Ketschendorf Castle

The origins of Ketschendorf date back about 900 years, when it was an unprotected village outside Coburg. It suffered from Hussite incursions (1430) and the Peasants' War (1525), as well as two outbreaks of the plague (1567, 1626). In 1632, Wallenstein took up quarters here during the siege of Veste Coburg, and just two years later, the village was destroyed by imperial troops. Economic recovery only began in 1804 with the construction of an Empire-style summer palace by Duchess Auguste, wife of Franz Friedrich Anton of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. After her death in 1831, it became the widow's residence of Marie of Württemberg, the second wife of Ernst I. Duke Ernst II sold the property in 1868 to the French opera singer Victorine Noël, known as Rosine Stoltz, who was ennobled in 1865. She had the original palace demolished in 1868 and replaced it with the current Neo-Gothic building by Georg Konrad Rothbart, completed in 1869.