High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Maximilian was born in Baden-Baden. He received his first name from his late maternal grandfather, Maximilian Jevgenevich de Beauharnais, 3rd Duke of Leuchtenberg. Max's mother was from Russia, princess Maria Maximilianovna of Leuchtenberg, herself a niece of Tsar Alexander II. He bore a striking resemblance to his first cousin twice removed Emperor Napoleon III. Noted as a liberal before and during the First World War, he was appointed Chancellor of Germany in October 1918 in order to negotiate an armistice with the allies in the last days of the war. Although he had serious reservations about the way the German General Staff wanted to conduct negotiations, he accepted the charge, and appointed a government that for the first time included representatives of the Social Democrats, Friedrich Ebert and Philipp Scheidemann.