HOW THE ACCIDENT HAPPENED.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 55, Issue 272, 30 August 1935, Page 5

HOW THE ACCIDENT HAPPENED.

KING GLANCES AT A MAP.

THE CAR, GREATLY DAMAGED. (Received This Day, 1.15 p.m.) BRUSSELS, August 29. The entire country is grief-stricken. Their Majesties wore holidaying at their Swiss villa, “Hassihorn,” at Honvbank, Lake Lucerfie. Their children, Prince Baudouin, and Princess Josephine, left for Brussels yesterday. They jwei still unaware of the tragedy. Their Majesties left on a motor ox-

cursion early in the morning, the King driving an open touring car; with the Queen beside him and the chauffeur in the dickey seat. Another car followed with four members of the Royal suite. A mile from Kiussnacht the King apparently removed his attention from the road in order to glance at a. map in the Queen’s handl. The car swerved, the .right-hand wheels mounted the concrete kerb ‘and continued thus for 17 yards to a sunken transverse path. Tho shook evidently caused tho King to lose control of the car, which swung to the right, ran 20 yards down an embankment and collided with a tree, against which the Queen was thrown violently, fracturing her skull.

The car rolled on and struck a second tree, hurling the King out and slightly injuring his arm and head. The car then plunged over a stone wall into the lake. The chauffeur then scrambled out. ' Peasants and the occupants of the second ear rushed to the scene. The King was assisted to the side of the Queen. A priest was bi ought from Ivussnacht, with a doctor, and said prayers for the dying. Only when hope was abandoned 1 did the King permit the doctor to attend to his injuries. The identity of his Majesty was not immediately known, as the King travelled incognito. The car was removed from the lake. The radiator was wrenched off. The offside of the car where the Queen sat was completely wrecked, the body being twisted and nearly torn off the chassis.

THE BELGIANS STUNNED.

NEWS OF FATALITY BROADCAST,

(Received This Day, 10.50 a.m.) BRUSSELS, August 29. News of the Queen’s death, broadcast by wireless, stunned tho Belgians, The Premier (M. Vanzeeland) chartered a special ’plane and flew to Lucerne. WORLD-WIDE SYMPATHY. FUNERAL NEXT TUESDAY. (Received This Day, 1.15 p.m.) BRUSSELS, August 29. The Prime Minister, holding a special meeting of Cabinet to issue mourning proclamations, flew to Lucerne. Later he accompanied the King to Brussels in a special train conveying the body of the Queen. Telegrams of sympathy have arrived from all over the world. Herr Hitler and the Pope conveyed «*ondolences. The funeral will probably be held next Tuesday.

The Queen of the Belgians, who w,as Princess Astrid! of Sweden, was the third daughter of Prince Charles Duke of Vastergotland and Princess Jngeborg of Denmark, and a niece of King Gustav V'., of Sweden. She was born at Stockholm in January, 1911. Her mother had original ideas and tho education of her daughters was unusually democratic. Princess Astrid and her sisters were taught to earn their own living, if necessary, for Princess- Ingeborg considered nothing so insecure as the existence of at Royal dynasty. Their training included domestic science, and they had to go down once a week to the kitchen and cook the family’s meals. They also had to supervise the household expenses, for strict economy had to be practised, as the family was not rich. The girls learned to make their own clothes and even to launder them. All took a course of nursing and had to spend four months as probationers at the hospital, where they were oji the same footing as the other nurses, getting up at 5 a.m. and siveeping floors, etc. Princess Ingeborg was sent to Spa for her health and took Princess Astrid with her. They were invited to visit the Queen of the Belgians, who liked the young princess and thought she would be a suitable wife for Prince Leopold Duke of Brabant. In March, 1926, he and his mother visited Stockholm incognito and it was then that the young man lust met Princess Astrid. They saw each other again at Luxembourg, where Astrid went with her mother and sister for a christening ceremony. The Swedish princesses were invited to stay with the Belgian Royal family at their summer residence and during the summer Prince Leopold visited Princess Astrid’s family incognito. •

T'he betrothal was announced in September, 1926, andl it was emphasised that it was based on warm, mutual love. Tlio wedding took place in November in two stages, the civil ceremony in (Stockholm and the religious service in Brussels, for the bride was and remains a. Protestant, while the Prince is a Catholic. The honeymoon was spent in the South of France and in Paris, where the young people stayed in an hotel incognito as M. and Mine, Losange from ’Mentone, seeing the sights like ordinary tourists and sometimes taking supper in Montmartre.

The Queen was described, as one of the most beautiful women in Europe. Noted for ber simple habits, she adhered to the fashions of dress of 1929. There was a storm of indignation in Europe when a priest criticised her short skirts. She was a skilled sportswoman and an accomplished dancer. There are two children of the marriage; Princess Josephine Charlotte Tngeborg Elisabeth. Marie Jose Marguerite Astrid, who was born at Brussels on- October 11, 1927( and Prince Baudouin Albert Charles Leopold Axel Mario Gustave, Count of Hainaut, who was born in Brussels on September 7, 1930. Prince Baudouin is the lieir to the throne.

King Leopold’s youiiger brother, Charles, is an honorary lieutenant in the British Navy. Tt is less than two years that King Albert of the Belgians, father of the present King, was accidentally killed on February 17, 1934. Accompanied only by a valet, he drove from Brussels to Marche les Dames, near Namur, where ho set out alone to climb the Corneille, a rocky pinnacle on the

banks of the Meuse. He was a keen mountaineer. Two hours after the King left the far his servant was at the foot of the pinnacle, as he had been told to be,, and when it began to grow diuislc, and there was still no sign of the King he liecame alarmed. The alarm was raised 1 in a nearby village, and at 2 o’clock next morning the King’s body was found, the head dreadfully wounded. There were signs that a piece of rope to which ho was clinging had broken off or slipped, so that he fell backward into space. Sensational allegations were madb that the King had been murdered, but these were completely d i s proved.