Exile
The Spanish royal family went into exile on 14 April 1931 after municipal elections brought Republicans to power in most of the major cities, leading to the proclamation of the second Spanish Republic. Alfonso XIII had hoped that his voluntary exile might avert a civil war between the Republicans and the Nationalists. The royal family went to live in France and later Italy. Ena and Alfonso later separated, and she lived partly in the UK and, after being invited to leave this country by its government, in Switzerland. She purchased a chateau, the Vieille Fontaine, outside of Lausanne.
In 1938, the whole family gathered in Rome for the baptism of Don Juan's eldest son, Juan Carlos of Spain. On 15 January 1941, Alfonso XIII, feeling his death was near, transferred his rights to the Spanish crown to his son Don Juan de Borbon, Count of Barcelona. On 12 February, Alfonso suffered a first heart attack. Alfonso died on 28 February 1941. In 1942 she was obliged to leave Italy having become persona non grata to the Italian government - according to Harold Tittmann, a U.S. representative at the Vatican at the time, for her "ill-disguised leanings to the Allied cause."
Ena returned briefly to Spain in February 1968, to stand as godmother at the baptism of her great-grandson, Infante Don Felipe, the son of Infante Don Juan Carlos de Borbón y Borbón Dos-Sicilias (later King Juan Carlos I of Spain) and Princess Sofia of Greece and Denmark (later Queen Sofia).
Read more about this topic: Victoria Eugenie Of Battenberg
Famous quotes containing the word exile:
“No exile at the South Pole or on the summit of Mont Blanc separates us more effectively from others than the practice of a hidden vice.”
—Marcel Proust (1871–1922)
“The bond between a man and his profession is similar to that which ties him to his country; it is just as complex, often ambivalent, and in general it is understood completely only when it is broken: by exile or emigration in the case of one’s country, by retirement in the case of a trade or profession.”
—Primo Levi (1919–1987)
“The exile is a singular, whereas refugees tend to be thought of in the mass. Armenian refugees, Jewish refugees, refugees from Franco Spain. But a political leader or artistic figure is an exile. Thomas Mann yesterday, Theodorakis today. Exile is the noble and dignified term, while a refugee is more hapless.... What is implied in these nuances of social standing is the respect we pay to choice. The exile appears to have made a decision, while the refugee is the very image of helplessness.”
—Mary McCarthy (1912–1989)