Zita’s brother Sixtus had visited Buckingham Palace to seek help for his sister and her family. In a meeting with the king and queen, Sixtus gravely explained the danger of the situation, alluding to the massacre at Ekaterinburg. Queen Mary was deeply troubled by what she heard. Turning to her husband, she said, “What Sixtus has told us is very serious.” The king was equally concerned. “We will immediately do what is necessary,” he said. According to Gordon Brook-Shepherd and Queen Elizabeth II’s personal librarian, Sir Robin Mackworth-Young, the exact details of this meeting were never recorded, but it was enough to spur the British monarchs into action.1131 George deployed two British colonels to Eckartsau in an effort to relieve some of the family’s burdens. The officers in question were Colonel Sir Thomas Cunningham, Britain’s military representative to the Allied Mission in Vienna, and Colonel Summerhayes, a member of the Royal Army Medical Corps. They were ordered to “endeavour by every means … to ameliorate the conditions of life of the Emperor and Empress and give them the moral support of the British government.”1132
The family at Eckartsau was informed that Summerhayes and Cunningham would be arriving in February 1919 to be of service. Zita described how her husband was “astonished and overwhelmed with gratitude and relief and also [was] deeply touched by this gesture of solidarity from one monarch to another across all the barriers of war.” With Zita’s help, Charles drafted a short thank-you note for the king of England.
Majesty,
I am happy to be able to thank Your Majesty for the delicate attention in sending Colonel Summerhayes. I am very touched by this courteous act and at the same time am very grateful. The Colonel is a charming man who fulfills his mission with great tact and amiability. The situation in the world is very difficult for us sovereigns. May God have pity on humanity’s suffering and soon give them the rest they need!
Your Majesty’s good brother and cousin,
Charles
Eckartsau, 21 February 19191133
After a few weeks, a third officer—Colonel Edward Strutt—arrived on the scene to relieve Cunningham and Summerhayes. A fluent linguist from an aristocratic background with a deep Catholic faith, Strutt developed a strong rapport with Zita and Charles. He recorded his impression of the emperor in his diary. “It was impossible to avoid liking him,” Strutt wrote; “an eminently lovable if weak man, by no means a fool, and ready to face his end as bravely as his ancestress, Marie Antoinette.”1134 Strutt was also struck by the empress, whom he described as having “extraordinary strength of character.” Colonel Strutt noted that there was a determination “written in the lines of her square little chin, intelligence in the vivacious brown eyes, intellect in the broad forehead half hidden by masses of dark hair.”1135 He was deeply moved by the empress’s strength, believing that if she had the chance, she alone could have carried the Austrian monarchy. It was his opinion that Zita “must always share with the Queens of the Belgians and Rumania the honour of being one of the three great royal women of the war.”1136 The colonel made just as strong an impression on the family as they did on him. Otto, Zita’s eldest son, recalled decades later, “I still think with great respect and great gratitude toward him. Recently, an English person asked me whether I was not full of resentment against the British for the way they had treated my father later on in his exile. I replied: ‘But after all, there was Colonel Strutt.’”1137
By March, anger in Austria toward the monarchy was at an all-time high. Soldiers belonging to the new government made regular assaults on the grounds surrounding the hunting lodge. One particularly violent incident occurred when a cart loaded with food, clothing, and medicine bound for Eckartsau was intercepted by a group of young officers who proceeded to destroy and then light the cart and its contents on fire. When the badly beaten cart driver arrived at Eckartsau, he was carrying a note from a lieutenant addressed to “Mr. Karl Habsburg.” With the army now clearly against them, it became imperative for Zita and her family to get out of Austria as quickly as possible. On March 15, the British War Office received intelligence suggesting the family was in imminent danger. They sent a note to their mission in Vienna, saying, “Most desirable to get the Emperor out of Austria without delay. All possible steps to be taken to expedite departure.”1138 It was now up to Colonel Strutt to get the family safely out of the country, but Charles was implacable. He refused to leave Austria under any circumstances. The colonel realized his best chance was to appeal to the empress. He met with her alone, making a passionate speech saying that, from everything he could see, the country was entirely against them. He would get them out of the country somehow, he said, without Charles having to abdicate. For a moment, Zita fell silent.
“A dead Habsburg is no good to anyone, whereas a live one, with a family, may yet be,” Strutt finally told her. It was enough. She smiled and took his hand.
“I will do all I can to help,” she replied. “We will leave under your orders and arrangements and trust you to avoid Karl’s having to abdicate.”1139
The options for the family’s exile were limited, since most countries wanted nothing to do with the deposed dynasty. The years after World War I saw the birth of a number of national republics that had once been monarchies, and most of those wanted to distance themselves from royalty as much as possible. With much of Europe out of the question, the only real possibility left for the Habsburgs was Switzerland. When the moment came for Colonel Strutt to tell Charles he had no choice but to go into exile, the emperor looked him directly in the face and asked, “Only promise me that I shall leave as emperor and not as a thief in the night.” His face gravely serious, Strutt replied, “Sir, I promise.”1140
After an exhausting political chess match, Strutt managed to secure a promise from Austrian chancellor Karl Renner that the Habsburgs could leave Austria unconditionally. On the afternoon of Sunday, March 23, Zita, Charles, their family, and a handful of retainers left Austria. At 10:00 a.m., the imperial family attended Mass in the chapel at Eckartsau. The deeply moving service was performed by the court bishop Seydl with Otto serving as altar boy. Once the Mass ended, the entire congregation broke out into the imperial anthem. This was especially poignant because it was “destined to be the last time it was sung before an Austrian Emperor, who sat with his family in the gallery.”1141 By the end of the song, everyone in the chapel was reduced to tears. The rest of the day was rife with emotion. As the children gathered their belongings, Zita packed her family’s most treasured possessions, which included a trunk of dazzling jewels. One of the most precious pieces the empress was taking with her was a six-row pearl necklace and chain of diamonds that had once belonged to Empress Maria Theresa.
At 6:35 p.m., Charles and Zita, locked arm in arm, descended down the grand staircase at Eckartsau to bid farewell to the last home their family had in Austria. Gathered on the ground floor for a tearful good-bye were the many servants, groundskeepers, and townspeople who had remained loyal to the imperial family throughout their struggle. At the sight of the emperor and empress, everyone fell to their knees in hushed reverence. Colonel Strutt observed in his journal that the “dignity of the Imperial couple at so heart-rending a moment was superlative.”1142 The family filed into the automobiles for the twenty-minute drive to the train station at Kopfstetten.
Many of the Austrian people were deeply saddened by the departure of their imperial family. Joining the family in exile were a small group of servants and a number of Zita’s relatives, including her brothers, who had fought for Austria in the war, and her mother, the Duchess of Parma. When the motorcade arrived at Kopfstetten, Zita and her family were met by a crowd of nearly two thousand people, all in tears, waiting in the rain. Deeply moved, the emperor and empress took the time to shake hands with as many people as they could before Colonel Strutt implored them to board the train. There were twenty-five people in total aboard the train that night. As it lumbered its way through Austria, the reality of her family’s situation came crashing down on the empress. “My
family has been exiled from France, Italy and Portugal,” she muttered to Strutt. “When I married I became an Austrian subject, and now I am an exile from Austria. Colonel Strutt, tell me to what country do I belong now?”1143 There came no reply.
Nearly a day later, the train pulled into the station at Buchs in Switzerland. The first stop after disembarking was Wartegg, an old castle on Lake Constance that had once belonged to Zita’s father after his own exile from Parma. Waiting to greet Zita and her family were many of her Bourbon relatives, including her brothers Felix and Sixtus. From Wartegg, Charles sent a message to King George V.
My dear brother,
We have arrived on the hospitable soil of Switzerland with the military escort that the Government of Your Majesty has kindly placed at my disposal, I desire to express to you directly and without delay my feelings of gratitude which makes me feel the support and generosity of the British Empire in these cruel circumstances that I believe are only temporary.… I have nothing but praise, especially for the steps taken by Colonel Strutt, who has accompanied me thus far and whose character is full of fortitude and has been greatly appreciated by me.
Charles
Wartegg, 11 April 19191144
Wartegg offered the family a modicum of safety, but it was incredibly cramped. The castle became a rallying point for dozens of Habsburgs and Bourbons. The emperor’s mother, brother, and cousins arrived. Most of Zita’s family came too, including many of the half-siblings from her father’s first marriage. Every floor of the castle, including the attic, was occupied by exiled royals. The servants and staff who accompanied the imperial family were forced to find housing in nearby villages and hotels.
Crowded though Wartegg may have been, Zita was pleased to have so many relatives around. Her children had the chance to once again play in the castle gardens and enjoy life away from political upheaval. One visitor even played in the snow with the children and helped them build a snowman. Charles was offered the chance to take a moment to exhale after the tumult of the last year. As spring returned to Europe, the Habsburgs found their spirits temporarily lifted. But within a few weeks, the Swiss government began pressuring Charles to relocate his family further west, deeper within the country. The Swiss authorities were worried because Wartegg was just across the border from Austria. “From the balconies of Wartegg, the mountains of Vorarlberg seemed almost close enough to touch,” wrote one Habsburg biographer.1145 The Swiss government had also received pressure from the Austrians who, on April 3, ratified the Habsburg Law. Designed to secure the country’s new republicanism, Charles and Zita were now forbidden from ever returning to Austria. The law also stripped them of their sovereignty and titles and forbade any members of the imperial dynasty outside of the immediate imperial family from setting foot on Austrian soil unless they formally renounced all their titles, styles, and claims to the throne.
Not wanting to aggravate the country that harbored them, Charles and Zita relocated their family to Villa Prangins on the shores of Lake Geneva. Their new home was an eclectic mixture of “Venetian-style watchtowers, French-style conical domes and Tudor-style chimney stacks.”1146 Inside, it offered them more space than Wartegg. The family took over use of the entire ground floor. The second floor was used by the members of their court: Bishop Seydl, the family’s priest; Count Ledochowski, the emperor’s aide-de-camp; Zita’s ladies-in-waiting, the countesses Bellegarde and Kerssenbrock; and the court secretaries, barons von Schonta and Werkmann. The other two wings housed the domestic staff, consisting of a cook, a footman, and the maids.
The family moved into Prangins at the end of May 1919. On September 5, Zita went into labor with her sixth child, a son. Acknowledging their new humble circumstances, Charles and Zita named the boy Rudolf. The name was chosen in honor of Rudolf IV, the Swiss count who founded the Habsburgs: “The imperial family were returning to their humbler roots; this symbolised their new lifestyle, one in which, to all outward appearances, Karl was leading the existence of any prosperous Swiss country gentleman.”1147 After Rudolf’s birth, the family settled down to a quiet life they had not known in years. Circumstances seemed to ease for Charles and Zita, but changes were in store. The political upheaval that would sweep across the former Austro-Hungarian empire was set to engulf the emperor and empress yet again. Once it was all over, their exile would be final and would mark the closing chapter of their life together.
24
The Quest for the Crown
(1919–20)
At Amerongen Castle in the Netherlands, Augusta Victoria was a shell of her former self. Her only consolation was being with her husband again. If Empress Zita was more like Queen Mary in her response to adversity, then Dona was a mirror of Tsarina Alexandra’s more melancholy personality in times of hardship. The former German empress’s health and psyche were shattered by her country’s revolution and the toppling of her family from the throne. Wilhelm became worried about his wife, who had more difficulty accepting their circumstances than anyone else at Amerongen. Dona lacked the faculty to adapt to new situations the way her husband could. Wilhelm “realized that, having originally come from humbler surroundings than Potsdam, she could not reconcile herself to living modestly again in Holland.” In the end, it was her pride, which was “nourished by her position as one of the great ladies of Europe” that “prevented her from accepting with resignation the topsy-turvydom” of postwar, republican Europe.1148
From the day she arrived at Amerongen, Dona sequestered herself in the small suite of rooms that had been set aside for her use on the castle’s upper floor. Initially, the only person admitted into her presence was her lifelong friend and lady-in-waiting, Countess Keller. Somber, morose, and perennially depressed, the former empress and queen refused to participate in the little bit of court life that went on at Amerongen. Even when she ate her meals, she did so alone. One of the few pastimes she did partake in was letter writing. She wrote most often to her daughter, Sissy, who was still living with her in-laws at Gmunden. The former Duchess of Brunswick recalled that despite the difficult circumstances facing her mother, Dona wrote often and “always pleasantly.” But Sissy added gravely, “I could read between the lines the pressure she was under.” For the most part, letter writing was Dona’s sole activity. “Perhaps I would get some strength back if I had something to do in my own home,” she admitted. “Here, I always have melancholy thoughts and, at the most, letters to write.”1149 Aside from continuing her correspondence, one activity she began to occupy herself with was knitting. She hand made hundreds of articles of clothing to be sent to children living in the poorest parts of Germany. These were later distributed by the Red Cross, of which she had once been the head. Only a handful of people ever saw her from day to day, and that was usually limited to her husband or Countess Keller, who continued to bring Dona her meals. The only visitors she received—beyond her family and staff—were children from the nearby village of Zuiderzee. Dona was always intrigued by these children, who often wore traditional, old-fashioned Dutch country attire.
While other royals who found themselves deposed after the war were enduring hardship and poverty, Wilhelm and Dona were afforded a degree of luxury. In addition to nearly fifty live-in servants who waited on them at Amerongen, over a hundred courtiers joined them in exile. Not all of them did so from honorable motives. Many accompanied the former monarchs out of fear of falling into insignificance with the collapse of the monarchy. Wilhelm and Dona were permitted to keep twenty-five train carts sent by the German government full of personal belongings, including furniture, an automobile, and a boat. In a surprisingly magnanimous gesture, the Germans also agreed to acknowledge a number of the Hohenzollerns’ privately owned properties in Berlin that were worth more than $2 million at the time. Wilhelm also had nearly $12 million tied up in stocks and bonds, though these would not be liquidated until 1926. When Wilhelm died years later, he was estimated to be worth 14 million German reichsmarks, or more than $62 million in today’s money.1150 Th
e assets that the Hohenzollerns brought with them into exile helped fund the semicontinuation of their daily routines. Meals were attended by no less than twenty people, Wilhelm and his aides took afternoon walks in the parks around Amerongen, and courtiers insisted on having all their expenses paid. Wilhelm and Dona made no effort to be optimistic about their circumstances. This was supremely ironic given the level of comfort they received, compared to Nicholas and Alexandra or Charles and Zita.
Dona’s bleak frame of mind led to her suffering from deep depression, which she blamed on the “catastrophe” that had befallen her family. According to one of the hangers-on at Amerongen, the overthrow of the Hohenzollerns “had been infinitely more shattering to her than to” Wilhelm.1151 “The revolution broke the Empress’s heart,” Wilhelm wrote in his memoirs. “She aged visibly from November, 1918, onward, and could not resist her bodily ills with the strength of before.”1152 He reiterated this to their daughter: “She suffers dreadfully and her condition often makes me despair, especially when the pain overcomes her.”1153 Her son Willy wrote that “she suffers severely, is physically ill, but will not give way; she knows only one thought, namely, the welfare of my father and of us all, and has only one wish, which is to lighten for us what we have to bear.”1154 Wilhelm’s doctor made regular visits to examine her, but at nearly sixty two years old, Augusta Victoria was never again healthy after her heart attack. Courtiers at Amerongen knew their matriarch was not long for this world. One such individual who saw Dona on a handful of occasions left her reminiscences of the ex-empress in exile.
Imperial Requiem: Four Royal Women and the Fall of the Age of Empires Page 55