Hi,
Thank you Veronica, MarieCharlotte and Yseult for your wonderful contributions! It's great to have someone I can «talk» about Princess Maria Anna with. She really was a special Lady. The day she got married, she was brokenhearted to have to leave her family, but she stood firmly at the altar, and nobody saw her shed a single tear. «She cried it all out yesterday, by herself, not to hurt her brothers who all think they are losing a second mother». Queen Stephanie tells her mother that Maria Anna will specially be missed in King Ferdinand's (her father) life, since she was the one used as a moderator between him and King Pedro V because of being so diplomatic. During the months they spent together at the Necessidades Palace, between May 1858 and May 1859, Queen Stephanie and Princess Maria Anna developed a deep friendship and the Queen thought she was «so clever for her young age».
Before the future King Carlos was born and after tragedy struck the Portuguese Royal Family (4 deaths in 3 years: 1859-1861), she was the 3rd in the line of succesion, next to her surviving brothers King Luiz and Prince Augusto. Her husband Georg was always reminding her of that, because he was very proud. For what I have read, they were not happy. Maria Anna had great expectations and was keen of her liberal background. Georg believed in autocratic Monarchy, unlike her sister Antonia's husband, Leopold of Hohenzollern. So Maria Anna avoided any discussions about politics with him. Later on, as his character was similar to his convictions, she avoided discussions of any sort.
When her nephew King (then prince) Carlos visits her, she is living by herself in a small palace near Dresden (I will try to find its name). But Georg insists on Carlos staying at the main palace «because Aunt Anna's place is so small».
All I know about her death is that she had been ill for more than a week when it happened in February 5, 1884. Her children had all had a fever and the youngest, Albert, got dephtyria. She cared for him day and night during 3 months and became ill, growing weaker and weaker. After her death it was Mathilde who became a second mother to the others.
When Maria Anna left Portugal in 1859 she carried with her the most expensive wardrobe you can imagine, all of which is accounted for in the Royal papers. King Pedro V insisted on it, probably because Queen Stephanie had come almost without any money to her marriage. Maria Anna joked saying she would wear her old Portuguese court dresses anyway. In some of her photos already in Saschen you can see her wearing those favorite dresses.
About how Maria Anna and her siblings, Antonia and the Princes, were raised by Queen Maria II, there are a number of beautiful «jokes». Queen Maria was a «super-mother» and insisted on teaching the children herself and on going out with them to stroll through the streets of Lisbon like any normal housewife. That was what she understood being a Liberal meant. Once, at the public garden in central Lisbon, a poor boy came to ask for a kiss from the princes. As he was very dirty, they turned their faces on him in disgust. Queen Maria slapped them right there and made them kiss the boy because «it is them we live for». She is still called «the Good Mother» and «the Educator» in History books.
