I have told of my infancy and childhood thousands of times; and I am certain those stories will be further repeated to remain on record…

My name is Anita Delgado Briones and I am the Princess of Kapurthala.

I was born in 1890 in Málaga (Spain), city in which my childhood went by in the company of my sister Victoria, my parents and my grandmother. Due to matters of life my family was forced to sell the business they had. And when, months later, grandmother passed away we decided to sell the house and start over elsewhere. This was the reason for leaving Málaga and coming to live to Madrid.

In the capital my father could not manage to find work, and our situation was becoming more precarious, but, as you will see as follows,  suddenly fortune smiled upon us in a surprising way. It all began with some dance lessons that the neighbour downstairs used to give  us  for free, because we could not pay… Some promoters that were scouting  for new faces saw the two of us dancing and a few weeks later we were christened: Victoria and I were “Las Hermanas Camelias” - The Camelia Sisters.

The Camelia Sisters

Those gentlemen had hired us for the sum of thirty “reales”- royals per night, to entertain as a support act and to dance between the various acts of the artists in the “Central Kursaal”.

From the beginning we met a group of writers and painters who frequented the place. One of the latter, Anselmo Miguel Nieto was determined to paint me in 1905. The pose lasted three months.

Painting by Anselmo Miguel Nieto, “Anita Delgado la Camelia” 1905

…Little did the kind Anselmo know that years later he would paint me again, at least on another two occasions . And little did I know the amount of times I would have to pose for painters and photographers throughout my life.

Beltrán Massés painted me in 1919

The intellectuals from the Kursaal socialized on one of the tables with all the artists except with ourselves, as my father used to say.

One morning we went to attend the march of personalities which were on their way to the Royal Palace. They were guests to the wedding of King Alfonso XIII of Spain, who was to be married on the 31st of May to an English Princess, known as Victoria Eugene.

I was sixteen years-old then, I had my hair tied up in two plaits and wore mourning attire for grandmother.

We were left with our mouths open when, on the corner of Montera Street with Plaza del Sol, a silver plated coach with a strange character inside stopped before us. The man wore a white and blue turban over which shone a peacock-shaped brooch and clothing so luxurious and outlandish! He was loaded with jewels, a stout man, wore an odd beard and his eyes were insistently nailed upon myself. His piercing gazes made me shake from head to toes.

The Maharajah of Kapurthala on elephant

Those who were present said that, when the procession resumed its march, the man’s head turned around and with his face turned he remained until he lost us from sight. I remained pondering to myself whether he was Cuban or Muslim…

Later I knew that the character was none other than His Royal Highness the Rajah Jagatjit Singh of Kapurthala.

His Royal Highness the Rajah Jagatjit Singh of Kapurthala

I think that His Highness fell in love with me that instant, as the saying goes: true love is…love at first sight…

Destiny intertwined the rest. A series of coincidences facilitated the contact and the intellectuals at the Kursaal lent a helping hand “Gentlemen, achieving Anita’s marriage with that Rajah is a question of patriotism” I recall hearing Valle-Inclán proclaim.

On the day of the King’s wedding, an anarchist threw a bomb at the coach of the newly-weds. The latter came out unharmed from the attack but the guests, fearing civil war, made an impromptu exit from Spain.

Not a week had gone by when the Rajah’s secretary reached our door with a letter for myself. In it His Highness confessed that he was captured by my presence and he proposed for my hand in marriage. In case of acceptance, I should consider the bearer of the letter as my personal servant, as he would be in charge of taking me to Paris with my family to arrange the wedding. And so we did.

The whole train journey I spent suspecting:

Does this man love me so much  that  he would have me leave for foreign country with my family? Leave like this, in an express service, to see a king and to marry him, as if we were lovers from long ago…what do I know if that will be love or what it will be…

All in all, a month later we were arriving at the Quai d’Orsay.

Here I am in Paris with my first long-coat and hat. The attire was quite heavy!

When arriving in France I was determined to learn whatever was needed, as a queen must know things that women here do not learn…

The daily schedule that the Prince wished for me to undertake was quite tiresome: lessons in the morning, a short drive in auto mobile, a class of something they called etiquette and in the afternoon we had a review, dancing, tennis, skating, horse-ridding, piano, drawing and billiards, music, geography lessons, several languages… I had a teacher for each subject.

“Tomorrow I leave for my country-he told me with a deep sadness-, I hope you will be good and obedient. You shall not need a thing as your lady in waiting has orders to please you in whatever you desire, however as you are so young, you are only permitted to go to the cinema and for a drive. I will return to celebrate our civil marriage”.

It was the first time I was separated from him. I think that I already loved him somewhat and I was saddened that he left.

Mr. E. Patry made a portrait of me in Paris in December of 1907. I was few months pregnant, waiting my son.

My parents were delighted and Victoria, who now spoke French very well, told me she was courting, an American named Jorge Winans. I was very pleased indeed for her and though what coincidence that the two sisters had fallen in love with foreign men…from so far away.

We set sail from Marseille. After almost two months’ voyage I arrived in Bombay with my lady in waiting, 40 trunks and an Andalusian damsel. Some days before the Christmas of 1907 we were in India.

My only worry was imagining what it was that I had to do when I saw the Prince again as I was very nervous.

On reaching Kapurthala, I took a deep breath and came back down to earth. I was about to become The Spanish Maharani.

His Highness said:”Look to your right and you will see the dome of the palace that will be our residence. It is a copy of Versailles”. “Have you built it for me?”, I asked; he smiled: ” I never imagined that a woman so beautiful would be the first to live here, but now I know it was destined to be you”.

Inauguration of the Jagatjit Palace of Kapurthala

The Rajah explained to me that, as a result of previous matrimonies, he had had four sons and one daughter. Their mothers are the Ranis , four women that, since the Prince fell in love with me, have not had any sort of relation to the Rajah and they lived confined in the harem.

My bridal gown was brought to me, and as I was dying of curiosity, I observed as the package was opened. Everyone sung praise at the gown but I could not see what way the gown was worn , as it was only one whole piece of pink fabric. Mind you it was embroidered with gold and silver. I then became very sad and started sobbing. I cried so much that my lady in waiting had to come and console me. She explained that in India white is the colour of death and mourning; that the colour of luck is cherry red and that happiness is represented with silver and gold. But I was not in the mood for explanations. All my life I had dreamed of getting married with a beautiful white dress, like the Queens of Spain.

On said day I was awakened, bathed and combed, they began to dress me in the attire and newly-wed jewels. It was completely dark.

When they finished and I saw myself in the mirror I thought it was a dream. When my lady in waiting saw me she said “Oh my, how beautiful you look, Miss, you look like a virgin!”, those words were comforting.

As the sun rose  the Rajah arrived dressed up in his best attire. It was the first time I saw him armed with his Sikh suit.

Shortly after the foreign Rani was known as Prem Kaur of Kapurthala.

The official photograph of our wedding

My son was born in the month of April. The birth was difficult and both our lives were feared for. I did not stop praying to my Virgin of  Victory pleading she deliver me from a terrible ending. I promised her a ceremonial robe if she helped me. Everything was resolved happily and the boy was named Ajit Singh.

Here we are, the Maharani, and the Prince Ajit Singh.

So, little by little, I became accustomed to my new life.

Hunts, banquets, parties and receptions, those were my occupations.

Hunting on elephant back. Dizzying!

Summers were spent in the palace in the mountains with my son and we travelled to Europe twice a year.

Children's party in our summer palace.

Eighteen years I spent as the favourite wife of a Maharajah whose fortune would make any of the European royal families pale faced, Lord of life and death in the small kingdom of Karpurthala.

My most known photograph.

Time passed and His Highness and I had become quite famous in Europe. Each time we arrived for a trip hoards of photographers were waiting at the ships dock for us and made the most intrusive  questions about our private life.

With my husband, the Maharajah of Kapurthala on trip around Europe.

The truth is we were very well known. In Spain my story had been put to music by a librettist. He wrote a satire and was distributed around the streets on my wedding day. The lyric became so popular, that even the young girls would recite it while playing in circle…

The newspapers illustrators depicted my husband as a fat man weighed down with jewels. I thought that painting him so was quite reasonable, as he had always been stout, since childhood and the poor thing had spent his whole life dieting…

The Maharajah of Kapurthala when hi was a child

Since everything is shared in co-existence, I caught His Highness’ fondness for precious stones, jewels and bits of jewellery so with time’s passing my jewellery collection began to flourish with beautiful and valuable pieces.

H.R.H. The Maharajah of Kapurthala, my husband.

I recall that on the ninth year I took a fancy to a crescent moon shaped emerald. The gem was part of the decorations that harnessed the head of the oldest elephant in the palace. I became infatuated by it, I thought it a pity such a beautiful gem be worn by an elephant, and I asked the Prince for it. Finally and after a lot of begging, he gave it to me. The crescent moon shaped emerald is my favourite jewel. I like it some much I have had several portraits done with it. No matter how many jewels I may receive, it will always be my favourite.

Posing with my favourite jewel.

My husband was eager to see the publishing of the book which I myself had written telling about the travels we made given that the Maharajah loved to see me writing my daily diary, answering my correspondence and noting anecdotes of our daily lives.

One of my diaries, from 1913.

So in 1915, His Highness handed my manuscript to an editorial in New York. The piece is called “Impressions de mes voyages aux Indes” and is written under my Indian name.

It is a precious and singular book.

My book Impressions de mes voyages aux Indes.

Meanwhile my sister Victoria had married Jorge Winans. However the American turned out to be a bad husband. He was a womaniser, libertine, and fond of drugs. In the summer of 1917 he abandoned her for a woman of perverse nature with whom he was having an affair with in their own house. The grief due to her husbands outrage, the War and the Spanish plague all finished with my poor sister who passed away in 1918. She was twenty nine years old and left behind her four children of which only two survived her: Guillermo and Victoria Ana María, who is my goddaughter and has always been by my side.

My goddaughter Victoria Winans Delgado.

As the saying goes - when it rains it pours and, life took a turn for the worse. I was very saddened over my sister and I fell ill. I suffered: “Complications of an interesting state with a massive blood deficiency” -as was diagnosed in the medical certificate- which was brought on as a result of an abortion, a complicated surgical intervention and a long recovery period away from Kapurthala.

I took the decision to separate from my husband when, once recovered I returned to the palace and became aware of his infidelities. Despite everything and so as not to harm the inheritance rights of my son, I waited until Ajit reached adulthood.

My handsome son, Ajit Singh of Kapurthala, at the age of thirty.

Somebody said they had seen me ridding in company of a jockey that was not from Kapurthala. The Maharajah became very annoyed. I was not intimidated by his  reaction. After long discussions we signed a separation agreement.

…And the foreign Rani abandoned India.

I passed the first years as a divorced princess living in Paris with open houses in Switzerland and Málaga.

If you consult my photograph album you will see me on holidays in Deauville, in the Lido in Venice and in Nice during the saison . Of course I never missed Holy Week in Andalusia, the Seville fair and all the bullfights of the season. In Biarritz I used to play tennis with the Rostchilds, the Sultan Shiras Bey and I was devoted to the social gatherings of writers, painters and intellectuals such as Vicente Blasco Ibánez, Beltrán Massés, Néstor Martín-Fernandez de la Torre…One could say I lead a truly busy life.

I also had some loves and hundreds of admirers.

Photograph which I dedicated to the painter Néstor Martín-Fernandez de la Torre.

In 1927 I coincided in Paris with Vicente Blasco Ibánez, the famous writer from Valencia who lived in exile in the Côte Azor. He proposed something unexpected: he had the idea of writing about my life as a Spanish sovereign in India. I gladly accepted. Unfortunately the writers passing months later obliged him to leave his work unfinished.

I passed the Spanish Civil War with my niece in a discreet hotel in the Breton coast, in France, and together we lived the first compasses of the Second World War in Portugal, in relative tranquillity.

On my return to Madrid destiny made sure an old friend would cross my path: Ginés Rodríguez Fernández de Segura.

We had met in Málaga twenty something years back, at a distant cousins’ wedding. Ginés was the groom. That day he confessed that he had fallen in love with me “at first sight” but he married my cousin. We then lost touch.

As soon as we saw each other again we found ourselves once more.  Gazing into each others’ eyes we made the decision. - I love you more than my own life - he told me. I smiled and we never again separated. Two weeks later Ginés was officially named as my “personal secretary”.

With Ginés Rodriguez.

After 1953 I had an idea stuck in my head. I wanted to write my life-story. I was dedicated to publishing my memoirs, but things did not turn out as expected.

I became very sick from the heart towards the end of May and I felt there was little time left. I actually began to die, on the 6^th of July and the process lasted about twenty hours.

On the morning of the seventh of July the bell sounded with urgency,  before the door of my compartment I overheard agitated voices which were silenced. Ajit, my son had arrived. I knew it was time to go.

All the Spanish press published that a princess had just passed away in Madrid. It was on “San Fermín” day (7^th July) of 1962 at six o’clock in the evening.

My remains rest at the Sacramental de San Justo. The headstone is made of white marble. The coffin is dominated by a cross and over the headstone lies the Sikh dagger and the Crown of the House of Kapurthala, this denotes that the person that lies here belonged to royalty.

Ginés and Ajit took charge of realizing my last wishes. All my possessions became property of my son. He recovered my jewels, which were deposited in a safe in the Central Bank, and proceeded to empty and sell the houses in Madrid and Málaga.

For my niece Victoria I left my personal objects: clothes, coats. Saris, portraits, fans and my most priced possession: all my letters, diaries, photographs and documents with the charge of taking custody of my memory or to hand it over to whoever knows how to best preserve it.