Princess Alice of Battenberg - Widowhood

Widowhood

Princess Andrew returned to Great Britain in April 1947 to attend the wedding of her only son, now styled Lieutenant Philip Mountbatten R.N., to The Princess Elizabeth, the elder daughter and heiress presumptive of King George VI, that November. She had some of her remaining jewels used in Princess Elizabeth's engagement ring. For the wedding ceremony, she sat at the head of her family on the north side of Westminster Abbey, opposite the King, Queen Elizabeth and Queen Mary. It was decided not to invite Princess Andrew's daughters to the wedding because of the depth of anti-German sentiment in Britain following World War II.

In January 1949, the princess founded a nursing order of Greek Orthodox nuns, the Christian Sisterhood of Martha and Mary, modelled after the convent that her aunt, the martyr Grand Duchess Elizabeth Fyodorovna, had founded in Russia in 1909. She trained on the Greek island of Tinos, established a home for the order in a hamlet north of Athens, and undertook two tours of the United States in 1950 and 1952 in an effort to raise funds. Her mother was baffled by her actions, "What can you say of a nun who smokes and plays canasta?", she said. After her daughter-in-law became Queen of the Commonwealth realms in 1952, Princess Andrew attended the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in June 1953 wearing a dress in the style of her nun's habit: a conservative two-tone grey long dress and a flowing nun-like head-dress. However, the order eventually failed through a lack of suitable applicants.

In 1960, she visited India at the invitation of Rajkumari Amrit Kaur, who had been impressed by Princess Andrew's interest in Indian religious thought, and for her own spiritual quest. The trip was cut short when she unexpectedly took ill, and her sister-in-law, Edwina Mountbatten, who happened to be passing through Delhi on her own tour, had to smooth things with the Indian hosts who were taken aback at Princess Andrew's sudden change of plans. She later claimed she had had an out-of-body experience. Edwina continued her own tour, and died the following month.

Increasingly deaf and in failing health through incessant smoking, Princess Andrew left Greece for the last time following the 21 April 1967 Colonels' Coup. Queen Elizabeth II and the Duke of Edinburgh invited Princess Andrew to reside permanently at Buckingham Palace in London. King Constantine II of Greece and Queen Anne-Marie went into exile that December after a failed royalist counter-coup.