At George V’s death in January 1936, Queen Maud of Norway became the last surviving child of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra. Having just lost her sister, Toria, six weeks before, George’s death made those last weeks of 1935 and early weeks of 1936 especially trying. Maud attended her brother’s funeral heavily draped in a black veil and dress.
Like Queen Marie of Romania, Maud of Norway had been charmed by George’s successor, Edward VIII. Also like Marie, Maud was taken aback by David’s unexpected abdication. He had always been a favorite; she found in her carefree nephew something of the same irrepressible high spirits that she herself possessed. Maud never accepted Wallis Simpson and told her sister-in-law, Mary, just what she really thought of Wallis: “It makes me quite low to think of him banished out there and that he has given up everything of his own free will all on account of one bad woman who has hypnotized him—I hear that every English and French person gets up at Monte Carlo whenever she comes in to a place. Hope she will feel it.”50 To Maud and Marie, there was nothing “romantic” about David and Carol’s affairs with what they viewed as fast and loose women. In both Maud’s and Marie’s eyes, these women brought nothing but shame to their royal paramours.
Maud was in London again for another spectacular event: the coronation of her other nephew, George VI, and his wife, Queen Elizabeth. Dressed in a simple gold gown with an ermine-lined purple robe about her shoulders and a diamond tiara, the Queen of Norway watched intently as the couple was crowned. Maud was well disposed toward the new monarchs, whose family life and concept of monarchy were so grounded on tradition: “Thank goodness dear Bertie and Elizabeth are so devoted to each other, and great help to each other, and they are so popular, and so are the darling little children”51
Maud had also never forgotten her Russian cousins who suffered so much during the Russian Revolution. Her first cousin, the Grand Duchess Xenia (Tsarina Alexandra’s sister-in-law), was one of the fortunate ones who escaped from Russia. Xenia settled in England with her family and was never far from Maud’s thoughts. In an undated reply to an Easter greeting from Xenia, Maud wrote:
Beloved Xenia. My thoughts so constantly with you…God bless you.…Heaps of love fr. yr. loving Harry.52
And another undated card:
Darling Xenia,
Glad we met.…Here frightfully cold & I feel it & have aches.…Dreadful about dear Sophie, & Mossy miserable. I miss darling Louise.
Ever yr. devoted Maud.53
This second message to Xenia was most likely written during the Christmas season of 1931. Maud’s mention of Mossy’s misery seems to allude to Queen Sophie’s illness. The reference to missing “darling Louise” most likely alludes to the fact that Princess Louise, Maud’s eldest sister, was no longer alive.
Queen Maud set out for England as usual for a prolonged stay in October 1938. In November, she felt unwell and checked into a nursing home. An X ray prompted doctors to operate on an abdominal obstruction. King Haakon made his way to London to be by his wife’s side. Queen Mary, who had always found Maud to be her favorite sister-in-law, sat with the Queen of Norway before her operation. Afterwards, Maud appeared to be recovering. But she died suddenly in the middle of the night of a heart attack on 20 November, attended only by a nurse. Maud was just shy of her sixty-ninth birthday.
A grieving King Haakon issued a message that was read out in the Norwegian Church at Rotherhithe in London: “God has taken the Queen from me this night and it is a heavy loss for me to bear, though I well understand it is His will. He has taken her because her work on earth is finished, and He has, I know, spared her thus much suffering.”54 Back in Norway, the prime minister, Johann Nygaardsvold, announced:
We who had been more closely connected with the royal family knew what a warm, generous personality she was. The government and myself personally had learned to appreciate her burning interest for the Norwegian people and Norway.
We all share the sorrow of the royal family. I know that the whole Norwegian nation also feels the Queen’s death as a great loss.55
The tributes in England were equally heartfelt. In the House of Lords, Lord Snell said: “People treasured her friendships and her life was rich both in service and in example.” And from Lord Gainsford: “She was a person who was extraordinarily fond of the country of her birth.
Queen Maud’s body was taken to lie in state at the chapel in Marlborough House and then placed on board the battleship HMS Royal Oak for the journey back to Norway. Though she had expressed a desire to be buried in England, as Queen of Norway, it was only natural that Maud should be laid to rest in the country of which she had been queen. Her body lay in state at the medieval fort and castle of Akershus, where she was laid to rest.
That first Christmas without his wife was a somber one for King Haakon. The void left in his life was difficult to overcome. Haakon was grateful for the company of his grandchildren, who helped keep him from dwelling too much on his grief. In January 1939, he wrote to Grand Duchess Xenia, in reply to her message of sympathy on the death of his wife: “You can imagine what it meant to me, when we all got Xmas presents from darling Maud.” Haakon added that he was grateful to have taken the opportunity to stay with Olav and Martha, for it would have been difficult to be by himself at Christmas. Haakon also told Xenia how hard it was to reconcile himself to the fact that “darling Maud who was always full of life” had died. Then, he mentioned something surprising: “I found the enclosed money in Maud’s safe and I divided it between you and Olga [Xenia’s sister] guessing that she at times helped you in one way or another, so don’t thank me for it, but thank Maud as I feel I am only carrying out her wish by passing on to you two…Olga will get hers when I get a chance of sending it in a safe way. “57
Even in death, Maud’s kindness and generosity toward her Romanov cousins, the sisters of the late Tsar Nicholas II, was evident. In a fitting act of remembrance, King Haakon distributed the money Maud had been keeping for the Grand Duchesses Xenia and Olga; and in keeping with his own modest manner, Haakon asked that if thanks needed to be expressed, they must certainly be directed not at him but at Maud.
In death, Queens Maud, Sophie, and Marie were spared the horrors of having to live through the World War II. Unlike her four cousins, Queen Victoria Eugenie was to live much longer. Only Ena survived to see the conflagration that engulfed the world for six long years. Though exiled from Spain, she would never escape Spanish politics completely. They were to encroach upon her world as she watched a conflict over the Spanish monarchy erupt, pitting her son, the Infante Don Juan, against Spain’s Generalissimo Francisco Franco in a duel that would last for years. The question was, would Queen Ena be content to sit on the sidelines? And would she live long enough to see the outcome?
Thirty
FROM EXILE TO “VIVA LA REINA!”
QUEEN ENA S SEPARATION FROM KING ALFONSO MEANT THAT SHE had to try to carve a life for herself independently from her husband, who led a peripatetic life, traveling frequently, partly to alleviate boredom, partly to stay away from his wife. Increasingly, Alfonso found himself gravitating toward Rome. Ena, meanwhile, was drawn to England. As her children grew older, Ena naturally followed their marital prospects. Alfonsito was the first to marry. Back in 1918, Ena had written to Queen Mary of her eldest son: “I think you would approve of him as he looks absolutely English & English characteristics come out in him more & more.”1 But in time, Alfonsito ended up being far more of a hot-blooded Bourbon like his father than a cool-headed Briton like his mother.
Alfonsito fell in love with a Cuban commoner, Edelmira Sampedro-Ocejo y Robato. The prince went against his father’s wishes and married, renouncing his claim to the throne and becoming the Count of Covadonga. Ena had asked her husband to show his support by going to their son’s wedding ceremony: “Alfonso is our eldest child and you should attend his wedding.” Alfonso ignored his wife’s plea, saying, “Ena, I have lost this son forever.”2
Victoria Eugenie’s other hemo
philiac son, Gonzalo, was less hampered by his chronic illness than Alfonsito, and appeared headed for a promising life, enrolling at the University of Louvain in Belgium to study engineering. But tragedy struck in the summer of 1934, when Gonzalo died after a minor car accident. Ena rushed to her son’s side, but arrived too late, only to embrace her dead son’s body. She and King Alfonso watched disconsolately as they buried their son in the village cemetery. After the funeral, they went their separate ways.
In London, Ena found an elegant home to use as a base at 34 Porchester Terrace, just north of Bayswater Road, not far from Hyde Park. This afforded her the opportunity of being near her aged mother, Princess Beatrice, at Kensington Palace. When she was in London, Ena maintained a close friendship with the British royal family. Queen Mary and King George V counted her as a favorite among their many relatives. In late 1934, Ena faced a dilemma when she realized she might have to pay all the expenses of shipping her belongings from her palace in Santander. Ena said “she would prefer to do without the things.” But George V ordered his private secretary to continue with efforts “on her behalf,” saying that he “would himself pay the expenses.”3
Sometime after she and Alfonso were separated, Ena approached Sir Esme Howard, who had been British ambassador to Madrid, to obtain help in settling the separation. As a well-known English convert to Catholicism, whose wife was a prominent Italian, Howard appeared to be an ideal intermediary. Since Alfonso was proving uncooperative, Ena thought she might seek the help of Cardinal Pacelli. The Howards drafted a letter in Italian on Ena’s behalf to the cardinal, which stated:
H[er] M[ajesty] spoke with pain and sadness about her private relations with King Alphonso. In fact, from the time we were at the British Embassy in Madrid, from 1920 to 24—there was open talk of the abandonment of the Queen by the King.…She told us that it has been fifteen years since the King left her.…It is our duty to add that having spent about five years at the British Embassy in Madrid, having been very close to many Spaniards we heard nothing but eulogies concerning the private life of Queen Vittoria in abandoned, very difficult and painful circumstances.
While the monarchy was still in Spain, HM told us, that she endured it all in order not to make the position of the King and of his sons more difficult, however now that the political rationale was not there, and the King…had openly demonstrated his indifference to her…the Queen in order to maintain the dignity due to her requests that she live separately with an amiable agreement between the two parties that guarantees her peace and independence.4
They added that “we have dared to report all of this…in the hope that” the Pope might take an interest “in the sad situation” and influence King Alfonso to “regularize in an amicable manner the separation ‘de jure’ that which already exists ‘de facto.’ “5
In thanking Lord Howard for writing the draft letter, Ena said she found it “perfect.” She did, however, wish Lord Howard to add two points. The first was “that my children are being bribed by Alfonso to remain with him & threatened to be left without maintenance if they came to me.” The second was “that the Duke & Duchess of Lecera have nothing to do whatever in my demand for a separation & that with or without them I shall never go back to my husband. Already in Madrid on the day of the revolution I said to the Duke of Miranda, that I would separate rather than to put up in exile with what I had gone through during the monarchy”6 Ena had obviously endured much pain in her marriage and had put loyalty to Spain, the monarchy, and her family before her own interests for some time.
Two family marriages took place in 1935. Ena’s son, the Infante Jaime—who had renounced his rights and those of his heirs not long after his eldest brother’s wedding—married, as did the Infante Juan.
In July 1936, hostilities broke out and what became the Spanish Civil War began. The Nationalists, under the military leadership of General Franco, revolted against the Spanish government, known as the Republicans. For decades, Spanish society had been torn by rising enmity between factions determined to uphold traditional views and institutions versus those who viewed the old guard traditionalists as oppressive influences. Often seen as a kind of dress rehearsal for World War II, the Spanish Civil War attracted support for both sides from abroad. Many flocked to Spain to fight on either side. Hitler’s Germany and Mussolini’s Italy lent a hand to Franco’s side, while an assortment of left-leaning individuals, organizations, and countries sided with the Republicans. In three brutal years, which saw mass executions and atrocities committed by both sides, some 400,000 people were killed. By the time the war ended in 1939, Franco was victorious. He became Spain’s leader until his death in 1975. Even the Spanish royal family was touched by the tragedy of the Spanish Civil War when Ali and Beatrice’s son, Alonzo, was killed—his airplane shot down.
During her years in exile, Queen Ena never completely lost faith that the monarchy would someday be restored in Spain, though she believed that Juan would take on the mantle of king. When Ena went to visit her ailing son Alfon-sito in New York City, who was suffering a hemophilia attack and recuperating at the Presbyterian Hospital, Ena expressed her views through her spokesman, the Count of Mora. Mora spoke to reporters as Ena boarded the Queen Mary for her journey back to England. Asked if Ena thought that she might get back the throne, the count replied: “No, it is expected that the Duchess of Toledo [Ena] would not return, but that Prince Juan, who is now heir to King Alfonso, would become King of Spain.”7
In April 1938, when it appeared the Nationalists were getting the upper hand in Spain, concerns arose over security at Queen Victoria Eugenie’s home in London. King George VI’s private secretary wrote a confidential letter to New Scotland Yard:
The King thinks that at this moment when feeling is naturally running very high over the Civil War in Spain, it would not be very wise to remove all police protection from Queen Ena. If Franco does succeed as looks inevitable now, he might quite easily restore the Monarchy in the person of the third son of the Queen of Spain and Her Majesty might thus be still further involved.8
Evidently restoration of the Spanish monarchy was a real possibility in George VI’s mind and Ena’s third son, Juan, was increasingly seen as the next King of Spain. The birth in 1938 of Ena’s grandson Juan Carlos to Infante Juan meant the continuation of the Bourbon dynasty. Ena and Alfonso were briefly reunited when they appeared together at Juan Carlos’s baptism. Looking the height of fashion in her fur-edged ensemble and a fine set of pearls, Ena stood as godmother to the baby, who was baptized by Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli (soon to become Pope Pius XII). Within eight months of the baptism, a new tragedy struck. Alfonsito died after crashing his car in Miami. Alfonsito’s marriage with Edelmira had ended in divorce in 1937. He then married another Cuban woman, but that marriage was dissolved after six months. Alfonsito was considering a third marriage with a nightclub girl when he died. Just as King Alexander of Greece had called for his mother before he died, the Count of Covandonga on his deathbed asked for Queen Ena. Sadly, like Sophie before her, Ena never saw her son alive. By the time she arrived in Miami, it was too late. “My dear son’s tragic death is a terrible blow,” wrote Victoria Eugenie, “& all the sad circumstances make my grief all the harder to bear.”9
As the 1930s came to an end, Ena became preoccupied with Alfonso’s deteriorating health. She lived for a time in Rome in order to be near her husband, though the couple were still separated. In January 1941, a critically ill Alfonso renounced his right to the throne in favor of his third son, Juan. When, in February 1941, it became evident that King Alfonso was dying, Ena and their children went to him. Alfonso may have tried to keep Ena at bay since they separated in 1931, but this time, he agreed to her coming. The family kept vigil at the Grand Hotel in a room next to the king’s. Alfonso’s death throes were prolonged as he suffered multiple heart attacks, but he faced his torment bravely.
As death drew closer, Alfonso was given the last rites by his Jesuit confessor. When the priest ended the pra
yers commending Alfonso’s soul to God, the dying king answered resoundingly, “Amen!” Ena and the children, fighting back tears, fell to their knees and kissed Alfonso’s hand in a gesture of love and farewell. The king lingered a few days longer, slowly asphixiating, but as dawn broke in the Eternal City on 28 February, he was ready to let go of his earthly life. At one point he managed to murmur: “My God! My God!” And to his wife, sobbing by his side, he muttered: “It is over, Ena!”10 When the priest presented Alfonso with a crucifix, he kissed it, whispering the word “España.” Shortly afterwards, Alfonso XIII of Spain died. Ena, on her knees, cried for the man who had been her husband for forty-four tumultuous years. Alfonso was buried in the Eternal City.
Within a year of his death, Ena was forced to move again, since members of Mussolini’s government implied that as a British princess, the queen was capable of spying. To which a miffed Ena retorted: “I am not a Mata Hari.”11 There was also the issue of money. According to a “secret” despatch from the British Embassy in Madrid to the Foreign Office in London, “it might be necessary for the Queen to leave Italy…because her income which was in sterling and dollars was inaccessible in Italy”12 Ena chose to live in Lausanne, Switzerland, in 1942, at the Hotel Royal.
The queen next visited an England at war in 1944 to be with her dying mother. Princess Beatrice’s funeral was held at St. George’s Chapel, Windsor. In reply to one sympathy letter, the queen expressed her feelings: “You can imagine how sad & broken I feel at losing that best & dearest of mothers & she leaves such a great blank in my life.”13 Ena’s hemophiliac brother, Leopold, had died in 1922, leaving only her brother, Drino, as her closest relative in England.
Born to Rule: Five Reigning Consorts, Granddaughters of Queen Victoria Page 51