Petra Schürmann was the only German to have won the Miss World title. Interestingly, Petra did not even win the Miss Germany pageant, and was in fact placed third. She was chosen to represent at the pageant because of her better knowledge of English. The beauty queen had a tragic life. Petra’s daughter, Alexandra Freund, died at the age of 34 in an accident. Petra could not recover from the loss of her daughter as she was really close to her. Her husband passed away in August 2008. Following a long illness, Petra died on 14 January 2010.