musician who could be counted on to always be there and a musician who was prepared to play whatever was put in front of me." HOT: » What kind of news would you like to see more of? The largest peaceful march for human rights will take place for the 17th consecutive year The doors to the biggest event in support of human rights open at 14:00 and the concert will start at 16:00 The peaceful protest march through the streets of Sofia which is being held for the 17th year in a row will start from Battenberg Square after 19:00 The organizers shared the participation and safety rules on the Sofia Pride website - sofiapride.org Due to the expected high temperatures on Saturday it is recommended that participants wear hats and sun protection due to the good coordination with the Sofia Police and additional security Pride recommends that participants move in groups without displaying accessories associated with the LGBTQ+ community and use public transport or taxis to get to and from the event Participants in Sofia Pride are invited not to provoke or respond in any way to provocations by people outside the procession The stage of Sofia Pride 2024 will welcome some of the most popular and popular artists in Bulgaria - Mila Robert the singer YVA and the Ukrainian singer Orfi The organizers for the second year in a row will give young artists the opportunity to perform and sing in front of thousands This year they are the magnetic singer GABÓ the alternative and always ready to break clichés Elittna representing modern pop music in Bulgaria and the first opera singer in the history of Sofia Pride - Raya-Hristina Vateva This year Sofia Pride's campaign "Bulgaria is also our home" seeks to read the theme of patriotism and national belonging in the context of the LGBTQ+ community in Bulgaria and the people who support their rights 8 successful professionals in their field stand with their faces and names on billboards in Sofia as part of the campaign Their stories will be told digitally on Sofia Pride's Facebook and Instagram profiles in the coming days.Among the personalities who are included in the campaign are doctor Miroslav Angelov - cardiologist Clemon Bolo-Sukov - teacher of folk dances Krasimira Hadjiivanova - co-founder of the "Mother Mila" platform Nadezhda Rangelova-Boyadzhieva - animal breeder and child health activist Simona Metodieva - social pedagogue and Alexander Milanov - medical worker Sofia Pride is organized by the GLAS Foundation LGBTI Action and the Bulgarian Helsinki Committee The 2024 event is supported by the Bulgarian Women's Fund the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands and the companies Mastercard We need your support so Novinite.com can keep delivering news and information about Bulgaria Residents of Sofia who are customers of "Toplofikatsia Sofia" can now benefit from a new mobile application "My Heat," which offers a more accessible and user-friendly way to manage heating-related services The fourth edition of the LUNAR Festival of Lights in Sofia will illuminate 10,000 square meters of art across some of the city's most iconic buildings and public spaces from May 8 to May 11 The Sofia Police has launched a targeted operation against drivers of electric scooters and electric motorbikes who engage in reckless behavior in the city's central areas Todor Kantardzhiev warned that Sofia's sewer system should be cleared of rats opened fire with a gas pistol near a kindergarten in Sofia's Lyulin district Sofia Municipality is set to implement a revised framework for managing its municipal housing stock by introducing two distinct rental categories Today is one of the most revered holidays in Bulgaria – St Bulgaria commemorates one of its most significant national holidays – the Day of Saint George the Victorious and the official Day of the Bulgarian Army Employers in Bulgaria are legally required to implement all necessary measures to prevent and minimize workplace accidents with 45.2% of those aged 16–74 having bought goods or services via the internet in the past year Google Street View Cars Return to Bulgaria for Major Mapping Update Housing Prices Soar in Bulgaria’s Major Cities as Demand and Supply Strain Increase This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks The action you just performed triggered the security solution There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase You can email the site owner to let them know you were blocked Please include what you were doing when this page came up and the Cloudflare Ray ID found at the bottom of this page Don’t Miss a Single Sparkling Moment! Sign up for The Court Jeweller Newsletter The Court Jeweller Sparkling Royal Jewels From Around the World 11.06.2021 by // Leave a Comment The Romanov sapphires aren’t the only royal jewels being sold at auction by Sotheby’s in Geneva next week we’re taking a closer look at the most fascinating tiara from the auction catalogue: a diamond and sapphire palmette tiara that once belonged to the Battenbergs Sotheby’s calls the jewel an “impressive sapphire and diamond tiara” that dates to the “mid 19th century.” The tiara is “designed as five detachable graduated palmettes each set with a cushion-shaped sapphire enhanced with cushion- circular- and single-cut diamonds.” The tiara is not signed by its maker but it comes with a fitted case that may offer clues to its provenance “This tiara,” the lot notes clarify “is being sold with a fitted case signed Robert Koch although it was certainly made after the tiara itself.” Here’s a closer look at the tiara’s central palmette element. Something about the piece calls to mind another royal tiara: Queen Sofia’s Tiara, which is part of the Swedish royal collection. Sotheby’s also notes that they sold a very similar tiara back in 1994; that jewel came from the Thurn und Taxis family This tiara can be traced back to another European princely family: the Battenbergs The patriarch of the family was Prince Alexander of Hesse and by Rhine married the future Emperor Alexander II of Russia Prince Alexander accompanied his sister to St he fell in love with one of her ladies-in-waiting (Alexander and Julia are pictured together above in 1885.) Julia was the daughter of a Polish general Neither the imperial family in Russia nor the grand ducal family in Hesse approved of the relationship He and Julia finally married shortly before the birth of their first child their unequal (or “morganatic”) relationship was acknowledged by Prince Alexander’s brother He granted Julia the new title of Countess of Battenberg eventually upgrading her the title of Princess of Battenberg Alexander and Julia’s children were able to use the Battenberg princely title as well Alexander and Julia became the parents of five children several of whom will be familiar to you because of their brilliant royal marriages Princess Victoria of Hesse and by Rhine; they were the parents of several famous royal children The late Duke of Edinburgh was their grandson married Queen Victoria’s youngest daughter Their descendants included Queen Ena of Spain Prince Alexander of Battenberg (1857-1893) is pictured in the illustrated portrait above His royal life was an exceptionally unique one aiming to remove the territory from the control of the Ottoman Empire A peace treaty in 1878 secured Bulgarian independence and the new country decided to elect a new monarch and the new Bulgarian parliament unanimously agreed Prince Alexander became the first Sovereign Prince of Bulgaria The 22-year-old prince had suddenly been vaulted from his minor place in a morganatic branch of a German royal family to the position of ruling prince After his adventure as the ruler of Bulgaria Prince Alexander settled into a much quieter and more private life Though he had often been suggested as a match for various European princesses (including Princess Viktoria of Prussia he ultimately followed his heart and married for love who had been contracted for an extended series of performances at the court theater reported in 1889 that “Prince Alexander of Battenberg and the personal attractions of the gifted artist proved powerful enough to cause him to disregard his past and make her his wife.” The prince and the opera singer were married in February 1889 on the French Riviera the union between Prince Alexander and Johanna Loisinger was not an equal one The couple used the titles of Count and Countess of Hartenau which they were able to pass on to their children The image above shows her wearing just the base of the piece unfortunately) shows her wearing the complete tiara Alexander and Johanna’s daughter was less than a month old when The prince reportedly suffered from an intestinal condition The Evening Standard reported that the prince’s death was an incredible shock to his family: “The tragic death of the Prince produced the greatest gloom in all ranks of the population and the depressing effect has been intensified by the unfavourable news as to the condition of the Countess Hartenau which is such as to give rise to serious apprehension The Countess had scarcely left her bed after her recent confinement when her husband was suddenly struck down Throughout the Prince’s short illness which was never expected to have a fatal termination it was thought better to conceal from the Countess The shock was all the greater when the news of his death could no longer be withheld.” Prince Henry of Battenberg headed from Windsor to Austria to serve as the chief mourner at the funeral Prince Alexander’s body was moved to a grand mausoleum in Sofia A large public funeral was held in the city attended by Johanna and by Bulgaria’s new sovereign prince and she became a patron of the city’s musical institutions she also kept in touch with her husband’s royal relatives Johanna even had a personal audience with Queen Victoria in the south of France a meeting that was engineered by her brother- and sister-in-law is expected to fetch between 70,000-120,000 Swiss francs (or about $77,000-130,000 USD) Categories // germany Enter your name and email address below to subscribe to our weekly newsletter Sign up for my new subscriber-supported community, Hidden Gems, delivered directly to you each Saturday! Copyright © 2025 THE COURT JEWELLER LLC “I could not be more proud of the destroyermen of Mason,” said Cmdr “It was truly a team effort from our INSURV (inspection and survey) in January 2016 all the way through a tremendously successful deployment which concluded in December 2016.” Mason is only the fifth destroyer in the last 111 years to receive the award competing against larger ships including aircraft carriers and amphibious ships Ships From Houthi Cruise Missiles Awarded Battenberg Cup," Missile Threat Center for Strategic and International Studies https://missilethreat.csis.org/destroyer-protected-u-s-ships-houthi-cruise-missiles-awarded-battenberg-cup/.Copy the CSIS Defense and Security Department hosted a conversation on the diffusion of U.S and the impact of open-source AI on the defense industrial base the CSIS Defense and Security Department hosted a conversation on the evolving threat environment Sign up for our newsletter and receive the latest automotive news in your inbox More than just “another” place to find news, reviews, spy shots, commentary, features, and guides about the auto industry TheDetroitBureau doesn’t stop with the press releases or confuse a few lines of opinion with insightful Have some ideas for making The Detroit Bureau.com even better Δdocument.getElementById( "ak_js_2" ).setAttribute( "value" TheDetroitBureau.com’s Headlight News offers a look at the past week’s top automotive news stories as well as what’s coming up in the week ahead Check out the week’s top story and our latest review…along with a dive into the past with this week in automotive history home > news > Automobiles > Battenberg Hit With Hefty Fine for Delphi Scam Battenberg III must pay a $215,000 for violating U.S securities laws by misrepresenting a $237 million payment to General Motors Corp District Judge Avern Cohn entered judgment against Battenberg and a $118,500 sanction against former top Delphi accountant Paul Free A Detroit jury in January found the men misrepresented the GM payment and found Free committed wrong-doing in three other transactions in 2000 and 2001 The executives had been accused of trying to prop up the giant auto supplier’s stock even as Delphi slid steadily towards what would become the longest corporate bankruptcy reorganization in U.S “The remedies are for the court to decide,” Cohn said in separate memoranda explaining his rationale for each assessment The six-digit fine makes Battenberg one of only a handful of executives to pay for the decisions linked to the collapse of Detroit’s auto industry the former chief executive officer of bankrupt Collins &Aikman Securities and Exchange Commission by paying a $7.2 million rather than go to trial the budget director in the Reagan White House during the 1980s scolding both Democrats and Republicans alike on the budget deficit While the jury found the men had misrepresented the GM payment it cleared them of claims they committed fraud or helped Delphi violate securities laws in the transaction The long trial of former Delphi Chairman and Chief Executive Officer J.T Battenberg ended with a jury clearing him of fraud – but he was still found him liable for misrepresentation and responsible for accounting errors involving a $237 million payment the supplier made to former parent General Motors The Securities and Exchange Commission’s civil complaint against Battenberg alleged that the former Delphi CEO had tried to hide Delphi’s financial condition in order to improve its performance in the market He nonetheless sought vindication via a jury trial the fine was a serious rebuke to an executive who was considered one of Detroit’s major corporate stars for nearly three decades The SEC’s prosecutors hammered on the idea that Battenberg deliberately deceived outside investors about the handling of an item in the company’s financial filings in the years before Delphi filed for bankruptcy in 2005 The SEC sued Battenberg and other ex-Delphi executives in 2006 alleging they engaged in “fraudulent accounting or disclosure schemes.” Two other former Delphi executives a former director of capital planning and pension analysis; and Catherine Rozanski Belans agreed to pay $87,500 in disgorgement Rozanski agreed to a $40,000 civil penalty Battenberg’s lawyers repeatedly asserted their client never did anything wrong and said the SEC hadn’t provided evidence to support its claims former Delphi financial staffers testified they were coached by senior executives on how to handle a disputed claim from General Motors The SEC maintained Battenberg violated federal securities laws through improper accounting for a $237-million payment Delphi made to GM as part of a settlement involving warranty claims Delphi improperly recorded a $202 million payment instead of charging it against income which would have reduced the supplier’s quarterly profit It also would have reduced the size of executive bonuses though the bonus payments were not part of the government’s case The payment to GM grew out of a long-standing dispute at the time one of the world’s largest automotive parts manufacturers repeatedly protested GM’s claims but found it was steadily losing business from GM as the dispute dragged on when he took the stand in his own defense last autumn Delphi’s financial problems eventually drove the company to file for Chapter 11 reorganization in 2005 It only emerged from bankruptcy after one of the longest corporate trip through the courts in U.S the fine was a serious rebuke to an executive who was considered one of Detroit’s major corporate stars for nearly three decades.” a slight slap on the writ and it is doubtful he will ever pay it I’m glad to see Battenberg get banged on this one but a good friend of mine was working at the Albany GA Delphi (at one time Delco) plant in the mid 90s when ol’ JT was the main man JT came through the plant on a “dog and pony show” tour in the middle of the year As he was speaking to the employees of the plant he mentioned that Albany was ” the best kept secret in all of GM (Delphi was still part of GM at the time).” My friend and website in this browser for the next time I comment Δdocument.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value" 04.15.2019 by // Leave a Comment Today marks the fiftieth anniversary of the death of one of the royal matriarchs of the twentieth-century: Princess Victoria Eugenie of Battenberg who is better known to history as Queen Ena of Spain we’ve got a bejeweled look back on her fascinating royal life Princess Victoria Eugenie Julia Ena of Battenberg the daughter of Prince Henry of Battenberg and Princess Beatrice of the United Kingdom was born at Balmoral Castle in Scotland in October 1887 Her first three names honored her maternal grandmother Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom; her godmother the exiled Empress Eugenie of France; and her paternal grandmother When the family gave up their German titles during World War I he took on the new title of Marquess of Carisbrooke the genetic disorder that wreaked havoc in Queen Victoria’s family tree was killed in the First Battle of Ypres while serving with the King’s Royal Rifle Corps in October 1914 All four of the children grew up close to their grandmother especially after the death of their father Ena was only seventeen when she caught the eye of the man who would become her husband made a state visit to the United Kingdom in June 1905 At a dinner party given by King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra Alfonso — who was openly searching for a royal bride — was introduced to several young British princesses (Princesses Patricia and Margaret of Connaught and Princesses Helena Victoria and Marie Louise of Schleswig-Holstein were also invited.) Legend has it that his initial target was Ena’s cousin who wasn’t particularly impressed by the Battenberg princess’s paternal pedigree In the midst of the budding royal relationship Ena was also present for another royal wedding she served as one of the bridesmaids for her cousin who married the future King Gustaf VI Adolf of Sweden at Windsor Castle Ena is the bridesmaid standing on the left-hand side of this official portrait of the wedding party Regardless of Maria Cristina’s objections Neither Ena’s religion (she was an Anglican while the Spanish royals were and are Roman Catholic) nor the risks of joining the Spanish royal family (Alfonso had survived his fourth assassination attempt when his carriage was bombed in Paris just a few days before he and Ena met) slowed down the marriage negotiations the papers were heavily speculating that she would soon become Queen of Spain Queen Maria Cristina finally relented and gave her approval to the match Ena and her mother traveled to the south of France where they spent time with Alfonso before heading to Spain to meet with his mother and a treaty was signed between Spain and the United Kingdom to make things official King Edward VII even granted his niece the style of Royal Highness the wedding gifts offered to a future Queen of Spain were impressive indeed Her wedding dress was a gift from her new husband; so was the grand diamond tiara she wore on her wedding day is still known by the appropriate nickname La Buena which simply means “the good one.”) Her lace veil was a gift from her mother-in-law; it was the same one Queen Maria Cristina had worn on her own wedding day She was also presented with a treasure trove of tiaras held in Madrid at the Church of San Jeronimo on May 31 went off without a hitch — until the royal carriage procession headed back to the palace afterward The newlyweds were seated in a carriage at the end of the procession which also included numerous royals from throughout Europe the future King George V and Queen Mary of the United Kingdom and Prince Luis Filipe of Portugal.) As Alfonso and Ena’s carriage traveled along the Calle Mayor an anarchist threw a bouquet at the carriage killing more than twenty people and wounding 100 more Alfonso and Ena’s escape from injury was so narrow that her wedding gown was splattered with blood Queen Ena pairs La Buena with layered necklaces and a fantastic gown from the House of Worth In this 1911 profile portrait by Joaquin Sorolla y Bastida, Ena sparkles in diamonds, including her grand diamond riviere, her large diamond earrings, and (I believe) the Ansorena tiara given to her as a wedding present by her mother-in-law. That tiara was later dismantled and remade by Cartier. (More on that Pearl and Diamond Tiara over here!) Alfonso and Ena’s young family grew quickly Their happiness over the birth of an heir was dampened when they discovered that he had inherited hemophilia just like his uncle Maurice and several of his cousins Although he had inherited the bleeding disorder He ultimately renounced his rights to the throne in 1933 so that he could marry a Cuban commoner, Edelmira Sampedro-Ocejo y Robato (He died in a car accident five years later.) Ena’s second child but he became deaf after an operation during his early childhood and he too decided to renounce his rights to the throne when he turned 25 eventually becoming the head of the Carlists Ena gave birth to her third child in three years: a daughter She eventually married an Italian aristocrat, Alessandro Torlonia Their descendants include Princess Sibilla of Luxembourg Infante Fernando was stillborn in May 1910 she married an Italian aristocrat, Enrico Marone-Cinzano Princess Maria Mercedes of Bourbon-Two Sicilies and he died following a car accident in Austria at the age of nineteen Alfonso and Ena’s marriage ultimately was troubled in large part because he was not a faithful husband He acknowledged a number of illegitimate children At least five more sons and daughters were born during his marriage to Ena Ena gained a measure of popularity in Spain she became deeply involved with the Spanish Red Cross Images from this period also reinforce the majestic nature of her position as well as the diamond and emerald necklace that featured stones inherited from her godmother She wears the diamond and emerald necklace as a bandeau in this portrait, painted in 1924 by Bernhard Osterman. The emeralds were eventually sold. (More about them over here.) She was also photographed in several other important tiaras, including Queen Victoria’s Strawberry Leaf Tiara (more here!), which was loaned to her by her mother, and the magnificent Mellerio Shell Tiara (more here!) the Spanish royal family was sent into exile following a referendum on the monarchy Ena and Alfonso unofficially separated as well though she remained a vital part of the royal family She’s pictured here at the airport in Lisbon in 1935 with her son the Count of Barcelona (on the right) and his bride Ena also spent time with family in her native Britain Ena’s life in exile lasted for almost four decades and she was an active member of her family right up until the end she traveled to Lisbon to attend the wedding of her granddaughter to Luis Gomez-Acebo y Duque de Estrada Ena remains one of the most fascinating royal women of the last century Categories // in memoriam, Spain, united kingdom Fleet Forces Command announced via naval message May 18 that the Ohio-class ballistic-missile submarine USS Alaska (SSBN 732) is the winner of the Battenberg Cup recognizing outstanding achievements over the course of 2014 "Every Alaska Sailor should be proud of their record of sustained excellence and superior teamwork The Battenberg Cup is awarded annually to the best all-around ship or submarine in the Atlantic Fleet on the accumulation of the crew's success "We are truly honored to receive the cherished Battenberg Trophy for 2014," said Cmdr "As the trophy was originally intended to do back in 1905 Alaska's superior performance is a testament to the talent and dedication of her enlisted crew." Though other submarines have received the award before Alaska is the first SSBN to win the cup since the award's inception in 1905  "We are also greatly humbled to be the first ballistic missile submarine to earn this distinctive recognition the fine men of Alaska will continue to provide safe effective and survivable strategic deterrence on our next patrol," said Forman USS Alaska participated in numerous strategic exercises supported midshipman operations and prospective commanding officer and executive officer operations Alaska won the Battle Efficiency Award and was also awarded the 2014 Retention Excellence Award a junior officer from Alaska was selected as the Submarine Squadron 20 Junior Officer of the Year "The standard that the crew maintains on a daily basis is the only reason that we were nominated and selected for the Battenberg Cup," said Master Chief Yeoman Dave Wright "The chiefs and officers are extremely fortunate to be working with such a talented group of men The relentless dedication and superior performance the crew displays daily is the reason Alaska continues to be successful at defending our nation through strategic deterrence."  Metrics details Copy-number aberrations (CNAs) and whole-genome duplications (WGDs) are frequent somatic mutations in cancer but their quantification from DNA sequencing of bulk tumor samples is challenging Standard methods for CNA inference analyze tumor samples individually; however DNA sequencing of multiple samples from a cancer patient has recently become more common We introduce HATCHet (Holistic Allele-specific Tumor Copy-number Heterogeneity) an algorithm that infers allele- and clone-specific CNAs and WGDs jointly across multiple tumor samples from the same patient We show that HATCHet outperforms current state-of-the-art methods on multi-sample DNA sequencing data that we simulate using MASCoTE (Multiple Allele-specific Simulation of Copy-number Tumor Evolution) Applying HATCHet to 84 tumor samples from 14 prostate and pancreas cancer patients we identify subclonal CNAs and WGDs that are more plausible than previously published analyses and more consistent with somatic single-nucleotide variants (SNVs) and small indels in the same samples These methods rely on various simplifying assumptions such as: only one tumor clone is present in the sample While these assumptions remove ambiguity in copy-number deconvolution it is not clear that the resulting solutions are accurate particularly in cases of highly aneuploid tumors available methods for inferring CNAs analyze individual samples losing the important information that multiple samples from the same patient share many CNAs that occurred during tumor evolution HATCHet separates two distinct sources of ambiguity in the copy-number deconvolution problem the presence of subclonal CNAs and the occurrence of WGDs and uses a model-selection criterion to distinguish these sources existing methods attempt to fit a unique value for the variables tumor ploidy and purity (or equivalent variables) to the observed RDRs and BAFs conflating different sources of ambiguity in the data We show that HATCHet’s inferred subclonal CNAs and WGDs are more plausible than reported in published analyses and more consistent with somatic SNVs and small indels measured in the same samples resulting in alternative reconstructions of tumor evolution and metastatic seeding patterns a HATCHet takes in input DNA sequencing data from multiple bulk tumor samples of the same patient and has five steps HATCHet calculates the RDRs and BAFs in bins of the reference genome (black squares) HATCHet clusters the bins based on RDRs and BAFs globally along the entire genome and jointly across samples p and q Each cluster (color) includes bins with the same copy-number state within each clone present in p or q HATCHet estimates two values for the fractional copy number of each cluster by scaling RDRs the identification of the cluster (magenta) with copy-number state (1, 1) is sufficient and RDRs are scaled correspondingly HATCHet identifies an additional cluster with identical copy-number state in all tumor clones Dashed black horizontal lines in the scaled BAF-RDR plot represent values of fractional copy numbers that correspond to clonal CNAs HATCHet factors the allele-specific fractional copy numbers FA, FB into the allele-specific copy numbers A, B there is a normal clone and 3 tumor clones HATCHet’s model-selection criterion identifies the matrices A and U in the factorization while evaluating the fit according to both the inferred number of clones and presence/absence of a WGD g HATCHet outputs allele- and clone-specific copy numbers (with the color of the corresponding clone) and clone proportions (in the top right part of each plot) for each sample Clusters are classified according to the inference of unique/different copy-number states in each sample (sample-clonal/subclonal) and across all tumor clones (tumor-clonal/subclonal) tumor ploidy and purity are composite variables that sum the contributions of the unknown copy numbers and proportions of multiple clones tumor ploidy and purity are not ideal coordinates to evaluate tumor mixtures as many different clonal compositions may be equally plausible in these coordinates particularly when more than one tumor clone is present or a WGD occurs (Supplementary Figs a simulation framework to correctly generate DNA sequencing reads from multiple bulk tumor samples with each sample containing one or more clones that share the same evolutionary history during which CNAs and/or WGD occur (Supplementary Fig We simulated DNA sequencing reads from 256 tumor samples (1–3 tumor clones) for 64 patients (3–5 samples per patient) half with a WGD and half without a WGD (Supplementary Fig We separated the comparison of methods into two parts in order to assess both the inference of CNAs and proportions we provided the true values of the main parameters inferred by each method to assess the ability to retrieve the correct solution without the difficulty of model selection we applied HATCHet jointly on all samples as well as separately on each sample (single-sample HATCHet) to quantify the contribution of the global clustering and the factorization model which capture the dependency across samples Further details are in Supplementary Notes 1 and 2 a Average allele-specific error per genome position for the copy-number states and their proportions inferred by each method (here excluding THetA which does not infer allele-specific copy numbers) on 128 simulated tumor samples from 32 patients without a WGD and where each method was provided with the true values of the main parameters (e.g. HATCHet outperforms all the other methods even when it considers single samples individually (single-sample HATCHet) b Average allele-specific error per genome position on 256 simulated tumor samples from 64 patients and where each method infers all relevant parameters including tumor ploidy even when considering single samples individually (single-sample HATCHet) Box plots show the median and the interquartile range (IQR) and the whiskers denote the lowest and highest values within 1.5 times the IQR from the first and third quartiles c Average precision and recall in the prediction of the absence of a WGD and the presence of a WGD in a sample HATCHet is the only method with high precision and recall (>75%) in both the cases even compared to a consensus of the other methods based on a prediction for majority While Battenberg and Canopy underestimate the presence of WGDs (<20% and 0% recall) and cloneHD overestimates the absence of WGDs (<20% we observed a reasonable consistency between HATCHet’s profiles and those from single cells (Supplementary Figs Additional details of this analysis are reported in Supplementary Note 5 An important question is whether this difference is due to cancer-type specific or patient-specific differences in CNA evolution of these tumors or a consequence of differences in the bioinformatic analyses We investigated whether the HATCHet’s analysis would confirm or refute the discordance between these studies a HATCHet identifies subclonal CNAs in 29 samples while Battenberg identifies subclonal CNAs in all 49 samples b In the 29 samples where both methods identify subclonal CNAs HATCHet and Battenberg infer similar fractions of the genome with subclonal CNAs (dotted diagonal) while in the other 20 samples only Battenberg retrieves relatively high fractions of subclonal CNAs both HATCHet and Battenberg identify reliable subclonal CNAs that correspond to sample-subclonal clusters (magenta) with clearly intermediate positions in the scaled BAF-RDR plot (each point corresponds to 50 kb genomic bin) between those of sample-clonal clusters (black clusters with corresponding copy-number states) with clonal CNAs (dashed black lines) d The sample-subclonal clusters in c correspond to large genomic regions (magenta) with values of RDR (for 50kb genomic bins) clearly distinct from the RDR values of regions from sample-clonal clusters (black) Battenberg identifies extensive clusters of 50kb genomic bins with subclonal CNAs (green) such clusters are not clearly distinguished in the scaled BAF-RDR plot from the sample-clonal clusters (black with corresponding copy-number states) HATCHet infers only clonal CNAs in this sample f The sample-subclonal clusters in e correspond to large genomic regions (green) with values of RDR (for 50kb genomic bins) approximately equal to the RDR values of nearby regions from sample-clonal clusters (black) While it is possible that Battenberg has higher sensitivity in detecting subclonal CNAs than HATCHet the extensive subclonal CNAs reported by Battenberg in all samples is concerning This is because the inference of subclonal CNAs will always produce a better fit to the observed RDRs and BAFs but with a cost of increasing the number of parameters required to describe the copy-number states (model complexity) Battenberg models the clonal composition of each segment independently (Supplementary Fig and thus has 6× more parameters than HATCHet on this dataset (Supplementary Fig it is important to evaluate the trade-off between model fit and model complexity Battenberg does not include a model-selection criterion to evaluate this trade-off and it consequently infers a high fraction of subclonal CNAs in every sample (Supplementary Note 7) without fitting the observed RDRs and BAFs better than HATCHet (Supplementary Note 8) HATCHet uses a model-selection criterion to identify the number of clones; consequently in 20/49 samples HATCHet infers that all the subclonal CNAs identified by Battenberg are instead clonal (Supplementary Fig Since HATCHet fits the observed RDRs and BAFs as well as Battenberg (Supplementary Fig the extensive subclonal CNAs reported by Battenberg in these samples are equally well-explained as clonal CNAs we found that ReMixT’s inference of subclonal CNAs from the same dataset was more similar to HATCHet than Battenberg (Supplementary Fig Since both HATCHet and ReMixT outperformed Battenberg on the simulated data the similarity between HATCHet and ReMixT on this dataset suggests that Battenberg’s results are less accurate Further details of this analysis are in Supplementary Note 9 a HATCHet identifies subclonal CNAs in 15 of 35 samples while published analysis used Control-FREEC and excluded subclonal CNAs b In the lymph node metastasis sample Pam01_NoM1 HATCHet infers two distinct tumor clones (ellipses in lower right of plot with corresponding proportions) and a tumor purity of 69% Five sample-subclonal clusters (arrows) of 50kb genomic bins occupy intermediate positions between the other sample-clonal clusters (dashed black lines) in the scaled BAF-RDR plot and thus have distinct copy-number states in the two clones Control-FREEC copy numbers are shown on the right y-axis labels c In a second liver metastasis sample Pam01_LiM2 from the same patient one (red) shared with the lymph node sample Pam01_NoM1 starred) occupies an intermediate position in the scaled BAF-RDR plot and has distinct copy-number states in the two clones the five sample-subclonal clusters in Pam01_NoM1 (arrows) clearly overlap the sample-clonal clusters in this sample and thus correspond to clonal CNAs (dashed black lines) d In the liver metastasis sample Pam01_LiM1 HATCHet identifies a single tumor clone (white) that is shared with the lymph node metastasis sample Pam01_NoM1 in b The five sample-subclonal clusters in Pam01_NoM1 (arrows) correspond to clonal CNAs in sample Pam01_LiM1 but have different copy-number states than those in c The inferred low tumor purity (28%) of this sample results in a partial overlap of clusters that are clearly distinguished in higher purity samples in b and c e The five sample-subclonal clusters in Pam01_NoM1 (arrows) correspond to large genomic regions with values of RDR that are clearly distinct from the other sample-clonal clusters (dashed black lines) Genomic regions that are part of small clusters or have out-of-scale values are reported in gray Ranges of fractional copy numbers corresponding to the total copy numbers inferred by Control-FREEC in the previously published analysis are shown on the right y-axis labels additional analyses of RDRs and BAFs further support the subclonal CNAs identified by HATCHet (Supplementary Note 12 and Supplementary Figs We investigated whether HATCHet analysis would confirm or refute the different prevalence of WGDs reported in the previous studies a HATCHet predicts a WGD in all 31 samples from three patients (Pam02 published analysis used Control-FREEC and excluded WGDs HATCHet predicts a WGD and infers two tumor clones (ellipses in upper right of plot with corresponding proportions) with seven large tumor-clonal clusters (arrows with corresponding copy-number states) These clusters preserve their relative positions in the scaled BAF-RDR plot (each point corresponds to 50kb genomic bin) across samples and their fractional copy numbers correspond to sample-clonal clusters in each sample (dashed black lines) supporting the inference of a tumor-clonal CNA (i.e, unique copy-number state across samples) for each of these clusters Note that without a WGD three clusters (red dashed squares) would correspond to subclonal CNAs in all samples starred) are tumor-subclonal as they change their relative position across samples (Pam02_PT18 and Pam02_LiM4 vs supporting the inference of two distinct tumor clones in this patient The total copy numbers inferred by Control-FREEC in published analysis are shown on the right y-axis labels in the first scaled BAF-RDR plot a A genomic segment (cyan rectangle) harbors a somatic mutation which corresponds to either a somatic SNV or small indel Reads with variant allele (red squares) and reference allele (gray squares) are used to estimate the VAF (Top right) From T sequencing reads (gray rectangles) covering the mutation red area of posterior probability) on the VAF is obtained from a binomial model copy-number states and proportions are inferred for this genomic segment Given the numbers \({\tilde{c}}_{1},{\tilde{c}}_{2}\) of mutated copies in each of the two copy-number states the \(\overline{{\rm{VAF}}}\) of the mutation is computed as the fraction of the mutated copies weighted by the proportions of the corresponding copy-number states Assuming that an allele-specific position is mutated at most once during tumor progression (i.e. all possible values of \(\overline{{\rm{VAF}}}\) are computed according to the possible values of \({\tilde{c}}_{1}\) and \({\tilde{c}}_{2}\) A mutation is explained if at least one value of \(\overline{{\rm{VAF}}}\) is within CI b Over 10,600 mutations identified per prostate cancer patient on average HATCHet copy numbers (red) yield fewer unexplained mutations than Battenberg (blue) in all patients but A29 c Over 9,000 mutations identified per pancreas cancer patient on average HATCHet copy numbers yield fewer unexplained mutations in all patients than Control-FREEC we observed that nearly all mutations have low VAFs (Supplementary Fig consistent with low tumor purity as well as the presence of WGDs and/or higher ploidy in these samples SNVs/indels that occur after WGDs alter only one copy of the locus As lower VAFs are also observed in samples with higher purity (e.g. WGDs and high ploidy are the more likely explanation for the low VAFs consistent with HATCHet’s prediction of WGD in 3/4 patients (Supplementary Fig a CCFs of somatic SNVs and small indels in samples A10-C and A10-E of patient A10 computed from allele-specific copy numbers and proportions inferred by HATCHet (top) and Battenberg (bottom) HATCHet explains a substantial number of mutations that are unexplained by Battenberg; for example HATCHet infers a clonal CNA on chromosome 1p in A10-E and determines that the mutations at this locus (purple circle) are clonal (i.e. Battenberg infers subclonal CNAs at the same locus and determines that the same mutations are subclonal (CCF ≈ 0.3) b CCFs of somatic SNVs and small indels in samples A17-A and A17-F of patient A17 show groups of mutations that are explained by HATCHet and unexplained by Battenberg (only this subset of mutations is shown here for simplicity) HATCHet infers a clonal CNA on chromosome 8q in A17-F and suggests that mutations in that region (green circle) are clonal (CCF ≈ 1) while Battenberg infers subclonal CNAs and suggests that the same mutations are subclonal (CCF ≈ 0.5) c CCFs of somatic SNVs and small indels in samples A22-J and A22-H of patient A22 show a large group of shared mutations on chromosome 8p (cyan circle with CCF > 0 in both samples) HATCHet infers the same copy-number state (2, 0) in both samples Battenberg infers distinct copy-number states (1, 0) and (2, 0) in the two samples and suggests that the mutations are subclonal in both samples since the unexplained mutations are classified as subclonal in both samples based on Battenberg’s results these mutations are classified as clonal and are not evidence of polyclonal migration and in some cases assuming that copy numbers are the same in all tumor cells in a sample we showed the advantage of separating the two sources of ambiguity in copy-number deconvolution: ambiguity in fractional copy numbers vs ambiguity in the factorization of fractional copy numbers into integer-valued copy-number states HATCHet defers the selection of fractional copy numbers performing model selection in the natural coordinates of copy-number states and clone proportions a simulator for multi-sample tumor sequencing data that correctly accounts for different genome lengths of tumor clones and WGD we showed that HATCHet outperforms existing methods for CNA inference on simulated bulk tumor samples and produces more plausible inferences of subclonal CNAs and WGDs on two cancer datasets The increasing availability of DNA sequencing data from multiple bulk tumor samples from the same patient provides the substrate for deeper analyses of tumor evolution over time Algorithms that maximally leverage this data to quantify the genomic aberrations and their differences across samples will be essential in translating this data into actionable insights for cancer patients an algorithm to infer allele- and clone-specific CNAs and clone proportions for several tumor clones jointly across multiple bulk tumor samples We represent the accumulation of all CNAs in all clones by partitioning the L genomic positions of the reference genome into m segments with each segment s consisting of ℓs genomic positions with the same copy numbers in every clone a clone i is represented by a pair of integer vectors ai and bi whose entries indicate the number of copies of each of the two alleles for each segment we define the copy-number state (as,i, bs,i) of segment s in clone i as the pair of the two integer allele-specific copy numbers as,i and bs,i whose sum determines the total copy-number cs,i = as,i + bs,i we define clone 1 to be the normal (non-cancerous) diploid clone and thus (as,1, bs,1) = (1, 1) and cs,1 = 2 for every segment s of the normal clone We represent the allele-specific copy numbers of all clones as two m × n matrices A = [as,i] and B = [bs,i] we represent the total copy numbers of all clones as the m × n matrix C = [cs,i] = A + B the genome length \({L}_{i}=\mathop{\sum }\nolimits_{s = 1}^{m}{c}_{s,i}{\ell }_{s}\) of every tumor clone i is generally different from the genome length L1 = 2L of the normal clone We obtain DNA sequencing data from k samples of a cancer patient and we assume that each tumor sample p is a mixture of at most n clones with clone proportion ui,p indicating the fraction of cells in p that belong to clone i Note that 0 ≤ ui,p ≤ 1 and the sum of clone proportions is equal to 1 in every sample p We say that i is present in p if ui,p > 0 The tumor purity \({\mu }_{p}=\mathop{\sum }\nolimits_{i = 2}^{n}{u}_{i,p}\) of sample p is the sum of the proportions of all tumor clones present in p We represent the clone proportions as the n × k matrix U = [ui,p] We describe the details of these two modules in the next two sections The first module of HATCHet aims to infer the allele-specific fractional copy numbers FA and FB from the DNA sequencing data of k samples Further details are in Supplementary Methods 1 and 2 We introduce an approach to estimate FA and FB with rigorous and clearly-stated assumptions we assume there is a reasonable number of genomic positions in segments whose total copy number is 2 in all clones; this is generally true if a reasonable proportion of the genome is not affected by CNAs and hence diploid we assume there are two groups of segments whose total copy numbers are distinct and the same in all clones; this is also reasonable if some segments are affected only by WGD and tumor clones accumulate clonal CNAs during tumor evolution we scale the RDR rs,p of each segment s in every sample p into the fractional copy number fs,p and separate fs,p into the allele-specific fractional copy numbers \({f}_{s,p}^{A},{f}_{s,p}^{B}\) using the BAF βs,p The following theorem states that the assumptions above are sufficient for scaling RDRs to fractional copy numbers Theorem 1: The fractional copy number fs,p of each segment s in each sample p can be derived uniquely from the RDR rs,p and either (1) a diploid clonal segment \({s}^{\prime}\) with total copy number \({c}_{{s}^{\prime},i}=2\) in every clone i or (2) two clonal segments \({s}^{\prime}\) and \({z}^{\prime}\) with total copy numbers \({c}_{{s}^{\prime},i}={\omega }_{{s}^{\prime}}\) and \({c}_{{z}^{\prime},i}={\omega }_{{z}^{\prime}}\) for all tumor clones i and such that \({r}_{{s}^{\prime},p}({\omega }_{{z}^{\prime}}-2)\ne {r}_{{z}^{\prime},p}({\omega }_{{s}^{\prime}}-2)\) for all samples p this theorem states that the scaling is independent of other copy numbers in A and C as well as the clone proportions in U The second module of HATCHet aims to derive allele- and clone-specific copy numbers A, B and clone proportions U from the two values of allele-specific fractional copy numbers FA and FB that were estimated in the first module The first step of the second module is the inference of A, B, and U from each estimated value of FA and FB (Fig. 1e) Since the samples from the same patient are related by the same evolutionary process we model the fractional copy numbers jointly across the k samples such that FA = AU and FB = BU the problem that we face is to simultaneously factorize FA and FB into the corresponding allele-specific copy numbers A B and clone proportions U for some number n of clones Problem 1: (Allele-specific Copy-number Factorization (ACF) problem) Given the allele-specific fractional copy numbers FA and FB and the number n of clones find allele-specific copy numbers A = [as,i] B = [bs,i] and clone proportions U = [ui,p] such that FA = AU and FB = BU While the ACF problem is a mathematically elegant description of the copy-number deconvolution problem there are two main practical issues: first measurement errors in FA and FB may result in the ACF problem having no solution and second the ACF problem is an underdetermined problem and multiple factorizations of a given FA and FB may exist we do not solve the simultaneous factorization FA = AU and FB = BU exactly but rather minimize the distance between the estimated fractional copy numbers FA and FB and the factorizations AU and BU weighted by the corresponding size of the clusters we define the distance \(\parallel {F}^{A}-AU\parallel =\mathop{\sum }\nolimits_{s = 1}^{m}\mathop{\sum }\nolimits_{p = 1}^{k}{\ell }_{s}| {f}_{s,p}^{A}-{\sum }_{1\le i\le n}{a}_{s,i}{u}_{i,p}|\) where ℓs is the genomic length of the cluster s We also define the corresponding distance for FB Problem 2: (Distance-based Constrained Allele-specific Copy-number Factorization (D-CACF) problem) Given the allele-specific fractional copy numbers FA and FB a maximum total copy number \({c}_{\max }\) a minimum clone proportion \({u}_{\min }\) B = [bs,i] and clone proportions U = [ui,p] such that: the distance D = ∥FA − AU∥ + ∥FB − BU∥ is minimum; \({a}_{s,i}+{b}_{s,i}\le {c}_{\max }\) for every cluster s and clone i; either \({u}_{i,p}\ge {u}_{\min }\) or ui,p = 0 for every clone i and sample p; for every cluster s either as,i ≥ θ or as,i ≤ θ for all clones i; for every cluster s either bs,i ≥ θ or bs,i ≤ θ for all clones i We also derive an ILP formulation that gives exact solutions for small instances HATCHet uses one of these two algorithms to infer A, B, U from FA, FB Further details of this problem and methods are in Supplementary Method 4 perhaps increasing the sensitivity to detect small subclonal CNAs but with a danger of overfitting the data and overestimating n and the presence of subclonal CNAs; ignore the trade-off between subclonal CNAs (related to a higher number of clones) and WGD (related to a higher value of tumor ploidy) by not evaluating the presence or absence of WGD in the model selection Following the factorizations of the two values of FA and FB (corresponding to the cases of WGD and no WGD) HATCHet chooses the simplest solution that minimizes the total number n of clones across all samples Further details on the model-selection procedure are in Supplementary Method 5 HATCHet introduces an explicit model-selection criterion to select among different allele- and clone-specific copy numbers and clone proportions that explain the observed DNA sequencing data There are often multiple possible mixtures of allele-specific copy numbers that explain the measured RDRs and BAFs: for example segments with distinct values of RDR and BAF could be explained as either subclonal CNAs or clonal CNAs with high copy numbers It is difficult to distinguish these cases because the total length of the genome of each tumor clone is unknown HATCHet introduces a model-selection criterion which separates two distinct sources of this ambiguity: (1) the inference of allele-specific fractional copy numbers FA and FB which are not uniquely determined by the measured RDRs and BAFs; (2) the inference of the allele- and clone-specific copy numbers A, B and the clone proportions U HATCHet evaluates two possible values of FA, FB—corresponding to the occurrence of WGD or not—and defers the selection of a solution until after the copy-number deconvolution HATCHet performs model selection in the natural coordinates of the problem and evaluates the trade-off between inferring subclonal CNAs (and thus more clones present in a sample) or a WGD (Supplementary Fig when modeling a large number of distinct copy-number states Supplementary Table 2 lists the parameters used in HATCHet’s model-selection criterion and Supplementary Table 3 provides the default values of these parameters the expected proportion vs,i of reads in segment s that originate from clone i is equal to \({v}_{s,i}={\ell }_{s}\frac{{c}_{s,i}{u}_{i}}{\mathop{\sum }\limits_{j=1}^{n}{u}_{j}{L}_{j}}\) the fraction of the genome content from segment s belonging to the cells of clone i (Supplementary Method 1) 6c); (4) MASCoTE simulates each sample p by considering an arbitrary subset of the clones (always containing the normal clone) with random clone proportions and by mixing the corresponding reads using the read proportion \({v}_{i,p}=\frac{{u}_{i,p}{L}_{i}}{\sum _{1\le j\le n}{u}_{j,p}{L}_{j}}\) (Supplementary Fig Further details about this procedure are in Supplementary Method 6 We ran every method on the simulated samples by using the default available pipelines Details about the experimental setting of every method are described in Supplementary Note 1 Further information on research design is available in the Nature Research Reporting Summary linked to this article HATCHet is available on GitHub at https://github.com/raphael-group/hatchet. MASCoTE is available on GitHub at https://github.com/raphael-group/mascote The clonal evolution of tumor cell populations Emerging landscape of oncogenic signatures across human cancers The causes and consequences of genetic heterogeneity in cancer evolution Biological and therapeutic impact of intratumor heterogeneity in cancer evolution Pan-cancer patterns of somatic copy number alteration Absolute quantification of somatic DNA alterations in human cancer Dentro, S. C. et al. Characterizing genetic intra-tumor heterogeneity across 2,658 human cancer genomes. Preprint at https://doi.org/10.1101/312041 (2018) Genome doubling shapes the evolution and prognosis of advanced cancers Heterogeneity of genomic evolution and mutational profiles in multiple myeloma The evolutionary history of lethal metastatic prostate cancer Tracking the evolution of non–small-cell lung cancer Inferring parsimonious migration histories for metastatic cancers Allele-specific copy number analysis of tumors Allele-specific copy number profiling by next-generation DNA sequencing Sequenza: allele-specific copy number and mutation profiles from tumor sequencing data TITAN: inference of copy number architectures in clonal cell populations from tumor whole-genome sequence data FACETS: allele-specific copy number and clonal heterogeneity analysis tool for high-throughput DNA sequencing Copy-number analysis and inference of subclonal populations in cancer genomes using Sclust Control-FREEC: a tool for assessing copy number and allelic content using next-generation sequencing data THetA: inferring intra-tumor heterogeneity from high-throughput DNA sequencing data Quantifying tumor heterogeneity in whole-genome and whole-exome sequencing data in International Conference on Research in Computational Molecular Biology Phylogenetic copy-number factorization of multiple tumor samples High-definition reconstruction of clonal composition in cancer A renewed model of pancreatic cancer evolution based on genomic rearrangement patterns ReMixT: clone-specific genomic structure estimation in cancer Single-cell genome sequencing: current state of the science Intratumor heterogeneity and branched evolution revealed by multiregion sequencing Limited heterogeneity of known driver gene mutations among the metastases of individual patients with pancreatic cancer Monitoring chronic lymphocytic leukemia progression by whole genome sequencing reveals heterogeneous clonal evolution patterns PyClone: statistical inference of clonal population structure in cancer SciClone: inferring clonal architecture and tracking the spatial and temporal patterns of tumor evolution Reconstruction of clonal trees and tumor composition from multi-sample sequencing data Inferring the mutational history of a tumor using multi-state perfect phylogeny mixtures PhyloWGS: reconstructing subclonal composition and evolution from whole-genome sequencing of tumors Assessing intratumor heterogeneity and tracking longitudinal and spatial clonal evolutionary history by next-generation sequencing Scalable whole-exome sequencing of cell-free DNA reveals high concordance with metastatic tumors tHapMix: simulating tumour samples through haplotype mixtures Combining tumor genome simulation with crowdsourcing to benchmark somatic single-nucleotide-variant detection A community effort to create standards for evaluating tumor subclonal reconstruction CLImAT: accurate detection of copy number alteration and loss of heterozygosity in impure and aneuploid tumor samples using whole-genome sequencing data Copy number aberrations from Affymetrix SNP 6.0 genotyping data—how accurate are commonly used prediction approaches Chemoresistance evolution in triple-negative breast cancer delineated by single-cell sequencing Multiclonal invasion in breast tumors identified by topographic single cell sequencing Pancreatic cancer metastases harbor evidence of polyclonality Integrated genomic characterization of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma Principles of reconstructing the subclonal architecture of cancers Kleinheinz, K. et al. ACEseq-allele specific copy number estimation from whole genome sequencing. Preprint at https://doi.org/10.1101/210807 (2017) Phylogenetic quantification of intra-tumour heterogeneity in International Workshop on Algorithms in Bioinformatics Complexity and algorithms for copy-number evolution problems Calder: Inferring phylogenetic trees from longitudinal tumor samples High-resolution mapping of copy-number alterations with massively parallel sequencing Copy number variation detection in whole-genome sequencing data using the bayesian information criterion Carter, S., Meyerson, M. & Getz, G. Accurate estimation of homologue-specific DNA concentration-ratios in cancer samples allows long-range haplotyping. Preprint at https://doi.org/10.1038/npre.2011.6494.1 (2011) Correcting for cancer genome size and tumour cell content enables better estimation of copy number alterations from next-generation sequence data ART: a next-generation sequencing read simulator dbSNP: the NCBI database of genetic variation association mapping and population genetical parameter estimation from sequencing data VarScan 2: somatic mutation and copy number alteration discovery in cancer by exome sequencing Download references and David Wedge for assistance in running Battenberg on our simulated data We thank Gavin Ha for assistance in running TITAN on our simulated data This work was supported by a US National Institutes of Health (NIH) grants R01HG007069 and U24CA211000 and US National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER Award (CCF-1053753) to B.J.R implemented the algorithms and performed the analyses Peer review information Nature Communications thanks the anonymous reviewers for their contribution to the peer review of this work Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations Download citation DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-17967-y Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content: a shareable link is not currently available for this article Sign up for the Nature Briefing: Cancer newsletter — what matters in cancer research home > news > Automobiles > Delphi’s Battenberg Cleared of Fraud but Guilty of Three Other Charges The Securities and Exchange Commission’s civil complaint against Battenberg alleged that the former Delphi CEO had tried to hide the Dephi’s financial condition in order to improve its performance in the market Battenberg faced only civil, rather than criminal charges.  He nonetheless sought vindication via a jury trial but now faces a substantial fine and possibly other sanctions. He faces no jail time but could be barred from serving on the board of any publicly traded company on top of those fines.  It was a serious rebuke to an executive who was considered one of Detroit’s major corporate stars during the 1980s and 1990s. The SEC’s prosecutors hammered on the idea that Battenberg deliberately deceived outside investors about the handling of an item in the company’s financial filings in the years before Delphi filed for bankruptcy in 2005. The SEC sued Battenberg and other ex-Delphi executives in 2006, alleging they engaged in “fraudulent accounting or disclosure schemes.” Two other former Delphi executives, Milan Belans, a former director of capital planning and pension analysis; and Catherine Rozanski, a former accounting director, settled with the SEC during the trial. Belans agreed to pay $87,500 in disgorgement, interest and civil penalties, court filings show. Rozanski agreed to a $40,000 civil penalty. Battenberg’s lawyers repeatedly asserted their client never did anything wrong and said the SEC hadn’t provided evidence to support its claims. However, during the course of the trial, former Delphi financial staffers testified they were coached by senior executives on how to handle a disputed claim from General Motors. The SEC maintained Battenberg violated federal securities laws through improper accounting for a $237-million payment Delphi made to GM as part of a settlement involving warranty claims. Delphi improperly recorded a $202 million payment instead of charging it against income which would have reduced the supplier’s quarterly profit. It also would have reduced the size of executive bonuses, though the bonus payments were not part of the government’s case. The payment to GM grew out of a long-standing dispute with GM that festered for months after the automaker’s 1999 spinoff of Delphi. The supplier, at the time one of the world’s largest automotive parts manufacturers, repeatedly protested GM’s claims but found it was steadily losing business from GM as the dispute dragged on, Battenberg said, when he took the stand in his own defense last autumn. Delphi’s financial problems eventually drove the company to file for Chapter 11 reorganization.  It only emerged from bankruptcy a year ago, the longest corporate trip through the courts in U.S. history. Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked * Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Other royal families in Europe - all inter-related thanks to Queen Victoria's propensity for marrying her children to other royals - including Spain, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway considered offering the Romanovs asylum, but none did. She was analysed by Freud, exiled to a sanatorium, and named a war-time hero – no wonder Princess Alice of Battenberg's life made it into The Crown. Tatler looks back on a biography both tragic and triumphant Following their murder, speculation mounted that one of the daughters, Anastasia, had survived. Many pretenders tried to con their way into the Tsar's relatives hearts following the war, many of who had escaped to other European cities. The most famous, Anna Anderson, was proved to be a fraud in 1991, when Prince Philip, who was related to both the Tsar and Tsarina, gave his DNA to be compared to hers. SUPPORT OUR JOURNALISM: Please consider donating to keep our website running and free for all - thank you The late Duke of Edinburgh was an anchor of support for Queen Elizabeth II throughout her entire reign Although many considered him an outsider when the couple married Princess Alice of Battenberg was born on 25 February at Windsor Castle.  Princess Alice was born to Prince Louis Alexander of Battenberg and Princess Victoria of Hesse and By Rhine in 1885 at Windsor Castle She was a great-granddaughter of Queen Victoria; Alice’s mother Victoria was the daughter of Princess Alice the third child of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert.  Alice spent her childhood across many different countries she was diagnosed with congenital deafness Alice learned to lip-read and speak in both English and German and would go on to learn both French and Greek.  The Princess met Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark in 1902 and they were married in 1903 The couple had five children: Princess Margarita in 1905 The family of six was forced into exile in 1917 when King Constantine of Greece abdicated.  She claimed that she had direct communication with both Christ and Buddha She was diagnosed with schizophrenia and would spend two years in a sanatorium.  Alice lived in Athens and helped organise soup kitchens for those in need She also sheltered a Jewish family during the war she was named a British Hero of the Holocaust Princess Alice founded the Christian Sisterhood of Martha and Mary she moved into Buckingham Palace at the invitation of Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip She lived there until her death in 1969.  opposite the eastern wall of the old city of Jerusalem lies the grave of one of the most eccentric – if sometimes overlooked – British royals Princess Alice, Prince Philip’s mother and also a great-granddaughter of Queen Victoria she lived a life of regal glamour – married to a Greek prince – but also extreme frugality and spent two years at a Swiss asylum after a schizophrenia diagnosis the “Princess of Battenberg” established an order of nuns giving away all her possessions before dying on 5 December 1969 The 50th anniversary of that date will come on Thursday amid a resurgence in interest thanks to Netflix’s The Crown. In the third series the royal is seen during her final years as a chain-smoking nun seeking funds for the poor for which she is lovingly remembered in Israel and among many Jewish people Princess Alice sheltered the persecuted Cohen family from the Nazis and their sympathisers who had known the late patriarch of the Cohen family told close friends that the family were simply in need and not “to send a word to anyone about it” “She would often come up to my grandmother’s and my aunt’s small room As was common for the turn-of-the-century elite, Alice and her five children were related to many European royal families. While her son, the future Prince Philip she also had daughters married to men fighting for the German side At one point her daughters and their SS officer husbands visited her Athens home pretending not to comprehend their questioning and claiming that a nanny lived upstairs had managed to escape with his brothers across the Aegean Sea to Turkey and then Egypt to join the Greek resistance One brother did not make the journey and returned to Athens to hide with his family Alfred Cohen started the process of having her honoured by the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem which bestows the “Righteous Among the Nations” award to non-Jews who saved Jews during the Holocaust private capacity to skirt around the political sensitivities He said at the time that his mother had not mentioned the Cohens “I suspect that it never occurred to her that her action was in any way special She would have considered it to be a perfectly natural human reaction to fellow beings in distress.” “she said sharply that she had only done what she believed to be her duty” a Holocaust historian and the director of the Righteous Among the Nations department said it was important to remember that rescuers were rare in a 1940s Europe filled with antisemitism and indifference “Rescue in general was unfortunately and tragically a rather marginal phenomenon,” he said “You can also talk about indifference to the state of Jews even active collaboration of various elements and sectors in local society with Nazi Germany.” Jane Lapotaire as Princess Alice in The Crown Photograph: NetflixAnd the princess’s status would not have necessarily afforded her protection “There is definitely a sense of risk involved here I don’t think you can belittle that,” Zisenwine said Only in June last year did a British royal finally make an official visit to Israel and Palestine Prince William visited the crypt of his great-grandmother at the gold-domed Russian Orthodox church who met the prince alongside her cousin’s son Evy Cohen lives in France and works as an artist and has made a sculpture of a book forged from glass Asked whether many others in the family had watched the show This is the archive of The Observer up until 21/04/2025 The Observer is now owned and operated by Tortoise Media The Sunday TimesIt is the sort of cake for which The Great British Bake Off judge Prue Leith would reserve her favourite question: “Is it worth the calories?” The cake has been declared a threat to public health by nutrition scientists who found it has the highest sugar content of any such confection They compared the sugar content in 381 cakes of 29 types all bought in the UK’s nine leading supermarkets such as Waitrose All the cakes were laden with sugar — but none could rival the Battenberg .st1{fill-rule:evenodd;clip-rule:evenodd;fill:#2a2a2a}By The Associated PressThe Associated PressDelphi was spun off by General Motors in 1999 and emerged from bankruptcy in 2009.DETROIT -- The former chief executive of Delphi Corp was cleared Thursday of the most serious charges in a civil trial tied to allegations of financial fraud at the auto-parts maker in 2000 Battenberg III liable on three of the seven charges relating to how Delphi accounted for a $237 million transaction involving warranty costs with its former parent He and former Delphi accountant Paul Free were cleared of fraud but found responsible for bookkeeping errors and misrepresentations to accountants Free was found liable on several charges regarding other transactions at the company The lawsuit was filed by the Securities and Exchange Commission "The finding of no fraud is extremely gratifying," Battenberg Free and his lawyer could not immediately be reached SEC trial attorney Gregory Miller issued a brief statement The verdicts "send a clear message that filing false public statements and misleading investors will not be tolerated," Miller said The jury heard nearly 30 days of testimony beginning in October The SEC filed a lawsuit against Delphi and its executives in 2006 alleging that the company manipulated its earnings through several schemes from 2000 to 2004 including the concealment of the GM transaction although "we're disappointed that they found he violated anything." District Judge Avern Cohn to consider the evidence and overrule the jury's findings of liability Free and Battenberg likely face financial penalties pension analyst Milan Belans and financial accounting director Catherine Rozanski settled with the SEC in the middle of trial former chief financial officer Alan Dawes agreed to pay $687,000 in fines and restitution Delphi was not penalized because of its cooperation with investigators Use of and/or registration on any portion of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement, (updated 8/1/2024) and acknowledgement of our Privacy Policy, and Your Privacy Choices and Rights (updated 1/1/2025) © 2025 Advance Local Media LLC. 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