The Feilding Star Oroua and Kiwitea Courities' Gazette THURSDAY, JULY 23, 1925. THE TRAGEDY OF A LOST THRONE

Feilding Star, Volume 3, Issue 321, 23 July 1925, Page 4

The Feilding Star Oroua and Kiwitea Courities' Gazette THURSDAY, JULY 23, 1925. THE TRAGEDY OF A LOST THRONE

Over the cables has come a brevity of news to the cllect that the grahddaughter of. the Atexican revolution-' arv leader who had ordered the execution of that impossible potentate. Archduke Alaxamdia'n. ' Ferdinand Joseph, exported Lorn .Austria to misrule Alex'co, was going from Mexico to Belgium to expiate her grandl'atiler’s crime by giving her .blood (by transfusion) to extend t her ld'e of Alaximiliati’s widow. The

enblema-n socks to give a touch ol rein a nee to the tragedy, but does not ( stick to historical accuracy in declaring that the President who had deposed Maximilian forced the latter's consort to witness the shooting 1 of her husband. As a matter of tact, Charlotte was hack in Europe, alter occupying the tinsel throne of Mexico when that monarchy fell and the j royal Austrian’s life went, out with it. 'i’he mission of Gretta Lopez from Mexico to Maximilian's otcogenarian widow (she is now. in her Bt>th year) serves to recall a very interesting, if tragic, episode of so long ago that it takes us back into the days who'll Napoleon the Third, emulating the founder of his house, sought a great Emperorship overseas. After the French victory in its war with Mexico in Napoleon 111. chose Archduke Maximilian, brother of the Emperor of Austro; the late and irngie Francis Josef, of the illfated Hapsburg house, io he Emperor of Mexico. Live .years previously .Maximilian, who was a weak nntV vain sort of personage, had married Charlotte, sisbor of tihe lata TVing Leopold If. of Belgium, another monarch of the type of Francis Josef. Maximilian and Charlotte, had ruled over the Court of Mexico ho a mere three or four years, misunderstood of and misunderstanding the people out there, when the changeful Napoleon ordered the withdrawal from Mexico of the French troops, the Imllor hot ween .Maximilian and an outraged people. That withdrawal order sealed Maximilian's doom. He olfered to abdicate tool go hack to Europe, but Was persuaded by Charlotte to wait while slip went across to Europe to make a personal appeal to Napoleon to restore military support to her husband's tottering throne. Napoleon refused, and by the summer ol’ ISO 7 the empire was a republic. Maximilian and his prinepal Cabinet Ministers being summarily condemned io death and shot:. ’I he Empress Charlotte was spared the knowledge of this Until tragedy. She was in a highly strong condition ■ when she visited NanoTeoii 111., and the iaet that. imo official preparations 'pvcivi made to receive her had a still more disquieting ■effect. Her lady-in-wait-ing, Lhe Countess . del Barrio, has related that the interview between Charlotte and Napoleon/ was a stormv one. So much so, that alter her violent outburst the voting Empress collapsed. From that day she never recovered her reason. She was taken to Switzerland, where her dementia took Lite form of believing l.liaL she. wa,; being puts tied by assassins She visited the Pope, and in'sistdl upon the unique experience ol staying the-night at the Vatican. Next day she was immured in a. convent. Eventually, she was taken to Belgium, to the Chateau of Tervueren, where she could only he kept quiet by the presence ol a clay-figure dressed in imperial ra merit. In due course her madness became less and los« violent, aiidj»Eing Leopold had her taken to the Chateau Bouchoutie near the roval palace ol Latkeu. During the recent. Croat Mar Charlotte’s was almost the only domain 101 l unmolested by the invading Germans. been use she was sister-in-law lo their ally ol Austria. But ( harlolite knew ,noilhing' of the great. European enstnstropho, for although she is aide in talk and read and lead Io some extent the lile ol a great iadv. her mind remains a blank with regard to her life tragedy. §he is over So years of age and a girl of IS offers blood transfusion. 'rime’s revenge, indeed!