The life of a king isn't all it's cracked up to be, well, at
least sometimes. In the case of two kings of the 1920's, Alexander I of Greece
and Christian X of Denmark, the problems that trouble the royal head manifested
in very different ways.
Alexander I's father, Constantine I, was a supporter of his brother-in-law,
Kaiser Wilhelm II, in his war against the allied forces. This stand put him at
odds with his prime minister who wanted to join the British, French, and
Russians in support of Greek minorities in the Ottoman Empire in hopes of
territorial gains. This split resulted in the formation of a parallel
government. In July 1916, arsonists set fire to the Tatoi Palace and the royal
family narrowly escaped with their lives. Constantine surrendered his power on
June 10, 1917 and entered self-exile while maintaining the crown. The Allies
selected Alexander as the man to assume the crown, he was their third choice as
new monarch, owing to other candidates' German leanings or unwillingness to
take on the role.
Imagine the fate of a king, installed by conquerors,
stripped of power, and told by his father that he held the crown in trust only.
Alexander's family departed for exile, leaving him at the Tatoi Palace
surrounded by supporters of the prime minister who'd engineered his family's
downfall. The Greek revolutionaries and Allies didn't like him, the palace was
staffed with anti-royalists and enemies of the former king, and the king's
ministers openly called him the son of a traitor to Greece. Alexander was
surrounded by enemies and spies and a virtual prisoner in his own palace.
A day after assuming the crown, Alexander revealed what
would become known as his scandal. He had been involved with a woman named Aspasia
Manos, a Greek commoner, whom he wanted to marry. On his way to exile,
Alexander's father made him promise to hold off on the wedding until the end of
the war, however isolation led him to disobey this order. It would take the aid
of Aspasia's brother-in-law and three attempts before the couple was secretly
joined on November 17, 1919. The kings prime minister leaked news of the
wedding and Aspasia was forced to leave Greece, finally ending up in Paris. Six
months later Alexander was allowed to join her there, but the couple were
forbidden to attend public events together.
The couple were allowed to return to Greece in 1920 and,
though their marriage was legalized, Aspasia would not be granted the title of
Queen. On October 2 of that same year, Alexander was bitten by a monkey and
contracted septicemia and was dead by October 25th.
The crisis faced by King Christian X of Denmark wasn't one
of love, but pride. Christian was an authoritarian ruler who strongly believed
in the rights and powers of royalty. In the wake of World War I, Denmark was
faced with the question of how to handle the reunification between Denmark and
Schleswig which had been a Danish fiefdom before the war. Denmark had lost the
region to Prussia during the Second War of Schleswig in 1864 and Germany's
defeat offered an opportunity to bring the territory under Danish rule.
The Treaty of Versailles stipulated that the fate of
Schleswig be determined by two votes: one in northern Schleswig and another in
central Schleswig while southern Schleswig would remain German owing to its
overwhelmingly ethnic German population. The result put northern Schleswig in
Danish control while the central region voted to remain German. Danish Prime Minister
Carl Theodor Zahle determined that reunification with northern Schleswig should
go forward with the central and southern regions remaining part of Germany, but
settling the matter wouldn't be so easy.
King Christian sided with Danish nationalists who desired to
see Germany permanently weakened after the war and ordered the Prime Minister
to break up the central region, ceding key parts to Denmark. The Prime
Minister, citing the fact Denmark had been a parliamentary democracy since 1901
refused to carry out the king's orders and resigned within days. In the wake of
Zahle's resignation, the king dissolved parliament and attempted to put a
"temporary caretaker cabinet" in place which leaned toward his conservative,
royalist sentiment. Demonstrations and a nearly revolutionary atmosphere
mushroomed in Denmark and it seemed the monarchy would topple until the king
reversed course, opened negotiations with Social Democrats, and eventually
stood down, dismissing the government he'd installed and putting a compromise cabinet
in place until elections were held later in the year. This stumble would become
known as the Easter Crisis of 1920 and would be the last time a Danish monarch
took political action without the full support of parliament. Fortunately for
King Christian, his actions in World War II would return the shine to the
Danish crown.
Throne to the Dogs
King of Greece (to Danish King) - Yes, these are rotten times for men in our line.
Two different kings and two very different problems, but
both show up in the same cartoon. Appearing in the July 1920 issue of The Judge Magazine, King Alexander and
Christian are depicted sharing their royal woes on a train ride.
