In January 1931, Queen Ena’s mother, Princess Beatrice, broke her arm and fell seriously ill with bronchitis, prompting Ena to go to London to be at her bedside. Once her mother showed signs of improvement, Ena left England, worried about the deteriorating political situation in Spain. As she arrived by train in Madrid on 17 February, she was astounded to find herself being enthusiastically welcomed home. According to one report, “the poor Queen imagined, upon seeing so many people shouting [at the train station,] that the Republic had already been proclaimed, that was what she later admitted.”11 Never had Ena seen such moving demonstrations of loyalty. Shouts of “Viva la Reina!” could be heard everywhere. Caught off guard, Ena was moved to tears. Mobbed at the train station, Ena’s tumultuous welcome continued as she made her way back to the Royal Palace. The pace was so slow that her car virtually crawled. Throughout her triumphal journey back to the palace, cheers erupted— “Long live the monarchy!” and “Down with the republic.”12 Once at the palace, the crowds refused to leave, prompting an impromptu appearance by the royal family on the palace balcony. To loud ovations, Queen Ena, joined by King Alfonso and their children, acknowledged the cheers.
As heady as her return to Spain was, this tremendous welcome nevertheless masked deep divisions within Spain. The British ambassador summed this up in a lucid report: “The events of the last few days in Spanish politics have demonstrated once more the extent to which the country is divided. To make a rough generalisation, it appears as split up into two camps—those who desire that things should go on more or less as they have done hitherto, and those who aim at fundamental changes. The ideas and ideals prevalent in these two camps clash in almost every respect.” The ambassador pointed out that the country faced a schism between “Young Spain” and “Old Spain.”
Young Spain has behind it the pulsating aspiration of the youth of the country, most of the intellligentsia and cultured elements, many of the professional classes and the mass of the organised workers of the country. It is championed by brilliant political speakers, and has, when the censorship is not working, the assistance of numerous and ably-edited organs. Old Spain [on the other hand] has the advantage over its rival of having at its disposal organised strength in the shape of imposing police and military forces. By their aid it can quell and practically silence opposition, at any rate for considerable periods. But the exercise of repression is difficult to sustain perpetually, and there comes a time when it weakens through weariness, faulty direction, or divided counsels, and then the other side has an opportunity of demonstrating the dynamic quality inherent in its ideals of progress and liberty13
Even Ena knew that the end was near. She also could see that the king was taking the wrong advice, saying to one of her ladies, “I cannot understand Spain. Alfonso has as advisors many enemies. In the street, the police detain many university students who shout Viva el Rey! and leave much room to those who cheer Viva la República!”14
When nationwide local elections were finally held on 12 April 1931 (the first since 1922), the results were a blow to the monarchy. Though over 22,000 councillors voted in were Monarchists and under 6,000 were Republicans, the Monarchists came overwhelmingly from the rural areas, while Republicans swept all the major urban centers, except for three cities. Events moved quickly as soon as the election results were tallied. Instead of viewing the results “not as a crisis, but as the irreversible finale,” Alfonso’s ministers, in the next two days, took action that “only contributed further to the worsening of the situation, thereby hastening the premature end of the monarchy.”15 When King Alfonso heard of the election results, he was shocked. Upon learning the extent of the Republican victories in the major cities, the king said dejectedly: “I feel as though I had gone to make a visit to a friend and when I had got to the house I had learnt that he was dead.” Nevertheless, he believed the situation was still salvageable if parliamentary elections were held while he was out of the country. But in no time, advisers told Alfonso that the death knell of the monarchy had sounded and civil war was imminent. Emboldened by their victories in the cities and the government’s paralysis, the Republicans adeptly pushed their propaganda on the people and demanded that King Alfonso give up his position. When a rumor spread that the king had abdicated, pandemonium broke out in the capital. An eyewitness reported that “crowds of 4,000 and 5,000 persons, mad with joy, swept into the Puerta del Sol, the hub of Madrid.” Shouts rang out of “Viva la Republica! and Death to the King!”17 Even more worrying to Monarchists was the attitude of some members of the Civil Guard, who now switched from pro-Monarchist to anti-Monarchist. Instead of charging a crowd of thousands waving Socialist and Communist flags, as they marched down the Prado, the Civil Guard aided them.
When the king sounded out his supporters, including the military, he found to his dismay that they were abandoning the monarchy and siding with the Republicans. Fearing for the future of Spain, Alfonso finally conceded defeat. He issued a manifesto in which he did not renounce his rights but, instead, suspended his prerogatives. Though he could have fought his enemies, Alfonso announced: “I prefer to stand resolutely aside rather than provoke a conflict which might array my fellow-countrymen against one another in civil and patricidal strife.”18 Not wishing to see blood shed on his behalf, King Alfonso, like King Constantine I of Greece before him, opted to leave his kingdom. And having made that fateful decision, he wasted no time in implementing it.
The king left the Royal Palace just three days after the elections. Since it was imperative that he leave immediately, and since the rest of the family could not do so, the king had no choice but to go without them. He did so reluctantly, and only after he had received assurances that they would be protected from harm.
Not long before the king fled, his director general of security, Emilio Mola Vidal, met with him and Victoria Eugenie. Vidal was convinced that the events of 14 April might have taken the king by surprise. But when it came to the queen, he ventured with “absolute certainty” that she had expected this. When Vidal visited the young Prince of the Asturias, who was seriously ill, Alfonsito rose to greet his visitor but could not get up to say good-bye. Recalling that moment, Vidal said he saw in the prince an expression of “mixed anguish and resignation.…The eldest child of the King and Queen in those days, was very scared. I understood then all the intimate tragedy of the royal family and found justification for the sadness in the face of the Queen.”19
Queen Ena requested that Alfonso dine with her alone on the evening of his departure. Emotion filled the air, but the couple dined mostly in silence. At 8:30 P.M., the family and retainers assembled to bid the king farewell. The atmosphere was highly charged but the send-off was very businesslike. As the crowd outside the palace clamored for a republic, Alfonso said his good-byes, calmly but with clenched fists. To Ena he said simply, “You and the children go to your rooms and stay there tonight. You will leave by a special train in the morning.” A shout from the halberdiers of “Viva el Rey! Viva el Rey!” was met by a “Viva España!” from the king.20 The most moving scene of all took place when, just before descending the staircase, Alfonso XIII faced a portrait of his late mother, paused for a moment, and saluted. He then left hurriedly by car for Cartagena and boarded the cruiser Príncipe Alfonso for France. He was never to return to Spain.
Queen Sophie’s sister, Mossy, commented on the end of the Spanish monarchy: “The events in Spain were indeed terrible. What a shame to treat the King like that, who had been so excellent in every way. That poor country will probably go to rack & ruin now.”21
On the night that King Alfonso fled Spain, Ena and her children were alone at the Royal Palace, save for a few faithful retainers and family members. Shades of the Russian imperial family’s terrible murder at Ekaterinburg haunted the queen. As the family packed what they could to take into exile, shouts could be heard outside calling for blood: “Muera al Rey! Muera a la Reina! (Death to the King! Death to the Queen!)” No less audible were shouts of “Viva
la República!” In the nearby Campo del Moro, where Ena and her children had spent many happy hours, the crowds grew menacing, carrying weapons and shouting obscenities. Those surrounding the palace were massive, surging ever closer to the gates. Incredibly, only twenty-five guards outside and twenty-five inside stood between the agitated populace and the royal family. A tense moment took place when two men broke into the grounds, made for the main balcony, and hoisted the Republican flag. As the night dragged on, tension continued to mount. Ena’s children told her they were willing to take up arms in order to defend themselves.
“We did not sleep much that night, as you can imagine!” Ena said later of that petrifying evening.22 At five in the morning, the queen was advised that plans had to be changed. Because they were in the middle of a revolution, the streets clogged with hostile people anxiously awaiting the return of their republican heroes from exile, the royal family would have to leave for El Escorial by train from Madrid. At seven o’clock on 16 April 1931, Ena, her children, and retainers attended Mass, with the Infante Gonzalo serving as altar boy.
Nerves soon became frayed when a truck began bashing at one of the gates. Then, a group approached and insisted on being let in. Far from enemies, they turned out to be the nuns who had taught Infante Jaime to speak. They came offering to help the deaf Infante understand those terrifying moments; but Jaime understood well what was taking place. Ena, in the meantime, expressed her puzzlement at the land that had been her home for decades. “Spain!” the queen exclaimed when she greeted the nuns, “always does she surprise me! I believe I will never understand her!”23
Before leaving, the royal family distributed gifts to their servants. The Prince of the Asturias, seriously ill from a hemophilia attack and unable to walk on his own, gave his valet all his money and asked him to distribute it to those who had served loyally. Alfonsito was then carried by his mechanic into a car for the journey.
Dressed simply in a dark blue traveling suit and small matching hat, Ena and her children left the palace. Missing from the family was the Infante Juan, who was at naval school in Cadiz. He was to make his own way to France. Accompanying Ena on her journey into exile were her cousin, the Princess Beatrice, Marie of Romania’s sister; Ena’s sister-in-law, the ailing Marchioness of Carisbrooke; and an assortment of aristocrats, among them Ena’s ever faithful friends, the Leceras. One of the queen’s final thoughts was for the Spanish people when she admonished one of her ladies to “take care of my Red Cross.”24
During Ena’s last hours in Spain, a lady bid the queen a temporary farewell with the words, “Hasta la vista.” In reply, Victoria Eugenie said, “Those who now leave are not going to return.”25 But Ena’s most poignant words were heard not long after Alfonso left for exile. Feeling some responsibility for the monarchy’s debacle, an emotional Ena murmured: “I thought I had done well.”2
On the way to El Escorial, the party stopped at a place called Galápagar while waiting for their train, which was delayed. There, Ena sat on a boulder and chatted with her companions. She was clearly fatigued and anxious, her face betraying all kinds of emotions. According to The New York Times account, near the Escorial, at a small town called El Plantillo, they came across a group of peasants, one of whom, a woman, said to the queen, “Viva la república, Señora.” “ ‘Long live whatever is best for my people,’ the Queen replied, and the little group of onlookers fell respectfully silent.”27
At El Escorial, the magnificent and imposing monastery built by King Philip II, the royal family went to Queen Maria Cristina’s grave to pray. A forbidding place in which to spend last moments on Spanish soil, this was the final resting place of Spain’s monarchs. Victoria Eugenie had always found the royal family’s crypt too morbid for her tastes. All the onyx, marble, and gold could not make up for the frightening spectacle of so many red marble caskets lining the walls. When Alfonso brought some visitors there and “pointed out his waiting casket with a shrug,” Ena was not present. One observer said that “the Queen could not bear the place and always waited in the cathedral.”28
On her last visit to the Escorial on her way into exile, Victoria Eugenie, her lips trembling and her eyes swollen from weeping, told those around her: “The King has not abdicated; we do not know what is going to happen to us, but I feel sure it will turn out for the best.”29
Amidst a flood of tears, the family finally boarded the train for France. TheNew York Times reporter noted: “She has never been very popular with her people, and never was she left more alone than on this day of her final departure.…One curtain was raised [on the train] and a lone hand appeared through it. The hand was that of the Queen, her last farewell to a land that never learned affection for her.”30 In time, Victoria Eugenie herself admitted as much when she said, “I have a tranquil conscience of having always stayed outside political divisions, of having treated everyone with the same courtesy and of having dedicated all my efforts to the organization of charitable welfare in Spain. Nevertheless, I have the feeling that I have never really been loved, of having never been popular.”31 One contemporary monarchist comments: “I have always believed that the Spanish people were extremely unjust with Doña Victoria, who was never held in high esteem in spite of her extraordinary personality.”32
Twenty-eight
“THE GOD WITHIN US!”
KING ALFONSO ARRIVED IN PARIS FROM MARSEILLES TO A HERO’S welcome. Thousands mobbed him at the Gare de Lyon, shouting and waving, as Alfonso made his way to the Hôtel Meurice. Later, Queen Ena and her children arrived by train at the Gare d’Orsay to a similar welcome. Looking haggard and bemused, she bravely smiled and acknowledged the thousands who greeted her with shouts of “Vive la Reine!” No less than ten thousand people, along with French officials, amassed to greet Ena. The family met up with King Alfonso at the Meurice, where they and their entourage took up nearly thirty rooms. The noisy acclamations prompted Alfonso to go to the balcony and acknowledge the crowds. When Ena did the same, the cheers grew even louder.
Ena’s life of exile began in the French capital, but within weeks she and her family moved to an annex of the Hôtel Savoie in Fontainebleau, outside Paris. Her eldest son, Alfonsito, still suffering from an attack of hemophilla, left the family to recuperate in a clinic in Switzerland. Never one to keep still for long, the king resented being cooped up with Ena, the children, and the queen’s small set of retainers at Fontainebleau.
One visitor to Fontainebleau was none other than Sandro, who had been Tsarina Alexandra’s brother-in-law. When he met Ena, Sandro was impressed. “The tragic events she has lived through during the past months have added a certain spiritual halo to her striking blonde handsomeness,” he recorded. “Otherwise she is just as friendly and refreshing in the simplicity of her manner as in the old London days…I look at her and think: ‘The eternal British.…Tenacity and loyalty.…That’s what helps her keep her head up.…It takes an English woman to make a proud Queen.’ “1
Ena proceeded to give Sandro a moving account of the final days of the Spanish monarchy, finding parallels with the Russian Revolution that had destroyed her cousin, Alix::
I have read and heard many heartbreaking stories about the Russian Revolution, but really, I can not believe it could have been any worse in St. Petersburg. It came so suddenly, so unexpectedly. It seems I returned from London only a day before, not wishing to be absent from Madrid during the political crisis. And the crowds at the station in Madrid that met my train! Oh, Alexander, if you could only have seen those people! Cheering, delighted, throwing flowers at me! I thought I was the most popular human being in Spain! And then!…It is unbelievable.…How could a nation change its sympathies so abruptly?2
Hidden from Sandro during this visit was the tragedy that the couple had virtually decided to separate. With plenty of time on his hands and the burden of kingship stripped from him, Alfonso might have chosen to make amends to his long-suffering wife and begin a fresh start with her in exile. More than likely, with her own cap
acity for forgiveness, Ena would have given their marriage another chance. But that chance never came. Alfonso was as bitter as he had ever been. The specter of hemophilia in his two sons was still obviously too much for him to bear, and he continued to take out his frustrations on his wife.
Free from the constraints of reigning, Ena had reached her breaking point when it came to Alfonso’s cruelty. The last straw came when Alfonso accused her outright of having an affair with her longtime friend, the Duke of Lecera. The duke did harbor romantic feelings for the queen; so too, according to Ena’s English biographer, did the Duchess of Lecera. But Ena, as a true byproduct of a proper Victorian upbringing, could not even come to acknowledge this aspect of the duchess’s feelings for her. It was out of the question for Ena to be unfaithful in her marital vows. What she did know was that she was unprepared to let go of the Leceras as friends at this stage, since they had supported her through her darkest days, even choosing to go into exile with her. This episode pushed Ena into a fit of hysteria, in which she sent out a venomous reply to Alfonso that was completely uncharacteristic: “I choose them and never want to see your ugly face again.”3 Alfonso was taken aback and appalled. This unsavory incident marked the sad end of the marriage. From then on, they lived separate lives. Ena also eventually dismissed the Leceras from her entourage.
In many ways, Marie too, though still in Romania, was living the life of an exile, thanks to King Carol II’s continuing persecution. Intent on preventing her from exercising any kind of power or influence, Carol’s jealousy ensured that Marie was kept at arm’s length from Bucharest. In a “Very Confidential” report to his superiors in London, Michael Palairet of the British Legation in Bucharest reported that “a weak character like King Carol would always instinctively shrink from a strong and dominating personality like Queen Marie, who is evidently chafing under the necessity of adopting a rôle the inactivity of which is so uncongenial to her tastes and so at variance with her past.” The audience, which lasted an hour, touched upon “the present situation in Roumania, which she regards as highly critical.”4
Born to Rule: Five Reigning Consorts, Granddaughters of Queen Victoria Page 47
