STAMP STORY The last King of Spain

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32903, 29 April 1972, Page 11

STAMP STORY The last King of Spain

(By

KENNETH ANTHONY)

News that the Spanish monarchy may be restored on the retirement of General Franco lends new interest to some of the older stamps of Spain.

Especially is this true of stamps in the design illustrated here—showing King Alfonso XIII in babyhood. Few sovereigns have been portrayed as infants on their national stamps, but Alfonso’s case was exceptional because he was in fact king from the moment he was born, his father having died six months previously. The stamps did not appear until three years later, but then, strangely enough, they remained in use until 1901— by which time the king was

a young man of 15 and the baby portrait must have been embarrassingly out-of-date. Subsequent issues showed several different portraits of the king in his more mature years. 1931 abdication Although the youthful Alfonso was heir to a centuries-old tradition, the monarchy was by no means universally popular in Spain, and even on his wedding day an attempt was made to assassinate him. In spite of such adventures King Alfonso reigned for 45 years before he was eventually replaced by a republican regime in 1931—the change being brought about, not by violent revolution but by peaceful abdication. The republic, however,

lasted for only five years before an uprising brought General Franco to power after a long and bitter civil war. Madrid burial Just what might have happened if the king had not been persuaded to leave the country is one of the great question marks of European history. But after his departure Alfonso lived in exile in Italy until his death in 1941. Although he never returned to Spain in his lifetime, he was buried in Madrid; and since then the Franco regime had indicated its monarchist leanings from time to time on its stamps—notably by an issue of 1961, depicting a monument to Alfonso’s father.