Ena and Bee : Queen Victoria's Spanish Granddaughters

The lives and mutually supportive friendship of Queen Ena (Victoria Eugenia), consort of King Alfonso XIII of Spain, and her cousin Bee, Infanta Beatrice, wife of his cousin Infante Alfonso, set to a background of bitter court intrigues during the unsettled monarchical and then republican era of a country in which divisions led to civil war.

Princess Eugenia (Ena) of Battenberg and Princess Beatrice (Bee) of Saxe-Coburg, granddaughters of Queen Victoria of England, married into the Spanish royal family. In 1906 Ena became the consort of King Alfonso XIII, who had been sovereign since his birth in 1886. Three years later Bee married his cousin, Infante Don Alfonso. Ena's marriage proved unhappy with the ill-health of her haemophiliac sons and her husband's infidelities. The King abdicated in 1931, and they led separate lives in exile until he died in 1941. Bee and her husband Ali were more popular, although personal differences between them and the King resulted in their temporary exile for the first years of their marriage, they later returned to Spain, staying there for the rest of their lives. Bee died in 1966 and Ena three years later. This dual biography, written by Anna de Sagrera with additional material from Dona Beatriz, Bee's granddaughter, looks in depth at the friendship of the mutually supportive cousins against the often turbulent background of twentieth century Spanish politics.