Infante Alfonso, brother of King Juan Carlos

[Guinastasia]

What exactly happened with Juan Carlos and his brother?  I heard he accidentally shot him.  What's the story?

(So very sad-I can only imagine how painful it must be for the King).

[Eurohistory]

Two boys "playing" with guns with a terrible consequence.  Apparently they were cleaning he guns and one went off hiting the poor Alfonsito on his forehead. Death was almost immediate. It was a terrible tragedy.  The Countess of Barcelona was devastated and she plunged into a horrific depression, which even changed her physique considerably.

Much nonsense has been mad eof this private tragedy.  Some imbeciles have even argued don Juan Carlos disposed of his brothe ron purpose...trying to make political fodder of what was a provate family tragedy.

I visited the Villa Giralda in Estoril some years ago. Wa slucky enough to walk through the house, using a book on the exile of the Spanish royal family in Portugal as my guide.  I was also in Spain when Alfonsito's remains were repatriated to the Escorial, where he rests for eternity near his loving parents.

Arturo Beéche
 

[Yseult]

You´re right, Arturo...it was a great tragedy for all the family! Juan Carlos was eighteen years old, and Alfonsito was almost fifteen years old. I can imagine the Countess of Barcelona´s deep sorrow and pain. But I suppose the depression was increased with all the gossip about the terrible accident.

Infante don Jaime, brother of don Juan and, so, uncle of both Juan Carlos and Alfonsito, claimed for a public investigation. It was not "fair play". When the infante demanded the investigation, all the people began to spread gossip: the gun was a gift of General Franco, the Count of Barcelona forced his son Juan Carlos to swear under a spanish flag it was really an accident, and more, and more... It must have been very sad for the poor mother of the boys!.

[Eurohistory]

Yet another one of the Infante don Jaime many shenanigans and disgusting acts in a life fillled with a troublesome and wasted existence...poor man!

Arturo Beéche

[Guinastasia]

His own uncle said that?  How horrid!  What, was he trying to take over the throne?

IIRC, Adlai Stevenson had a similiar accident when he was about nine-he accidentally shot and killed a playmate while showing off his brother's rifle.

[grandduchessella]

There was a bio on JC not too many years ago that made that claim, wasn't there? I was reading through old Majesty & Royalty magazines once and came across an article on it but didn't pay too much attention as I don't study as much on modern royals. Seemed very sad to try and lay that on a young man, as the King was then. I mean, to allege he committed cold-blooded murder--and of his own brother--really shameful.

I had no idea that his uncle had a hand in it. I wonder was there bitterness because Jaime was excluded for consideration for the throne due to his health issues. Maybe it warped his familial relationships over time.  

[Eric_Lowe]

I guess that must be one of the reasons that the two branches of the family were not on speaking terms. It was a tragedy and should be seen as such.  :-?

[Eurohistory]

The reasons behind the rift between don Juan and don Jaime ran much, much deeper than that.

Arturo Beéche

[Eric_Lowe]

Care to eleberate ?  :-? It is about the sucession ? I heard there is also rivary between their sons, Juan Carlos and Alfonso.  :-/

[Eurohistory]

Succession
Finances
Jaime's family
Property
Franco
The Golden Fleece
Charlotte Tiedemann
Alfonsito's death
Etc, etc, etc...

Not a happy situation by any stretch of the imagination...

As for Juan Carlos and Alfonso...the King's cousin forgot, conveniently of course, that he was born without dynastic rights...this is a fact he never overcame, fact even amply explained by KIng Alfonso XIII.

Alfonso, the cousin, tried to position himself in front of Franco, as a possible choice for king, just in case don Juan Carlos disturbed Franco's plans.  Alfonso quickly forgot, in his blind ambiton, that his uncle Barcelona had contributed considerably to paying for his expenses and schooling (for further informaiton on this I refer you to the Countyess of Barcelona's memoirs) just as did his mother's second husband, Tonino Sozzani, a poor man who was seen by his wife and her children as a walking bank account.

A book can be written about the Borbon Dampierre's and their myriad ambitions no doubt, but in the end both poor brothers ended up become rather tragic figures overwhelmed by personal tragedy and failure.

Arturo Beéche

[Eurohistory]

His own uncle said that?  How horrid!  What, was he trying to take over the throne?

IIRC, Adlai Stevenson had a similiar accident when he was about nine-he accidentally shot and killed a playmate while showing off his brother's rifle.

It is a terrible tragedy that happens far too often.  Our neighbors went through the same episode when their 6 year old son shot his 10 year old sister while playing with their father's gun...it was a terrible tragedy, horrific!

My first cousin Juan Carlos shot himself with our grandmother's gun, in his case it was no accident sadly, but a terrible tragedy. After that I pushed for everyone in our family, and there were not that many gun owners anyhow, who possessed a gun to dispose of it.  Everyone did...

Arturo Beéche

[grandduchessella]

My paternal grandfather had his eye shot out when he was a pre-teen by a friend playing with a BB gun.    My Dad wouldn't let any of my brother's have one. Not that Bob would want a gun anyway but you can't have one if you live in military housing. All issued weapons are signed in and out at the armory at the beginning and end of shifts.

Were Juan and Jaime close as children? Did the estrangement start in childhood or after exile or when? Did the sisters take sides?

[Eric_Lowe]

Who is Charlotte Tiedemann ?

I agree that a book can be written about the Borbon Dampierre situation, would Eurohistory be interested ?

Yes I believe so. That is why I suopport gun control from the get-go. I heard these stories about the accidents too often.

[Yseult]

Eric:

Charlotte Louise Auguste Tiedemann was a divorced singer when infante Jaime married her. He was, by the way, divorced from his first wife, Emmanuelle Dampierre, mother of his two sons, Alfonso and Gonzalo.

Jaime was a poor man. He was the second son of Alfonso XIII and Ena. When he was...I think three years old...he suffered an attack of mastoiditis and, after a botched operation, became a deaf mute. So, a lot of years later, when his elder brother Alfonso prince of Asturias, an haemophilic, renounced his rights to the throne to marry a commoner, the king, father of both the two princes, obtained the renounce of Jaime, too. The king was sure about the lack of cualities to reign of Jaime.

I don´t like so much Emmanuelle Dampierre, the first wife of Jaime. She is not a sympathetic figure to me. About Charlotte Tiedemann, I have not info.

[Eurohistory]

When the Spanish Royal family found itself living in exile and radio was the only way the King could get his message to Spain, always hoping, for a call back from his people, it was terribly important for whoever was the heir to be able to communicate.

Infante don Jaime having suffered the effects of a botched surgery, he had speech and auditive problems.  This condition then, the King his father felt, made Jaime an unlikely candidate to succeed after the renunciation sogned by the Prince of Asturias.  Jaime and his father and close counsellors agreed that the best path to follow was for him to resign his rights in exchange for financial security guaranteed by both the King and later the Count of Barcelona.  Jaime signed on the dotted paper, of that there is no doubt.  His marriage to doña Emanuela Dampierre sealed his fate as she did not qualify as an equal bride  and thus the marriage (arranged by Jaime's father and Emanuela's mother) was a double guarantee of sorts to insure that Jaime would not have second doubts.  When their first boy was born, Alfonso de Borbón y Dampierre, the child was born without dynastic rights in Spain.  Furthermore, the King, Alfonso XIII, notified the Almanach de Gotha people that Alfonso was born his grandson certainly, but possessed no dynastic rights according the Pragmatica in Spain.

The marriage of Jaime and Emanuela went south soon enough anmd the couple obtained a divorce.  She remarried, this time Anotnio Sozzani, a very wealthy Italian, Jaime eventually set-up house with Charlotte Tiedemann, a monstrously ambition woman, an alcoholic and a social arriviste who many times physically abused her Infante!

Arturo Beéche