Not everyone cheered when three-year-old Isabella ascended the throne of Spain in 1833. In fact, a civil war broke out. Her father Ferdinand VII had abolished the so-called Salic Law shortly before his death. It provided that only men could claim the throne. Due to this decision of the king, his brother Carlos missed out on the crown. With the support of conservative nobles, he now rebelled against his niece and her mother, who acted as regent.
The civil war lasted six years and ended with a victory for the liberal nobles who supported Isabella. The problems for the very young queen were not over, because a fight immediately broke out among her supporters. Mother was pushed aside as regent by a successful general, who in turn was removed after a coup by two other generals. The Cortes, the Spanish parliament, now decided to declare Isabella (13) an adult, so that she – in name – was at the helm herself.
The politicians who accompanied her centralized power: the monarchy and the Cortes had more say, the regions of Spain less. Good news for Queen Isabella, but she had other things on her mind. Politics forced her to marry her cousin, Francis of Assisi, in 1846.
Isabella didn’t like this man of whom she said that “he wore more lace than I did on our wedding night.” Rumors soon spread that Frans was homosexual. When the queen fell in love with a handsome soldier a year after her marriage and wanted a divorce, there was a crisis. Her mother’s intervention – you stay with your husband! – brought peace to the palace.
For the sake of form, because when Isabella gave birth to her first daughter in 1851, it was immediately rumored that the child was not Frans’s. The same would be said about all twelve children she bore. (The queen had a long string of lovers throughout her life.) As if all this wasn’t exciting enough, in 1852 she survived an assassination attempt by a priest.
In 1854, a popular uprising broke out after a coup, which once again led to a change of power in Madrid. The following decade seemed somewhat more stable, but there was growing dissatisfaction about corruption at the court and the lack of say for politicians who did not belong to the ruling party. In 1866, that anger exploded with yet another military uprising.
This time it not only led to the replacement of the political elite, but also to the deposition of the queen. It was during this time that Isabella earned her nickname: ‘la de los tristes destinos‘, she of the sad fate/the unfortunate one. This was a reference to Richard III from Shakespeare, in which Queen Elisabeth is told: ‘Farewell, York’s wife, and queen of sad mischief‘.
Isabella’s luck had indeed run out. She spent the rest of her life in exile in France. Her son Alfonso became king of Spain in 1874, after the abolition of the republic.