Sophia: Princess, Suffragette, Revolutionary

by Anand, Anita

  Tsar Alexander III was not interested in the Maharajah, and refused even to grant him an audience. Duleep was forced to wait for almost a year for an imperial invitation which never came. Such was the maelstrom of surveillance around him that he slept every night with a loaded revolver under his pillow. Duleep and Ada were stuck for months in the down-at-heel Billoi Bolshoi boarding house, a draughty and inhospitable hole situated close to the neoclassical grandeur of the Bolshoi Theatre. It was all the Maharajah could afford, having been robbed on the journey between France and Russia. Suspecting that Queen Victoria’s spies had taken his belongings to thwart his mission, his resulting financial hardship gave him yet another reason to hate the British.

  On Boxing Day 1887, in the bleak misery of the Billoi, Sophia’s half-sister was born. Duleep’s illegitimate daughter entered the world only three months after his former wife, Bamba, had left it. Her life seemed blanketed in destitution and frustration from the start. The Russian winter dragged on interminably and even though Duleep was living more modestly than ever before, his meagre cash reserves were running out. The Maharajah took so little interest in his newborn daughter that he left Ada to select her name. There was nothing regal about the resulting ‘Pauline’, but then, this child was not destined to live the life of a princess.

  Her parents scraped together money for food and rent, relying on mysterious political connections to get them from day to day. They drank to while away the long hours of darkness, unable to visit the ballet and the great restaurants that surrounded them, and resenting the baby and each other for it. Despite Duleep’s preoccupations, he did at least manage to give the infant her middle name. Perhaps Pauline Alexandrina was so christened in an attempt to flatter Tsar Alexander and get him to change his mind about meeting. Or it might have been a nostalgic nod to his old benefactor, Queen Victoria.

  Less than two years later, a second daughter, Princess Ada Irene Helen Beryl Duleep Singh, entered the world in a different country but in similarly bleak circumstances. The names chosen for her came entirely from the streets of Lambeth, showing just how much Duleep had disengaged from his new family as well as his old. Irene, as she became known, was born on 25 October 1889 in Paris, after Duleep had amassed enough funds, largely borrowed from friends, to get out of Moscow. He had finally been forced to accept that Russian help would never be forthcoming and it left him bitter and angry. Although there may have been little joy at her arrival, Irene’s birth at least was legitimate. Duleep had chosen to marry Ada soon after arriving back in France. With Maharani Bamba dead, there was nothing to stop the union. Ada was keen on the status and recognition that came with being a queen, albeit a penniless one.

  The family moved from boarding house to boarding house, attempting to keep one step ahead of their creditors. The stress of living that way often drove Duleep and Ada into alcohol-fuelled rages. While they fought with one another and blamed the world for their hardships, the girls were forced to grow up without roots, playmates or competent parents. Quiet, introverted and fearful, in their father they saw only an old tottering drunk who barely noticed them and a mother who seemed more interested in escape than giving them care. The girls shuttled between their parents like unwanted packages.

  Ada was struggling in her own way too. She could neither bear her financial situation, nor her depressed and needy husband. Instead she chose to feign the life of a Parisian socialite, running up bills that could never be settled and attending parties where she was always the subject of gossip. Duleep stayed in his half-lit rented accommodation while Ada whirled around town without him.

  In 1890, when Irene was just a few months old, Ada decided she could tolerate Duleep no longer. Gathering up her children and most of her belongings, Ada moved out to the western outskirts of Paris. There she set up home with a new and mysterious female friend, Madame Parraton, whom London spies concluded must be a Russian agent sent by the Tsar. Ada, her children and Mme Parraton moved into an expensive villa situated in Le Vesinet, an exclusive tree-lined suburb of Paris. It was left to the Maharajah to pay for both his accommodation and Ada’s new address, despite having the reserves for neither. Hunted by creditors, he was forced to sell what remained of his ancestral jewels.

  Angry and lonely, the Maharajah was often seen out, drunk and insensible by lunchtime. It was only a matter of time before Duleep’s body began to fail. Having had to move his lodgings again, he was now living in a small attic room in the Grand Hotel at the heart of Paris. On the morning of 13 July, as he roused himself to face yet another miserable day, Duleep suffered a stroke. Alone, he had no idea what was happening to him and in terror managed to stagger out into the Boulevard des Capucines, gesticulating wildly to passersby. When nobody came to his aid, he managed to hail a cab and slur directions to his doctor’s house. Finding him out for the morning, he panicked and begged the driver to find another physician, ‘so then drove about Paris in search of another – all this motion, aggravated the attack’.18

  The second doctor confirmed Duleep’s fears. He had suffered a massive stroke, paralysing his left side and leaving his functioning right arm to tremble uncontrollably. He could barely speak and could not walk more than a few steps unaided. Even the British government’s spies began to feel sorry for him, and sent back reports filled with his frailty. ‘He’s on his last legs,’ commented one, and it seemed the Maharajah knew it too.

  Faced with his own mortality, Duleep was frightened, exhausted, and desperate to live out the rest of his days in some semblance of peace. Encouraged by his eldest son Victor, Duleep made the first of several furtive approaches to Queen Victoria’s officials. He wanted to come home and he wanted her forgiveness. Letters shuttled between Victor, his brother Frederick, the Palace and the India Office, negotiating the terms of his supplication. If such a pardon were to be granted the Crown wanted nothing short of full and unconditional obedience from the Maharajah. Duleep agreed to all their conditions. After nearly two decades of defiance and crushing failure, he felt that God himself had turned his back on him. Summoning Victor, he told him to write what would be one of the most painful letters of his life:

  May it please your Majesty, my son Victor is writing this letter from my dictation – I have been struck down by the hand of God and am in consequence quite unable to write myself – I have been disappointed in everyone in whom I have been led to believe and now my one desire is to die at peace with all men – I therefore pray Your Majesty to pardon me for all that I have done against You and Your government, and I throw myself entirely on your clemency.

  It seems to me that it is the will of God that I should suffer injustice at the hands of Your people. I can find no one to curse Great Britain and in spite of all her faults and her injustices God blesses her and makes her great and when I look at her, I feel that in fighting against Your country I have been fighting against God – I would return to England, were I assured of your free pardon. I am your Majesty’s obedient servant.19

  Duleep’s once bold signature was reduced to a spidery, tentative scrawl across the bottom of the letter. This and Victor’s subsequent petitions were considered for some months at the highest levels of government before the Queen became involved in the matter. Between the Palace, the India Office and Westminster it was decided that only a complete and public capitulation would facilitate Duleep’s return to England. He would have to state his loyalty to Britain and repudiate any plans to unseat the Raj. He would also have to apologise without reservation to the Queen Empress and pledge his loyalty to her for as long as he lived. He agreed to all of the above and told his son he was longing to see her Majesty so that he might make an account of himself to her face.

  While he was waiting to hear whether Victoria would see him, in August 1890, Duleep suffered a further stroke. Victor now pleaded with the British government to allow the Maharajah to come immediately to England, for at least a short spell of convalescence; the sea air might revive him, and his children could look after him. Permission w
as granted and the British watched carefully to see how this dress rehearsal for his (permanent) return might run.

  Victor rented a house at 6 Clifton Gardens in Folkestone for the Maharajah, who arrived with his second family, Ada and their two daughters, in tow. Ada, it seemed, had grown tired of her fugitive life in Paris and was more than a little frightened of the domineering Mme Parraton. She too was ready to come home. Alarmed at the extent of their father’s decrepitude, Victor and Freddie also moved in and engaged a nurse for Duleep’s care. After a week or so, with some trepidation, Arthur Oliphant allowed Edward and Sophia to visit their father. It was the first time they had met their stepmother and little sisters, and Arthur did not record their reaction in his letters to the Palace. However he did note sadly that there was no room for Sophia and Edward in the house, forcing them to stay at a nearby hotel with their nanny.

  Bamba and Catherine were away in Germany with Lina Schaeffer when their father arrived in Folkestone and it was decided that they should not be called back early for Duleep’s sake. Instead, they would be allowed to see their father only when they returned to England in September, on their way back to Oxford. The prospect of even a brief meeting between Duleep and his elder daughters was causing concern in some quarters. Lord Cross, the Secretary of State for India, feared corruption. ‘I do not want these young ladies to go to D. Singh,’ he wrote to the Palace. ‘They are much better off at Oxford. At the same time if their father insists upon it, I am not sure that we can prevent it.’ The Queen noted in the margin of his letter ‘Think we cd urge strongly agst it.’20

  In the end, the Maharajah only stayed in Folkestone for less than two months. He longed for warmer climes, and in late September left for the spa town of Aix-la-Chapelle in North Rhine-Westphalia. The Romans had believed that the hot sulphurous waters possessed miraculous healing powers, and for centuries invalids had gone to the town in the hope of curing rheumatism, gout and scrofulous disorders.

  Palace and government officials were satisfied: Duleep Singh was not the rebel king he once was, and the damage he might do to his children could be contained. They now set out to arrange the final part of his penitence, a reunion with Queen Victoria herself. The date was set for 31 March 1891, when Victoria would be holidaying in Grasse on the French Riviera. The Maharajah would be brought to her in order to apologise personally.

  Queen Victoria was staying at Grasse’s Grand Hotel under the name of the ‘Countess of Balmoral’. Prince Frederick had already travelled from England in order to escort his father from Aix-la-Chapelle to the meeting place. With his decreased mobility and heightened state of anticipation, the journey was hard on the Maharajah. Queen Victoria in contrast was in a calm and pleasant mood on the day of his arrival. She had spent her morning among the flowers in the fabulous gardens of her friend Alice de Rothschild and after a pleasant lunch, she settled to receive Duleep in the small drawing room of the hotel. Victoria recorded the event dryly and factually in her journal, but in a letter to her daughter Victoria, the Princess Royal, Empress of Germany and Queen of Prussia, the Queen gave vent to her true feelings:

  The poor Maharajah Duleep Singh came to see me yesterday having driven over from Nice with his 2nd son Frederic. He is quite bald and very grey but has the same pleasant manner as ever. When I came in I gave him my hand which he kissed, and said; ‘Pardon my not kneeling’ for his left arm and leg are paralysed tho’ he can stand and walk a little. I asked him to sit down – & almost directly he burst out into a most terrible & violent fit of crying almost screaming (just as my poor fat Indian servant Muhammed did when he lost his child) – and I stroked & held his hand, & he became calm and said; ‘Pray excuse me & forgive my faults’ & I answered ‘They are forgotten & forgiven.’ He said; ‘I am a poor broken down man’ & dwelt on the loss of the use of his left arm as a great trial. I soon took leave & he seemed pleased with the interview – but it was very sad –; still I am so glad that we met again & I could say I forgave him.21

  Duleep returned to Paris, comforted by the meeting. Ada was less happy. She had been snubbed by the Palace and forbidden to travel to Grasse with her husband: Queen Victoria could forgive Duleep, but not the woman who had caused him to abandon Maharani Bamba and their children. The Maharajah promised Ada that better days were around the corner, and soon they would be able to leave Paris for England where life would be easier.

  One of the very few visitors during that period was Raja Jagatjit Singh of the princely state of Kapurthala in the Punjab. The fathers of Jagatjit and Duleep Singh had been close confidants during their lifetimes, and it was out of deference to the old order that Jagatjit, who had managed to hold on to his minor kingdom, decided to pay his respects while travelling through Europe. What he saw so appalled him that he begged Duleep to hasten his planned return to London, where at least his grown-up children might minister to his needs. The Raja wrote later in his journal, ‘he gives me the impression of a man whose mind is affected’.22

  Victor and Frederick increased the intensity of their negotiations with the British government, helped in their cause when Queen Victoria let it be known that she had no objection to the Maharajah’s permanent return. Arthur Oliphant, however, was alarmed at the prospect. Having worked so hard to settle the children and wean them off their antipathy to the Crown, he worried about the impact of Duleep’s return. It was a fear echoed by Sophia’s other guardian, Lord Henniker: ‘I shall be very sorry for them if they have to return to their father’s house, but, if he insists, I don’t know that there is any course for us to pursue than that of yielding to his wish.’23

  Oliphant was less sanguine about the situation. He set out to build a case against the man he felt was morally bankrupt and physically incapable of looking after the children. He travelled to Paris to visit Duleep himself and see whether he could be convinced that Edward and Sophia were better off in his care. Arthur’s assessment was not promising: ‘I was in Paris a fortnight ago and saw the Maharajah. He is still very weak and unable to walk much. I did not like the appearance of his face – he looked bloated and unhealthy. In speech he was very humble and grateful for all God’s mercies; but he did not touch on the subject of his children, tho he was pleased to hear from me of their well doing.’24

  Her guardian’s fears notwithstanding, Sophia began to allow herself the hope that her ‘papa’ would finally be home. Christmas 1891 passed with a sense of great anticipation for all the Duleep Singh children, both in England and in France. Sophia, surrounded by her family again, felt enveloped and safe. However her sense of happiness was fleeting. Edward had to return to his school just a week after Christmas for the spring term. The Princesses Bamba and Catherine were also packing to go back to Oxford, and Victor and Frederick left soon after the festivities to resume their lives in the army and at Cambridge.

  Alone in Brighton just two weeks after they had all been celebrating together, Sophia received distressing news. One of Edward’s numerous colds had turned into pneumonia. In the days that followed, his condition deteriorated swiftly. Within a week he was sent back by the school, deemed too sick to be cared for by the nurse. Edward’s health declined to such an extent that physicians advised him to give up his place at Eton.

  By late April, Edward was battling a secondary condition as well as pneumonia. He had developed tubercular swellings in his stomach which rapidly increased in size and were filling with pus. Sophia looked on in horror as her brother sank deeper into feverish sickness. Just as Maharani Bamba had watched her deteriorate some years before, Sophia was powerless and could only pray for her brother. It was determined that the young prince would receive the best care at a private hospital in Hastings in East Sussex. There, Edward was placed under the care of Dr Cecil Christopherson, a young medic who was something of a local hero, famed for his skill in treating conditions like the prince’s.25 Christopherson battled valiantly to arrest the progress of Edward’s illness, but not even he could save the stricken prince. He advised the family to gird
themselves for the worst. Sophia and Bamba and Catherine spent all their time at Eddie’s bedside, trying to keep him comfortable and calm as he drifted in and out of consciousness.

  Once more the sisters had to rely on each other for support in the absence of their eldest brothers. Victor and Frederick had been called away earlier that same month to attend to their father, who had become seriously ill. Failing to find his miracle cure in Aix-La-Chapelle, Duleep had travelled to Algiers in the hope that the heat might restore some mobility to his frozen left side. No sooner had he arrived in the French colony than he suffered a major heart attack. Ada wired Duleep’s sons urgently, telling them to come to their father’s bedside. The Duleep Singh men were all together in Algiers when news of Edward’s plight reached them.

  As he later informed Queen Victoria, Arthur Oliphant was the one who broke the news of Prince Edward’s decline: ‘When the little boy’s illness commenced I was commissioned to send a telegram daily to the Maharajah as to the little one’s condition. I mention this to show that the Maharajah has some sort of feeling for his children, though not quite as much as one would like.’26 Arthur was being unduly harsh. When it became clear that Edward’s condition was terminal, the Maharajah found the strength to make the journey to England, reaching Hastings on 21 April 1893. His once proud and mercurial bearing was reduced to that of a distraught and shattered old man. Victor warned his father to hold back his tears in Edward’s presence, so as not to scare the boy.

  Duleep sat by his son’s bedside struggling to contain his emotions. Edward drifted in and out of consciousness, wondering whether he was hallucinating when he saw his father by his side, his breathing laboured. Any joy Sophia might have felt at seeing her father again was made leaden by the cause of his return. After only three days, the Maharajah became too sick to remain by his son’s bed. Rather than becoming a second patient for his family to nurse, Duleep returned to Paris and awaited the inevitable. The doctors had told the Maharajah that Edward would die in a matter of days.