Emperor of Mexico Maximilian

Raised in the Habsburg court, Maximilian was born in Vienna on July 6, 1832, and built an early career in the Austrian navy before politics pulled him in a very different direction. In 1864, with backing from Napoleon III of France and Mexican conservatives, he accepted the crown of the Second Mexican Empire and arrived in Mexico with his wife, Carlota.

His rule was full of contradictions. Though he was placed on the throne by conservative forces, he often showed liberal instincts, supporting some reforms and trying to broaden support beyond the faction that had invited him. But the empire depended heavily on French military power, and once that support was withdrawn, Maximilian was left exposed in a country still deeply divided and firmly opposed by the republican forces of Benito Juárez.

Captured after the siege of Querétaro, he was executed by firing squad on June 19, 1867. His short reign has remained one of the most striking episodes in Mexican and European history: an idealistic but ill-fated attempt to build a monarchy in a nation that was already fighting to define itself on very different terms.