There was a time when Austria was the head of a huge empire that ended up disintegrating after the end of the First World War. Many revolutions or wars ended kingdoms and empires and that of Austria was the last to go down in history. Who was then the last to wear his crown? Who was the emperor who had to turn off the light, as they say?
That emperor was Charles I of Austria, also known as Carlos IV of Hungary, a man born in 1887 who died in 1922. Besides being the last Emperor of Austria and the last King of Hungary he was also He was the last monarch of a family that gave many kings to the world, the House of the Habsburg-Lorraine.
Charles I of Austria reigned barely three years, from 1916 to 1919 when he left the government without abdicating. The monarchy was dying, although he tried not to make that happen until the day of his own death in 1922. He was born on August 17, 1887 at Persenbeug Castle, in Lower Austria, when the Emperor and King of Hungary was his Great-uncle Francisco José, a man with whom she would never get along.
He married Princess Zita of Bourbon-Parma y when Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in Sarajevo, triggering the Great War, he became heir. Only then did the emperor begin to take him more seriously and was inclined to introduce him to matters of state. When Francisco José died he finally acceded to the throne, in 1916. Shortly after, the Poles would declare their independence and Austria would become a confederation of states, which would mean the beginning of the end of the Empire. In 1918 he left the state and it left it to the Austrians and Hungarians to decide on their form of government.
Charles I of Austria, Although he tried to keep the monarchy in Austria and later in Hungary, he did not succeed. He went into exile with his wife to the island of Madeira. In 1922 he caught cold while walking in the city, it was complicated in bronchitis and then pneumonia. With no antibiotics in sight, they hadn't been invented yet, he had a couple of heart attacks and died on April 1 in front of his wife who was pregnant with their eighth child.
His remains are still buried on the island of Madeira, except for his heart, which along with his wife are buried in Switzerland. In 2004 he was beatified by the Catholic Church.