Magdolna Vilma Benedikta Purgly de Jószáshely (10 June 1881 – 8 January 1959) was the wife of Admiral Miklós Horthy. Early life She was born as the youngest daughter of Hungarian nobleman Janos Purgly de Jószáshelyi (1839-1911) and his wife Ilona Vásárhelyi de Kézdivásárhely (1841-1896). She was confined to talking with suitors until she was an adult by her parents. She met a fellow nobleman Miklós Horthy, who was 13 years her senior, when accompanying his brother-in-law who was a friend of her family. Horthy's military background and many experiences attracted Magdolna. The attraction was mutual. They were married on 22 July 1901 at Arad, her family's estate of Hejobába being not far away. Miklós and Magdolna spent their honeymoon in Semmering, Austria. After this, Mrs. Horthy lived the life of an officer's wife, accompanying her husband to his official stations. Between 1901 and 1908, Horthy was stationed in Pola, where they built a new home, and where their children were born: Magdolna (1902), Paula (1903), István (1904) and Miklós (1907). In 1903 Horthy was given the command of the new battleship SMS Habsburg, then the flagship of the Empire's Mediterranean Squadron. He was able to take his wife and daughter on the warship's courtesy cruise to Smyrna, in Turkey. Afterwards, he was in command of SMS Lacroma, the naval yacht of Commander of the Fleet Admiral Count Rudolf Montecuccoli (1843-1822) and then became Captain of SMS Taurus, the Embassy yacht in Constantinople, arriving there to take up his post on 8 June 1908. He was subsequently presented by the Austro-Hungarian Ambassador to the Ottoman Emperor, Sultan Abdul Hamid II (1842-1918). The family resided there, for a year, in a villa at Yenikeul on the banks of the Bosporus. In 1909 Horthy was appointed naval Aide-de-Camp to the Emperor Franz Josef I at the Court in Vienna, for five years, where Horthy and his wife and children had an official apartment in the Hofburg. World War I Magdolna Horthy and her children spent the years of The Great War back in Pola and as a result met with her husband rarely. By later 1918, it was clear that the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy could lose the war. Magdolna gleaned information about Horthy's appointment as rear-admiral only from mutual acquaintances. At the end of October 1918 Horthy, Magdolna and the four children were forced to leave Pola since it had been ceded by