Queen Marie and the Baha'i Faith
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Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Robert Postlethwaite, Queen Marie and the Baha'i Faith, bahai-library.com.
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Queen Marie and the Bahà’i Faith
Robert Postlethwaite

Abstract
This article focuses on the first monarch to embrace thé Bahďí Faith, Queen Marie of
Romania. It sets out to convey the stature and the character of this remarkable woman,
her unique position in the early twentieth century, and, above all, her position in the
Bahďí Faith. It also sets out to examine two issues. First, it is widely known that Queen
Marie was a Bahď I. Yet, a number of her own statements seem to contradict this
affiliation and bring into question her conversion to the Bahďí Faith. Through
examining her diaries and public statements, this work attempts to clarify the apparent
contradiction. The second issue concerns Queen Marie’s plan to visit the Bahďí World
Centre in Haifa in 1929. Shoghi Effendi had made arrangements for a visit that never
took place. It is well known that she reached Haifa in Palestine (Israel) on March 30,
1929, but failed to contact Shoghi Effendi or to visit the places she had deeply desired to
visit. Information from her unpublished personal diaries sheds new light on her aborted
pilgrimage. In the process of exploring the above issues, what emerges is the faithful
friendship of Martha Root, an early Bahďí teacher, from the moment Martha met the
Queen in 1926. An integral part of that relationship were some deeply touching, loving
letters from Martha to Marie about the Bahai Faith. Excerpts from these letters are
included in this article.

Résumé
Cet article porte sur la première souveraine à avoir adopté la foi bahaie, la Reine
Marie de Roumanie. L'auteur tente de démontrer Timportance et la personnalité de cette
femme remarquable, le rang unique dont elle jouissait au début du XXe siècle et, surtout,
le rang quelle occupait au sein de la foi bahaie. L’auteur se penche aussi sur deux
questions. D'une part, il est bien connu que la Reine Marie était bahďíe. Néanmoins,
nombre de ses propres déclarations semblent contredire ce fait, soulevant ainsi le doute
quant à sa conversion à la foi bahďíe. En examinant ses journaux intimes et ses
déclarations publiques l'auteur tente d’éclaircir cette apparente contradiction. D'autre
part, Tarticle traite de la visite que la Reine Marie se proposait de faire au centre
mondial bahďí, à Haifa, en 1929. Shoghi Effendi avait fait des préparatifs en vue de
cette visite, qui n'eut pourtant pas lieu. Il est bien connu que la Reine Marie est arrivée à
Haifa, en Palestine (Israël), le 30 mars 1929, mais elle n’a ni contacté Shoghi Effendi ni
visité les lieux qu’elle désirait ardemment voir. Des renseignements tirés de journaux
intimes inédits de la Reine Marie jettent une lumière nouvelle sur ce pèlerinage avorté.
Par ailleurs, l’examen de ces deux questions met en relief l'amitié indéfectible que
Martha Root, Tune des premières enseignantes bahaies, a voué à la Reine Marie depuis
leur première rencontre, en 1926. Des letters empreintes ď affection et profondément
touchantes que Martha a adressé à la Reine Marie au sujet de la foi bahďíe étaient au
coeur même de cette amitié. L’article présente des extraits des lettres en question.
56          T HE J O U R N A L OF B A H Á ’I S T U D I E S                   6.2.1994

Resumen
Esta articulo trata sobre el primer monarca en ceňirse a la Fe Bahd’i, la Reina Maria
de Rumania. Busca impartir la talia y carácter de tan notable mujer, su lugar ûnico a
comienzos del siglo veinte y, sobre todo, su posiciém dentro de la Fe Bahai. Procura
también examinar dos temas. Primera, es ampliamente conocido que la Reina Maria era
bahâ’i. Sin embargo, muchas de sus propias declaraciones parecen contradecir esto y
ponen en duda su conversion a la Fe Bahà’i. Mediante examinación de sus diarios y sus
declaraciones pùblicas, este escrito trata de poner en claro esta aparente contradicción.
El segundo tema se refiere al inteàto de la Reina Maria de visitor el Centro Mundial
Bahd’i en Haifa en 1929. Shoghi Effendi habia llevado a cabo los preparativos para una
visita que al fin no occuriô. Se sabe que ella llegô a Haifa en Palestina (Israel) el 30
marzo de 1929, pero déjà de ponerse en contacto con Shoghi Effendi o visitor los
lugares que ella tan hondamente deseaba ver. Extrados de sus diarios personates no
publicados dan nueva comprensiân respecto al peregrinaje inconcluso. En el transcurso
de investigar los temas antes mencionados, emerge la fiel amistad de Martha Root, una
de las primeras maestros Bahà’is, desde el mornento de Martha conocer a la Reina en
1926. Forman parte esencial de ese vinculo unas cartas profundamente conmovedoras y
amorosas de Martha a Maria acerca de la Fe Bahd'i. Pasajes de esteas cartas se
incluyen en esta disertación.

ahà’u ’Uàh enjoins his followers to give due regard to the monarchy:
B    “Regard for the rank of sovereigns is divinely ordained, as is clearly
attested by the words of the Prophets of God and His chosen ones (quoted in
Shoghi Effendi, Promised Day 72). And BaháVIláh gives us a vision of a true
monarch, whom he describes as “the very eye of mankind, the luminous
ornament on the brow of creation, the fountainhead of blessings unto the whole
world” (quoted in Rabbani, Priceless Pearl 117).
When one looks at the life and character of Queen Marie, it can easily be
said that she falls into this category. Marie was a royal’s royal. She could hardly
have been born into a more exalted position in royal Europe. Her paternal
grandmother Queen Victoria, and her maternal grandfather Alexander II, the
Tsar of Russia, were two of the most powerful rulers of their day. An interesting
fact about this lineage is that when BaháV Iláh wrote to the kings and rulers of
the world in the second half of the nineteenth century,1 these were the only two
monarchs BaháV Iláh addressed favorably.
Queen Marie was a people’s queen as well. She earned a reputation for
having a deep love and concern for her subjects, as being a woman of action
and of compassion, and of mixing easily with the people. Few, if any royal in
Europe in her day, surpassed her devotion and service to her compatriots.
Before World War I, she established the practice of allowing the public easy

1. In the second half of the nineteenth century, BaháVIláh addressed a series of
letters to the rulers of his day, proclaimiflf the coming of the unification of humanity and
the emergence of a world civilization.
Queen Mari e and the B a h a ’i Faith                                     57

access to her. One of the queen’s governesses said: “All day long people call at
the palace and if Queen Marie is at home she will see them at once” (Pakula,
Last Romantic 264).
Marie was a celebrity in her own right too. She was loved, admired, sought
after, gifted, and renowned for her beauty, charm, kindness, and humanity as
well as for her intelligence and political savvy. Contemporary journalists
described Queen Marie as “the most famous Queen of Europe,” and “the
world’s first ultra-modern Queen” (“Marie” New Republic 237). One reporter
described Marie as

a story-book queen, so variously gifted and so altogether regal in her charm that one
who writes of her must fear the accusation of flattery. Even a few minutes in her
presence enable one to understand why all Rumanians [sic], and the foreigners who
have met her, glow in praise of the simplicity, naturalness, warm-heartedness, and
talent of this queen who is kinswoman to many other queens and kings, and who has
lived all her life in the purple. The womanliness of the queen and the queenliness of the
woman have made her the idol of a kingdom. (Ellis, Roumania’s Soldier Queen 330)

The Childhood and Youth of a Princess
Born October 29, 1875, Queen Marie was of Russian and British descent. Her
mother was the former Grand Duchess Marie Alexandrovna, the only daughter
of Russia’s Tsar Alexander II. Her father, the Duke of Edinburgh, was the
second son of Queen Victoria. This lineage conferred upon her a high rank
among the royals of Europe in the late nineteenth century.
Her childhood was “a happy, carefree one, the childhood of rich healthy
children protected from the buffets and hard realities of life” (Marie, Story 3).
But, it was a Victorian childhood, which included certain duties and the
strictness of the era, as well as the discipline of a Russian mother. One of those
duties was regular visits to “Grandmamma,” Queen Victoria:

The hush around Grandmamma’s door was awe-inspiring, it was like approaching
the mystery of some sanctuary. Silent, soft-carpeted corridors led to Grandmamma’s
apartments . .. those that led the way . .. talked in hushed voices and trod softly. . . .
One door after another opened noiselessly, it was like passing through the forecourts
of a temple, before approaching the final mystery to which only the initiated had
access.. . .
When finally the door was opened there sat Grandmamma not idol-like at all, not a
bit frightening, smiling a kind little smile, almost as shy as us children, so that
conversation was not very fluent on either side. . . . I have the sort of feeling that
Grandmamma as well as ourselves was secretly relieved when the audience was over.
(Marie, Story 26)

Marie, along with her two sisters, grew up in several homes, including
Clarence House in London and Osborne Cottage on the Isle of Wight. Her
favorite was a rambling gray mansion known as Eastwell Park in Kent. It was
58           T H E J O U R N A L OF B A H Á Í S T U D I E S                  6.2.1994

set in an English park where, in Marie’s words, “magnificent old trees grew
well apart in great stretches of grass; where herds of lowing cattle grazed while
deer scampered away in the woods” (Marie, Story 3).
Marie was a beauty, even as a young girl, with a vivacious, energetic
personality to match, a combination that often captured the hearts of young
boys. In her autobiography The Story o f My Life, she told of one little boy
completely taken with her. She described him as being

red-haired, freckled, and impudent, with a fine disdain for authority. We had a
sneaking liking for each other. At first, we did not dare show it openly, but by
degrees, our red-haired guest threw away all pretense and brazenly admitted his
preference for me, declaring before witnesses that when he was grown up, he would
marry me. (Marie, Story 32)

This “red-haired, freckled” boy was later to become prime minister of Great
Britain during one of its darkest hours. That boy was Winston Churchill.
When Marie turned sixteen, there was talk of marriage. Many thought she
would marry her cousin “Georgie,” heir to the throne, and become the next
queen of Great Britain. Even Queen Victoria had encouraged this match, and
Prince George himself wanted her for his wife.
However, the Duchess of Edinburgh had other plans for her daughter and
worked to prevent the marriage. She steered Marie toward the young crown
prince of Romania, Ferdinand Viktor Albert Meinrad, Prince of Hohenzollem-
Sigmaringen. In those days, marriages were orchestrated by the royal mothers,
and daughters were often uninformed about the plans made by their mothers to
lead them toward' the young men selected for them. This certainly was the case
with Marie. In 1892, her mother arranged for Marie and Ferdinand to be together
often in Munich—outings, tours of galleries, parties, and shopping. The plan
worked wonderfully from the Duchess’s standpoint as Marie and Ferdinand fell
in love and soon became engaged. To the majority of royals throughout Europe,
especially the English court, however, sending such a talented and beautiful
princess to Romania seemed an unfortunate waste.
Perhaps Ileana, Marie’s youngest daughter, provides the best explanation for
why the Duchess favored Marie’s union with Ferdinand to that with George:

It was only because they were first cousins. And my grandmother [the Duchess of
Edinburgh] disapproved terribly of %usins marrying. . . . She [Marie] did want to
marry him [George], But she was only sixteen. . . . I don’t think my mother was
aware of the proposal [from George]. In fact, I’m convinced she wasn’t . . . . (Pakula,
The Last Romantic 58)

Ferdinand was a painfully bashful and inarticulate man, who became heir to the
throne by default. Ferdinand’s uncle. King Carol, had a son, who had died in
Queen Mar i e and the B a h d ’i Faith                            59

1874. So, it fell to Carol’s older brother. Prince Leopold, to provide a successor.
Leopold’s oldest son, Ferdinand’s older brother, Wilhelm, resided in Romania
for a year but found it “unrewarding.” He returned to Germany and passed
down the “honors” to his younger brother, Ferdinand, who could not bear to
displease his uncle or his father by refusing the post.
This approach to life was characteristic throughout Ferdinand’s reign and
often embarrassed his ministers and Marie. Unlike his wife, Ferdinand would
tremble or be speechless when he met subjects. Although they began their life
in a naive, romantic state, by the time Marie reached her twenties, she admitted
she did not love Ferdinand. In her thirties, she told her mother they had become
very good friends. And later in life, as they mellowed, and, after suffering so
much together from the war and other burdens of rank, they both appreciated
each other for their strengths: Marie for her superb handling of people, and
Ferdinand for his behind-the-scenes coordinating. He told her what points to
make as she charmed foreign visitors.
In spite of these social inadequacies, some people who knew Ferdinand well
commented on his intelligence. In one interview, George Duca, the son of Jean
Duca, a Romanian Prem ier, described Ferdinand as “a great personality
intellectually, and practically no one knew it. Those who knew it, like my father,
were absolutely full of admiration” (quoted in Pakula, Last Romantic 133).

A Royal Wedding
As one would expect, a royal wedding was a huge social event, drawing
members of royalty and prominent people of the day. On the morning of
January 10, 1893, at Sigmaringen Castle in southwestern Germany, “bells
pealed outside her window as her maids dressed her in a white silk wedding
dress” (Marie, Story 264). Three ceremonies were performed—civil. Catholic,
and Protestant—to accommodate both sets of parents and the civil authorities.
Afterwards the company of royals, including Kaiser Wilhelm II, Emperor of
Germany, .and some future subjects celebrated the marriage in a huge glass and
steel amphitheater built just for the occasion.
At nine o ’clock the newlyweds left the castle for an evening sleigh ride
across the moonlit snow to Ferdinand’s father’s hunting castle, Krauchenwies, a
romantic setting for a honeymoon. Several days later, Marie and Ferdinand left
by train for the long journey to Romania.

Early Years in Romania
Marie’s first years in Romania were sad and painful. Romania was a strange
country to her, with many unfamiliar customs and ways. And her rather carefree
life was suddenly confined by the strict habits and rules of the Romanian court
established by Ferdinand’s uncle, King Carol, a man of German descent and a
stern disciplinarian.
60           TH E J O U R N A L OF B A H Á ’I S T U D I E S               6.2.1994

Other than official public royal functions, King Carol forbade the young
couple outside contact for fear of the heirs allying themselves unintentionally
with a political party or family. The only human contact Marie had other than
Ferdinand and the King were her German maids and a tutor sent to teach her
Romanian. Marie passed endless hours in the stone-silent palace, which was set in
the middle of a lively city, wandering from room to room trying to fill the time.
The birth (1893) of her first child, a boy named Carol, made matters worse:
she felt trapped and used. It was not until several weeks into her pregnancy that
she first became fully aware of her real function: to produce a future heir. “So
this is what they wanted me for,” she recalled in her autobiography. “They
wanted me to give them an heir. But I had only just left home. . . . I was feeling
so ill, so lonely; there was no one to go to and no one to talk to; there were no
flowers and no one seemed to care about fresh air and out-door exercise . .
(Marie, Story 293). Indeed in the English court, pregnancy was never referred to
directly, the most said was that a “lady” was “in delicate health.” Her mother had
succeeded in leading Marie to the altar innocent of sex. Years later Marie wrote:

And in this she succeeded marvelously. . . . A risqué book never reached our hands,
we blushed when it was mentioned that someone was to have a baby, the classics
were only allowed in small and well-weeded doses; as for the Bible, although we
were well up in both Testaments, all the more revealing episodes had been carefully
circumscribed. (Quoted in Elsberry, Marie of Romania 48)

Marie resented her new role partly because she was remote from the Romanian
people and then had absolutely no desire to produce an heir for them and partly
because pregnancy was so difficult for her. In her day, the only pain killer
available for a difficult pregnancy was chloroform, but doctors in Romania did
not give her this relief because the Romanian clergy believed that women
should suffer for the “sin” of Eve. Nevertheless, over the next twenty years,
until she was thirty-eight, Marie gave birth to five more children, two boys and
three girls: Elisabetha (1894), Marie (Mignon) (1900), Nicholas (1903), Ileana
(1909), and Mircea (1913).
Her children were the center of her life. She wrote: “As only my two eldest
children were born in close succession, and there were longer pauses between
the other four, I was able to prolong it [the joy and pleasure of motherhood]
indefinitely” (Marie, Story 516). Unlike other royal parents, Marie spent a great
deal of time with her children and became more of a friend and companion than
a parent during those years. Disciplining her children was not one of her
strengths, something she admitted later in life: “I was in fact always inclined to
be too lenient, as I hated the feeling of any sort of tyranny or coercion, and had
an insurmountable aversion from scolding. . . . I confess that many of the
failures, even disasters of my life, can be brought back to this fundamental
inability to scold or reprove” (Marie, Story 516).
Queen Mari e and the B a h d ’i Faith                          61

The royal mother was proud of her first-born Carol’s intelligence and natural
curiosity, and found his resolve in matters preferable to his father’s passivity.
The queen enjoyed Nicholas for his charm, humor, and independence. She
appreciated Elisabetha’s “classic look” as a child but had trouble liking her
because of Elisabetha’s lack of affection. Marie described herself as a lover of
beauty and certainly took particular pleasure when she found classic beauty in
one of her own. Mignon’s sweetness, patience, and unjudging manner brought
Marie a certain satisfaction since this daughter was not demanding or self-
centered, as her first two children gradually became. The Queen called Ileana,
her youngest daughter, the child of her soul. These two became close, and
Marie saw her selflessly serve others as she herself did, and approach life in
much the same way. This brought her great pleasure and satisfaction too. Her
youngest child Mircea would not survive past the age of four after having
contracted typhoid fever.
Except for Ileana, M arie’s children became a source of sadness as they
reached adulthood. Carol especially seemed destined to break Marie’s heart. As
Marie reached her sixties, his cruelty toward her and his siblings was almost
beyond belief. When he became king in 1930, for example, he appropriated for
his own use the retirement funds Ferdinand had provided for Marie.
How a woman as competent and attentive to (although not strict with) her
children as Marie could produce such a tyrant is easily explained. When Marie
was still only eighteen and nineteen, King Carol I selected German governesses
to rear the first two children. They were completely spoiled by the household
and allowed to do as they pleased. These two children developed a superior
attitude toward others, as they were treated with excessive deference.
As she grew older, Marie demanded that she have primary responsibility for
the other children. Nevertheless, M arie found her two oldest daughters’
inclination to be overweight and somewhat lazy, even during World War I,
almost intolerable. This became an obstacle in her efforts to find them suitable
mates later in life.

Romania’s Soldier Queen
Marie’s early aversion to Romania gradually changed to a deep love. As she
matured and the restrictions of her life slowly lifted, she came to know her
adopted count ry intimately. W orld W ar I, in particular, gave her that
opportunity.
World War I’s immense casualties and losses pale from the perspective of
the end of a century that has witnessed relatively more devastating wars and
infinitely more powerful weapons. In its day, however. World War I was
unprecedented in its devastation. And in its day, it produced what most wars
produce, victors and vanquished, spoils and losses, and the inevitable heroes
and heroines. Marie easily fell into the latter category during the war, when her
62           T H E J O U R N A L OF B A H Á M S T U D I E S             6 . 2 . 1994

remarkable nature, her humanity, kindness, and courage became fully evident.
As one writer, Pauline Astor, said about Marie:

No woman in all Europe has a better war record than Queen Marie. She showed the
greatest courage, tenderness, and devotion. Do you know that she went into places
where nobody else would go—into leprous buildings and villages filled with
influenza where the dead were piled high and people dying of disease, and others
were afraid to enter? (“Queen’s” 35)

Mrs. Astor, as a close friend of the Queen, knew more than most about what
Marie did during the war, but her statement still only suggests what Marie
accomplished, suffered, and endured. We see a woman, the queen of a Balkan
country of 7.5 m illion people, which even in her day was considered a
secondary power in Europe, but an important one in the web of European
politics. We see a woman who was, in the course of the war, a wife, a mother, a
politician, a fighter, a negotiator, a manager, a relief worker, a prisoner, an
assassin’s target, a victor, and a diplomat.
At the same time, we see Romania neutral for two years in the early days of
the war, August, 1914, to August, 1916. We see Romania enter the war on the
side of the Entente (also known as the Allies: Great Britain, France, Belgium,
Italy, Russia, Serbia, and later Portugal, the United States, and Greece). Ill-
prepared and with an ill-equipped army, Romania relied largely on the promise
of help from her allies. We see, in a matter of months, her defeat by the German
forces, with the government compelled to flee Bucharest to the provisional
capital of Jassy. We see a country eventually overcome and forced to surrender
to the German forces (December 6, 1917), as well as a country occupied and
completely spoiled by its conquerors (December, 1917 to the Autumn of 1918).
But when the Central Powers were finally defeated by the Allies, we see a
country that discovered itself being treated with greater respect and more as an
equal, largely because of Marie.
The queen was in the center of these events from the very beginning. During
her country’s neutrality, Marie, with the assistance of R om ania’s Prime
Minister Bratianu, laid out the terms for Romania’s entry on the side of the
Entente. Among other things, she wrote lengthy letters to her first cousins,
Great Britain’s King George and Russia’s Tsar Nicholas. Indeed, even in these
early days, Marie was recognized as a powerful woman. Germany and Austria
sent representatives to her to persuade her to enter the war on their side. They
knew the influence she had over King Ferdinand, who being of German
ancestry was naturally inclined to enter the war on the side of the Germans.
Once Romania picked sides and was faced with the superior German forces
and lessening support from its allies (mostly Russia, which was internally
crumbling and on the verge of revolution), Marie actively and increasingly
involved herself in the war effort. Her primary work initially focused on the
Queen Mari e and the B a h d ’i Faith                                 63

hospitals, where she visited the sick and dying soldiers. These were hospitals in
the Bucharest area that were a prime target for German bombers. As one war
correspondent reported:

But no hospital was too hard for her to visit. Where the railroad did not run, or the
royal automobile could not go, she went on horseback. Even also right to the front
and under shrapnel fire she insisted upon going to inspect the troops and cheer the
men in the trenches. Through the plague, pestilence, and death that now swept the
country, she the Queen went everywhere undaunted. Alike fearless of the bullets
falling at the front and the terrible filth and disease she faced in the overcrowded
hospitals, she went indefatigably on with her war work. (“Maria Regina” 323)

Her connections with the royal houses of Europe, particularly the allied ones,
were invaluable for Romania. Marie would write frequently apprising them of
Romania’s situation and requesting more support.
In Jassy, the temporary seat of government, Marie established hospitals and
bakeries to help feed the more than 230,000 refugees during the coldest winter
in Jassy in fifty years. She organized a means to transport fuel into the city and
provide sanitation. At one point, she cleaned up the triage at the Jassy rail
station— a filthy, dark, stench-filled place where soldiers lay on the floor,
covered with lice. She continued to visit hospitals and, against doctor’s advice,
touched soldiers without her rubber gloves, “insisting that the touch of her hand
was soot hi ng to the pat i ent s and that the gl oves w ere cl ammy and
disconcerting” (“The Queen” 90). Of course, this put her at risk of catching a
deadly disease. In Jassy, too, one of the most tragic moments for her came when
her three-year-old son Mircea succumbed to typhus and meningitis.
Under occupation, a situation that was a complete anathema to her, she
defied as best as she could the occupier’s demands. She endured not only
German propaganda against the royal family but also a constant threat of
assassination from Bolsheviks, the revolutionaries who had already killed her
cousin Tsar Nicholas and his family.
She endured her son Carol’s elopement with a commoner. Carol’s action
brought the King and Marie “almost insurmountable grief,” and they viewed it as
“a staggering family tragedy.” Personally, Marie would not begrudge a son the one
he loved, commoner or not. She was sufficiently liberal to advocate that people
marry for love and have the right of choice. But Carol, who was heir to the throne,
had horrendous timing. With Romania still occupied by the Germans, his action
was considered the height of irresponsibility. Not only did he desert his military
post as a soldier, an act of treason punishable by death, he also completely
disregarded the Romanian constitution, which required princes to marry foreign
princesses of equivalent rank, a provision designed to prevent a faction or a family
from gaining undue political influence. The king and queen were sensitive to such
issues, too, because the trend of the time was to dethrone monarchs, some brutally
so, and such acts gave enemies a pretext to advocate their overthrow.
64           T H E J O U R N A L OF B A H Á ’ I S T U D I E S                6.2.1994

With Allied victory, Romania was faced with com pletely rebuilding a
nation. Marie plunged into this work as well. She began her prewar practice of
being available to the public again, meeting with her subjects daily. Afternoons
she reserved for visits to the devastated villages around Bucharest to which she
led a small convoy of cars filled with food and clothing. It was on one visit that
Alice Rohn, a reporter for Good Housekeeping, described a touching moment
during Marie’s busy relief work:

In one village, an old woman, sick in rags miserable came forward to Queen Marie
when she was handing out clothing in her village. The old wom an’s eyes were
dimmed with tears and her body bent with disease. Pellagra, a disease caused by
malnutrition, had claimed her. She lifted her rags to show Marie the ugly marks of
the disease. The two dressed in peasant clothes, Marie in her fresh ones, and the old
woman in her old, worn ones, looked at each other. Someone tried to pull the lady
away. Instantly, Marie stepped forward and drew her back to herself.
“Majesty!” the old woman said, and the elderly lady pulled from beneath her skirt
a soldier’s cap. “I have brought it to you.”
Close by a boy of fourteen watched, and laughed. “A battered old soldier’s cap, a
gift fitting for a Queen? Surely the old lady was mad.”
Again Marie leaned forward and drevwthe old woman to her. They sat there, the
aged head on the bright blouse o f the Queen, Marie’s arm around her. The Queen
took the battered cap as if it were the most precious gift she had ever received. Marie
talked to the woman of the woman’s boy and her country, and gave her back the cap
to keep as a memory o f him and o f her Majesty. She then placed a huge bundle of
clothes in the woman’s arms and dismissed her with a smile. (15)

With Allied victory came recognition of Romania and one last “war” effort
by Marie on behalf of Romania— to represent Romania at the Paris Peace
Conference in the Spring of 1919. Her mission was to persuade the Allies to
honor their commitments toward Romania and ensure that it gained the territory
it felt was its due. Her role brought her into contact with all the principal players
there: Georges Clemenceau, France’s premier; Woodrow Wilson, president of
the United States; David Lloyd George, Great Britain’s prime minister; and
others. Her mission included a visit to England, where she met with King
George and Queen Mary, as well as Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs Lord
Curzon and the then Secretary for War and Air Winston Churchill.
In both France and England, Marie was wildly popular and drew very
favorable publicity for Romania. In England, the Times ran an editorial outlining
Romania’s suffering and bravery, in particular the country’s “heroic but hopeless
struggle, the abandonment by Russia, and the rape of Romania by the Germans.”
The editorial further argued that because the Romanians were committed to land
reform and demonstrated their loyalty to the monarchy, they deserved Britain’s
aid. The editorial described Marie as “not only a niece of King Edward VII, but a
Queen of an Allied State, who has done her full woman’s part in sharing the
Queen Mar i e and the B a h d ’i Faith                                 65

sorrows and the sufferings of her adopted country” (“Resurrection,” Times 11).
Marie’s efforts that Spring of 1919 helped make Romania the fifth largest
country in Europe, after France, Spain, Germany, and Poland.

A Spiritual Journey for the Queen
Seven years later, in 1926, Queen Marie learned of the existence of the Bahà’i
Faith. Martha Root, a journalist and a famous Bahà’i teacher, introduced her.
Miss Root traveled extensively between 1919 and 1939 promoting the Bahà’i
teachings, and Marie was one of many royals and distinguished figures she
interviewed in the course of her travels. In the Balkans that year, Miss Root’s
schedule was packed with daily lectures and barely enough time to rest. She
wrote to Shoghi Effendi: “I am speaking each day or evening in Bukarest [s/c],
everything is going just like a miracle. . . . I have just strength enough to do the
daily work and the correspondence is utterly neglected— I cannot do more”
(Garis, Martha Root 240).
On this trip, Martha set her heart on an audience with Queen Marie, at the
very least hoping for an interview with Marie’s lady-in-waiting:

I shall leave here Feb. first or second or third, [as] soon as I can have [an]
interview with the Lady in Waiting to the Queen of Rumania [jj'c], she had promised
to see me, but she has grippe these few days, o f course 1 should be happy if I can
meet the Queen, but if 1 cannot this Lady in Waiting will convey to her my messages
and Bahà’i books. (Quoted in Garis, Martha Root 241)

It must have seemed quite difficult to see the Queen of Romania. Indeed, the
American Minister to Romania flatly told Martha she could not see Queen
Marie. Martha had other plans:

. . . I wrote her a letter & sent her ‘Abdu’l-Baha’s picture and Dr. Esslemont’s book.
Next day came a letter from the Palace inviting me to visit her the next day at noon.
Next to. my visit to the Greatest Holy Leaf, this visit to Queen Marie was one of the
most splendid events o f my life. I took her the Greatest Name and “Seven Valleys”—
and two Esperanto books and my Esperanto pin, a little bottle o f perfume, a little box
o f candy, a branch o f white lilacs, and a report o f the Education Congress in
Edinburgh.2 (Quoted in Garis, Martha Root 241 —42)

That day at the queen’s beautiful Cotroceni Palace outside Bucharest, Marie
warmly welcomed Martha. Among her first words were: “I believe these
Teachings are the solution for the world’s problems today!” (Qtd. in Root,
“Queen” 580). She asked Martha to tell her about the Bahà’i Faith and told her
she had been reading Dr. John E. Esslemont’s book Bahà’u’llâh and the New

2. Before her marriage, Marie was Princess of Edinburgh.
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Era until 3 a.m. and was very interested in the principles. Later, Queen Marie
recorded in her diary for that day:

Real thaw today which makes everything dull and ugly. Received a kind modest
American, a Miss Root who goes about trying to spread good will amongst nations.
She is a great upholder o f Esperanto believing that a universal language learnt by all
would promote good feelings and understanding among all Nations and there is
certainly something in the idea.
Curiously enough she is interested in the same teaching as Roxo and has brought
me the very book Roxo always keeps near her bed with the teachings o f a certain old
Baha’u’llah now dead but who was one o f the wise ones of this earth. She seemed
terribly moved by our grief about Carol [Marie’s oldest son] and liked to believe that
there was some devine [x/c] trial in it which would ultimately turn out for the good of
all of us, even of the Prodigal Son. (Marie, Personal Diaries, Jan. 30, 1926)

Marie’s friend, Roxo Weingartner, had already exposed Marie to the Bahà’i
Faith, at least to the extent that Marie had seen Roxo’s copy of Bahà’u’llàh and
the New Era. Ms. Weingartner was an obsessive admirer of Marie, but a friend
that Marie said she had a real feeling of affection for and one Marie considered
wiser in spiritual things. In a letter to Roxo a week after Martha’s visit, Marie
wrote:

Through the books I am reading I am getting also very near your venerable old
master Baha’u’llah. I know all about him now and love him profoundly, Vandyne
[Ileana, M arie’s youngest daughter] shares my discovery o f him. His universal
kindness to all men is what makes him feel so neOT me. — No creeds, but God.
(Marie, Letters to Roxo, Feb. 9, 1926)

The “g rief’ that “moved” Martha was the king and queen’s grief over their
eldest son’s abdication of the throne just a month earlier. Since the war, Carol
had created numerous serious difficulties for Marie and Ferdinand. The first
blow cam e with his elopem ent in 1918. The m arriag e, whi ch was
unconstitutional, was annulled by the Church and State, and Carol returned to
Romania. Then, C arol’s infidelity after his marriage to Princess Helen of
Greece in 1921 compounded problems. Finally, in December, 1925, he fled to
Paris, abandoning the succession and deserting his wife for another woman.
These actions greatly embarrassed his parents and also damaged the prestige
and authority of the monarchy. Marie was deeply hurt.
This event was the catalyst for several months of intense soul searching by
the queen, something only alluded to in her public statements. As she wrote to
Roxo: “Roxo dear, I have been having a curious inner life lately. In the life of
this world I have perhaps been through the hardest times of my whole 32 years
in this country” (Letters to Roxo Weingartner, March 3, 1926).
Queen Mari e and the B a h d ’i Faith                                     67

During most of February, 1926, Marie immersed herself in the Bahà’i
writings, beginning every morning for awhile with the . . reading of some of
‘Abdu’l-Bahá and Bahà’u ’ilàh’s teachings and wisdome [sic]. It does me a great
deal of good, consoles me and makes me think” (Marie, Personal Diaries, Feb.
23, 1926). The Bahà’i Faith moved her at the depth of her being. At one point,
she said that the BaháT Faith “at last has brought God quite near—for the first
time I have felt religion” (Feb. 22).
Later, for most of March, her inner search included work with Dr. Frank
Buchman, an American evangelist and founder of the Oxford Group. This
m ovement set out to strengthen the spiritual lives of individuals, while
encouraging participants to continue as members of their own churches. Marie’s
American friends in Turkey had sent this self-styled “soul surgeon” to her in her
“hour of need.” During his month in the palace, he acted as her spiritual guide
and psychologist, her confidant and family mediator. To Marie, her crisis was a
purification, a way to greater self-realization, and Buchman helped her in that
journey. He acted as a “mirror” to herself, she said, and helped her understand
her weaknesses and limitations:

I have liberated my own spirit, my own personality, but a Buchman makes me see,
holding a mirror up to myself. I am something o f a heathen for all that. My spirit is
not all Christian— I’m too sure o f my own rights— too dominating, not out o f want of
heart, but have freed m yself o f the fetters o f timidity, ill will, suspiciousness and
diffidence. I am too impatient and uncompromising with those still bound by their
own selves.
I see it all and it is certainly most healthy, if not always quite pleasant to have an
over-clear mirror held up to one’s own face. (Personal Diaries, Feb. 26, 1926)

At the same time, her spiritual path took her occasionally to the Catholic
Church for Holy Communion and to the Anglican Church, the emptiness of
which reminded her of how much the BaháT Faith brought God close. It was all
part of a healing process. She did not rely on any one persuasion, but all. She
saw all of the religions as one great process and put this belief into practice.
From her p ersp ectiv e, if t hey w ere all from God, then there was no
contradiction in turning to them all when the need was so great. About her
taking of Holy Communion with her children, which she described as a solemn
and happy moment, Marie wrote: “I was living up to my soul creed, the unity
before God. Here we were of different confessions, kneeling before God’s
table— some would condemn me for it— but I felt G od’s hand over us in
blessing” (Personal Diaries, March 27).
She practiced this “soul creed” for the next twelve years and boldly expressed it
through her public testimonies about the BaháT' Faith. She never actually publicly
called herself a BaháT until the end of her life, which was both in keeping with this
“soul creed" and a practical matter since she was bound by her position to uphold
68           T H E J O U R N A L O F B A H À ’Î S T U D I E S                 6.2.1994

the State religion, the Romanian Orthodox Church. Any outward alliance with a
religion other than the official one would have created untold political
complications within the country. Indeed, on one occasion when pressed by
reporters as to whether she was a BaháT, she stated that she was not. But during
these years, it was an act of courage to support enthusiastically through her
testimonies a seemingly obscure and non-traditional religion. It was the act of one
who deeply believed, felt, and appreciated “the beautiful truth of Baha’u’llah.”

Queen Marie’s Open Letters
As a result of her first contact with Martha Root, Marie spontaneously wrote her
first article in support of the BaháT Faith. The queen wrote her own syndicated
columns for Hearst and the North American Newspaper Alliance in 1926. By this
time in her life, she was developing into a literary talent. Reporters saw in Marie a
kindred spirit, and called her . . a thoroughly modem journalist and the first
queen-joumalist of modem Europe” (“Queen’s” 35). Already she had published
several books, some to support the war efforts in Romania, and some fairy tales.
By the mid-1930s she had written over fifteen books, ^he most popular and
famous of which was her two-volume autobiography The Story o f My Life.
Her open letter about the BaháT Faith appeared in her column entitled
“Queen’s Counsel,” first in Canada in the Toronto Star on May 4, 1926, and
later in nearly 200 newspapers in the United States and in several newspapers
around the world. She wrote in part:

A woman brought me the other day a Book. I spell it with a capital letter because it
is a glorious Book of love and goodness, strength and beauty. . ..
It teaches that all hatreds, intrigues, suspicions, ev il words, all aggressive
patriotism even, are outside the one essential law o f God, and that special beliefs are
but surface things whereas the heart that beats with divine love knows no tribe nor
race.. . .
It is Christ’s Message taken up anew, in the same words almost, but adapted to the
thousand years and more difference that lies between the year one and today.
. . . If ever the name o f Bahà’uTlàh or ‘AbduT-Bahá comes to your attention, do
not put their writings from you. Search out their Books, and let their glorious, peace-
bringing, love-creating words and lessons sink into your hearts as they have into
mine. (Bahai World 2: 174)

Her spontaneous public testimony was astounding and completely unexpected.
When Shoghi Effendi read the first of the Queen’s “open letters,” he wrote
Martha Root that this was “a well deserved testimony of your remarkable and
exemplary endeavours for the spread of our beloved Cause. It has thrilled me
and greatly reinforced my spirit and strength, yours is a memorable triumph,
hardly surpassed in its significance in the annals of the Cause” (quoted in
Rabbani, Priceless Pearl 109).
Queen Mari e and the B a h a ’i Faith                                      69

There could hardly have been a better or more well-known supporter of the
BaháT Faith in 1926 than Queen Marie, or a better time. Her popularity and
fame were at their peak after 1925. Journalism students at Northwestern
University voted Queen Marie the most important woman in the news (from a
newspaper clipping found in Marie’s diaries 1927). The religion she promoted,
however, was young and relatively unknown. The Heroic Age3 had just come to
a close with the death of ‘AbduT-Bahá, and the Formative Age4 had been under
way only five years. The BaháT' Faith could claim a scattering of local Spiritual
Assemblies and BaháT Centers, and only five National Spiritual Assemblies
worldwide. The first formal teaching plan, the first Seven Year Plan,5 was still
over ten years away. A young Shoghi Effendi, twenty-eight years old in early
1926, had barely assumed his weighty duties in Haifa. So, the queen’s action
boosted the BaháT' Faith enormously .
Shoghi Effendi, “moved by an irresistible impulse” (quoted in Rabbani,
Priceless Pearl 108), wrote to Queen Marie thanking her for her testimony and
describing how it had relieved the suffering of the BaháTs in Iran, who had
been under severe persecution that year.6 Marie responded in what Shoghi
Effendi described as a “deeply touching letter”:

I was deeply moved on reception o f your letter. Indeed a great light came to me
with the message o f Bahà’u’Uàh and Abdu’l-Baha. It came as all great messages
come at an hour o f dire grief and inner conflict and distress, so the seed sank deeply.
. . . .We pass on the message from mouth to mouth and all those we give it to see a
light suddenly lighting before them and much that was obscure and perplexing
becomes simple, luminous and full o f hope as never before.
That my open letter was balm to those suffering for the cause, is indeed a great
happiness to me, and I take it as a sign that God accepted my humble tribute.
The occasion given me to be able to express myself publically [sic], was also His Work,
for indeed it was a chain o f circumstances o f which each link led me unwittingly one step
further, till suddenly all was clear before my eyes and I understood why it had been.

3. The Heroic Age, 1844-1921, included the ministries o f the Báb, B aháV lláh, and
‘AbduT-Bahá, and was a period o f revelation, martyrdom, and persecution.
4. The Formative Age, is a period that began in 1921 under the leadership o f Shoghi
E ffendi, appointed Guardian and great-grandson o f Bahà’uTlàh, and a period o f
expansion and the maturing of BaháT' institutions that is still occurring.
5. The Seven Year Plan (1937-1944) was the first systematic plan in the BaháT'
world, launched in the United States and Canada, involving specific goals for the growth
o f the Bahá’1 Faith in North and Latin America. It was followed by a second Seven Year
Plan in 1946 intended to carry the work o f the first one a stage further and involving
Western Europe.
6.   T w elve Baha’is had been martyred in Jahrum, Iran, April 11, 1926, causing
widespread sympathy for them and their fam ilies, and concern that this persecution
might spread throughout the country.
70           T H E J O U R N A L OF B A H A ’ I S T U D I E S                 6.2.1994

Thus does He lead us finally to our ultimate destiny.
Some of those of my caste wonder at and disapprove my courage to step forward
pronouncing words not habitual for Crowned Heads to pronounce, but I advance by an
inner urge I cannot resist.
With bowed head I recognize that I too am but an instrument in greater Hands and
rejoice in the knowledge. (Quoted in Rabbani, Priceless Pearl 108)

From her standpoint, her open letters were a relatively simple matter. Marie did
what she felt moved to do. About the letter from Shoghi Effendi, she wrote to
her friend Roxo Weingartner:

I am enclosing a letter that w ill interest you— when read you w ill send it back.
Amongst the Queen's Counsels, I once wrote of the wonderful message of ‘Abdu’l-
Baha that had come to me at an hour o f grief. This gave the Bahà’is tremendous joy,
they consider it as a sign that the great of this world are opening their ears to truth,
but the letter speaks for itself. O f course, I never thought whilst writing that small
little article that it would be read by so many. But I am pleased though that my words
were a consolation of peace to those oppressed. (Aug. 27, 1926)

In the 1920s, Ileana studied the BaháT Faith and shared her mother’s interest.
In Ileana’s later years, she developed an interest in Christian Science and tried to
interest her mother in it. In her final years, she became a nun in the Orthodox
Church and founded a convent in Pennsylvania. Why Ileana’s interest in the
BaháT Faith did not blossom is not clear, although it seems reasonable to suspect
that she had little support for an allegiance to the BaháT Faith other than her
mother, and that life simply overwhelmed her. Ileana had six children and lived
with her Austrian-born husband near Vienna when the Germans captured it at the
outset of World War II. She tried to assist Romania after the War but had to flee
because the country came under Communist rule. So, her initial spark of interest
must have been overcome by events and life’s concerns. In later years, she
turned to the religion and way of life closest to her heart. None of the other
children expressed interest in the BaháT Faith to our knowledge.
As far as we know, Ferdinand had no interest in the BaháT Faith, although
he must have known of his wife’s interest, at least in 1926 when the whole
family was a part of her spiritual growth. Even if he had an interest, it would
have been unlikely that he would act on it in any way. He was a cautious,
reserved, traditional man. For example, once Marie took her the children to
Communion. When he discovered this, he became upset, since Communion was
not within the Orthodox church; it was a Catholic rite. M arie said that
Ferdinand was “upset at her unorthodoxy, at our admission of all confessions
equally” (Personal Diaries, April 28, 1926). So, if he would be upset by a
relatively minor thing as taking of Communion by his family, to consider the
BaháT Faith for himself would have been unthinkable in this context.
Queen Mari e and the B a h d ’i Faith                                    71

Queen Marie in North America
In the summer of 1926, Shoghi Effendi, upon learning that Marie might visit
North America, wrote to the American National Spiritual Assembly through his
secretary with the following instructions:

We read in The Times that Queen Marie o f Rumania is coming to America. She
seems to have obtained a great interest in the Cause. So we must be on our guard lest
we do an act which may prejudice her and set her back. Shoghi Effendi desires, that
in case she takes this trip, the friends will behave with great reserve and wisdom, and
that no initiative be taken on the part o f the friends except after consulting the
National Assembly. (Quoted in Rabbani, Priceless Pearl 107)

Queen Marie felt deeply drawn to the United States. It was not only a matter
of friendship and curiosity for her, or the benefits that might accrue for her
country from such a visit, but something much deeper, something a part of the
personal development she began early in the year. A week before her departure
from Romania on October 2, 1926, she wrote in her diary:

I cannot say that I am anxious to off so far for so long, only I have such a [.vie ]—
instinctive feeling that I ought to go to America, that I will make a good thing o f it
for the country. It is a real urge, as though something hidden within me knows that it
is good that I should go. It is not a selfish desire to see, do, and amuse myself. It is
something much deeper, a sort o f feeling that I have to have this experience, it is in a
way a final step in my development, for my own personality.
The Americans want me. Of course this may be a complete illusion, but I have
strongly that feeling. There is some bond between us I cannot quite explain, some
attraction towards each other from over the seas. (Personal Diaries, Sept. 26)

It promised to be an extraordinary trip, far beyond what she envisioned herself.
What she would encounter were throngs of admiring people of all strata of
society and, as one would expect, great demands on her time and for her
attention,'as well as a relentless press that would report her every move.
After a train trip from Romania, Marie and her youngest children, Prince
Nicholas and Princess Ileana, set sail from France on the luxury liner S. S.
Leviathan, one of the premier ships of her day. Correspondents covered her
cruise across the Atlantic and sent detailed reports back to the United States
describing her voyage. What impressed them most were Marie’s democratic
ways. She would stroll freely among the passengers and dined often in the main
dining room. They reported how she entertained the four-year-old son of a New
York garment manufacturer in her suite and swam mornings in the ship’s pool.
On her arrival in New York Harbor (October 18, 1926), her first words in the
United States echoed the words of ‘AbduT-Bahá about wom en’s role in
bringing about world peace: “I am interested in the position of women in
America and their work for world peace. W e’ve all had enough wars, haven’t
72         T H E J O U R N A L OF B A H À ’Î S T U D I E S           6.2.1994

we? I am confident that women will end all wars!” Then after a pause she
added, “If they do not quarrel among themselves first” (“New York” 1).
This official state visit to the United States, the third by a reigning queen
(the others being Elizabeth of Belgium and Liliuokalani of Hawaii) was to last
over a month and take her on an 8,750-mile journey from New York and
Washington, D.C., to Washington State and back. Along the way, she would
attend an endless stream of banquets, receptions, dinners, luncheons, and
dedications. She also granted numerous newspaper and radio interviews and
gave countless speeches. Coverage of her trip was exhaustive. From October 4,
before M arie’s arrival in the United States, front-page articles about her
appeared daily in the New York Times, except for two days. The Times said that
she faced “probably the most relentless camera bombardment that anyone has
ever been called on to face in the world’s history” (Times 2).
What disarmed everyone and reinforced their respect and admiration,
especially reporters, were her openness and candor. In those days, questions
usually asked of royalty by the press were limited to those about health, but
Marie fielded questions about her life as an author, persecutions of Jews in
Romania, and her son’s position in regard to the throne, among others.
In spite of the rather rainy fall weather, Marie’s arrival in New York was
spectacular. Mayor Jimmy Walker and his official welcoming committee met
the queen first at her ship. Waiting on shore were two specially selected
battalions from the army and the navy, three batteries of coast artillery, an
infantry war unit, a company of Marines, and 750 New York police. Once
ashore, her twenty-car motorcade set out at noon (a move planned by the mayor
to ensure the largest possible crowd). Marie was greeted by tens of thousands of
New Yorkers who showered her with ticker-tape and torn paper. “1 was not
prepared for the American custom of throwing papers of every size, shape and
description from the thousands of windows of the extraordinary buildings,
whose tops I could hardly see. The air seemed alive with fluttering wings, as
though swarms of birds had been let loose in the streets” (quoted in Pakula, Last
Romantic 345). Front-page headlines read “New York Gives Hearty Welcome
to Queen Marie” and “Ovation in Fog Stirs Royal Visitor.”
The next day, Marie arrived in Washington, D.C. for her official visit with
President Calvin Coolidge. After a formal reception during the day, Coolidge
hosted a formal state dinner in her honor at the White House. About this dinner
the American humorist Will Rogers said, “I can just imagine when the President
and Queen Marie sat down to the dinner table. I don’t know, but, I bet they sat
there a long time and then Cal said: ‘What country are you from Marie?” ’
Actually, Rogers was not too far off the mark. It was a rather stiff affair due in
large part to President Coolidge’s excessive formality and his well-known
frugality with words. Even with her charm, M arie could not engage the
President for the evening.
Queen Mari e and the B a h d ’i Faith                                73

This aspect of his personality and his dry Yankee humor were legendary. A
young woman who once sat next to the President at a dinner party told Coolidge
she made a bet she could get at least three words of conversation out of him.
Without looking at her, he quietly replied, “You lose” (Freidel, “America Enters
the Modern Era” 570).
Characteristically, Marie soon tired of formal affairs and officials, although
she never showed it. As she journeyed westward through New York (Albany,
Utica, Syracuse) and up through Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal, and Winnipeg,
toward Washington State, she increasingly expressed a desire to meet “real
Americans.” And indeed she did. She met with North Dakota farmers, cowboys,
and American Indians. The Sioux and Blackfoot inducted her into their tribes.
The Sioux gave her the name Winyan Kipanpi Win, which means “The Woman
Who Was Waited For.”
There is no record of her having met with any BaháTs. They apparently
remained in the background. However, during her audience with Martha Root a
year later in 1927, the queen did lovingly recall and wanted to thank

all those BaháT friends in America who sent me the lovely bouquets in all the cities
through which I passed. How it touched my heart! Wherever I came, those nosegays
always on my table, nothing personal, never saying who had brought them, never
able to thank anyone, just sent with the love of the BaháTs o f those cities, went
straight to my heart! No one ever understood how much those bouquets meant to me!
(Quoted in Garis, Martha Root 287)

Marie’s tour came quickly to a halt when she received news of her husband’s
sudden illness in Romania. She left the United States on November 23, 1926, to
return home to be with him. But in the days prior to her departure, her pace did
not slacken.

Queen Marie and Martha Root: 1926-1931
The day in 1926 when Martha and Marie’s paths first crossed was three months
after Marie’s fifty-first birthday. Over the next twelve years, until Marie’s death
in 1938, Martha kept in close touch with her “spiritual child,” showering her
with love and the spirit of the BaháT Faith. Including her first visit, Martha
visited Marie eight times from 1926 to 1936.
Each audience was eventful. In 1927, for example, after the passing of King
Ferdinand, when the family was receiving few people because they were “still
in deep mourning,” Marie told Martha how she had been reading the BaháT
teachings about life after death. During this second audience, she gave Martha
an appreciation of the BaháT Faith in her own handwriting for the fourth
volume of The B ahď í World. Marie would write two additional appreciations of
the BaháT' Faith for The B ahď í World in the coming years.
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Earlier that year, Martha had received a precious gift from the BaháTs of
Mashad. Martha described it as “a Prayer of BaháV lláh. It was adorned and
blessed in the center with a lock of Bahà’u’ilàh’s own shining hair” (quoted in
Star 370). Martha wrote her friend Harry Randall, an early American Bahà’i
and co-worker, about how this gift would be a worthy gift for Her Majesty
Queen Marie— “if I could give them up,” she explained. During this second
audience, Martha presented her gift to Marie. The Queen was deeply touched.
Struck by the polished gold calligraphy, she observed: “It is in the most perfect
taste of all the Orient! I know how rare and beautiful it is!” (Quoted in Star
370). She also told Martha that she planned to have a frame specially designed
for it and in the frame also place a small photograph of ‘AbduT-Bahá.
Also during this meeting, Ileana invited Martha to her room, where she
asked her, “How does one become a BaháT?” During their conversation,
Martha noticed the BaháT books, nearly all the writings of B aháV lláh and
‘AbduT-Bahá then in print, and a photo of ‘AbduT-Bahá there. Ileana, touched
by the beauty of the BaháT' Faith, offered to translate some BaháT' booklets into
Romanian, which she did at a later date.
Of this 1927 meeting. Queen Marie wrote in her diary:

Had no time to go out as had several people to see. Miss Root the Baha’i adept came
with a heart full of love, with books and an ardent desire to carry on her message.
Ileana and I received her with affection and listened with interest to all she had to tell
us about ‘AbduT-Bahá whose teachings we are so profoundly in sympathy with.
Nicky [Marie’s youngest son] came to listen. (Personal Diaries, Oct. 9, 1927)

January, 1928, saw Martha in Greece and Yugoslavia, where she gave a
number of lectures and published newspaper articles. Queen Marie and Ileana
had traveled to Yugoslavia to help Marie Mignon, Mane’s second daughter, now
Queen of Yugoslavia, at the birth of Mignon’s son. Marie and Ileana, learning
that Martha was in Belgrade, sent her an invitation to tea at the royal palace.
During this audience, Marie’s comment about the BaháT Faith delighted Martha:
“The ultimate dream which we shall realize is that the BaháT channel of thought
has such strength, it will serve little by little to become a light to all those
searching for the real expression of Truth” (qtd. in Garis, Martha Root 296-97).
On this visit, too, Marie gave Martha a precious gift. Many years earlier one
of her royal relatives in Russia had given Marie a beautiful brooch consisting of
two tiny wings of gold and silver, set with little diamond chips and a large pearl
between the wings. Marie looked at Martha and said: “Always you are giving
gifts to others and I am going to give you a gift from me.” Smiling, she pinned it
on Martha’s dress. Martha remarked how the wings and pearl made it appear
“Lightbearing” [BaháT'], and she proceeded to send it to Chicago as a gift to the
BaháT House of Worship under construction. Later that spring, at the National
Convention, the delegates consulted about the appropriateness of selling the gift
Queen Mari e and the B a h d ’i Faith                                 75

from a queen who had promoted the Bahà’i Faith so eloquently and widely.
However, the brooch was sold and the money went to finance the Temple.
Willard Hatch, a Los Angeles BaháT, purchased this precious piece and carried it
to Haifa in 1931 to be placed in the BaháT archives, where it remains on display.
Over a year later on October 29, 1929, Martha’s fourth audience took place
at the queen’s favorite castle. Modest by comparison to her other palaces, this
handsome home had been designed by the queen herself, who had it built in the
small, quiet town of Balcic on the Black Sea. She named it “Tehna-Yuva,” a
Turkish name that means “A Solitary Nest.” At this meeting, Marie spoke of her
plans to visit the Holy Land soon.
Martha attended a luncheon that day, a birthday party for the queen. The
guests, including Martha, received a unique welcome at the gate of the palace.
Speaking of herself in the third person, Martha described the “welcome”:

She [Martha] sat alone in the motor car halted at the royal entrance gate while her
card was being sent on to the palace in the distance.
Suddenly a bugler comes out on the cliffs far above and to the right and began to
play a welcome. Yodelers on still higher rocks echoed the sweet sounds. (Quoted in
Garis, Martha Root 323-24)

After the lunch, Queen Marie led only one guest, Martha, upstairs to a spacious
drawing room overlooking the sea. On this occasion, Marie gave Martha some
autographed photos for Shoghi Effendi and the holy family. On this occasion,
too, Marie expressed her plan to visit Haifa, Shoghi Effendi, and the BaháT
holy places on her upcoming tour of the Middle East.

The World Centre Anticipates A Queen’s Pilgrimage
When Shoghi Effendi learned of Queen Marie’s possible visit, he wrote a letter
thanking her for the photos, and extending to her “a most cordial welcome
should Your Majesty ever purpose to visit the Holy Land to ‘AbduT-Bahà’s
home in Haifa as well as to those scenes rendered so hallowed and memorable
by the heroic lives and deeds of Bahà’u ’üàh and ‘AbduT-Bahá” (quoted in
Rabbani, Priceless Pearl 113).
Several days later, Martha Root wrote to Marie from Haifa. As always, it
was a loving, moving message, but this long letter made it almost impossible for
the queen not to visit Haifa (Root, Letters, Dec. 7, 1929). Martha spoke to the
heart and soul of the queen, beginning the letter, “O beloved Queen of all our
hearts and precious Princess [Ilieana], Alla-o-Abha!7 We all send you tenderest
love and every day we think of you and pray for you.”
Martha goes on to paint for Marie a moving portrait of Shoghi Effendi and to
describe Marie’s station as the first BaháT queen. Martha compares Marie to

7. A greeting and invocation to God in Persian sometimes used by Baha’is which can
be translated as “O Glory of Glories” or “O Glory o f the All-Glorious.”
76            T H E J O U R N A L OF B A H Á Í S T U D I E S                     6.2.1994

Constantine, saying that “her name will go down forever. People today still
honor Constantine that he was the first King to accept Jesus Christ, so Queen
Marie will be remembered with love all down the ages as the first Bahà’i Queen
of this Universal Epoch.” She tells Marie of BaháTs in Haifa and of the new
pilgrim house. Above all, Martha Root describes how this visit will be a balm to
the queen’s soul. For, Martha said, she will have come “home, and at last to the
House of your Lord!”

And when you rest your head at the Holy Threshold o f Bahà’u’ilàh’s Sacred Shrine
you will know you are in paradise and the cares, the hurts, the sorrows will all vanish
away and only the Reality, the Love o f God will remain. At This Threshold with your
head bowed amid the jasmines you will hear with His Ear, see with His Eye, inhale
the Fragrance o f His Nearness, and drink His Cup. Such a peace will possess your
heart, such a courage will come, such a joy to live and serve! And beloved Queen
and Princess when you lift your head from that dear threshold perhaps you will find
yourselves “crowned” for the jasmine flowers may cling to your tresses!
Also, you will feel ‘Abdu'l-Baha taking your hand and speaking to you. He will
always be with you when you kneel at His Great Shrine.8
At the Shrine of the Báb you will feel His Purity and His Sacrifice and the great longing
to be worthy of all this Spiritual Heritage. (Quoted in Root, Letters, Dec. 7,1929)

The prospect of such a prominent figure in the world visiting the BaháT World
Centre and meeting the head of the Bahá’1 Faith was one full of significance for
the religion and for Marie.
Queen Marie and Princess Ileana set out on their journey on February 21,
1930, apparently fully intending to visit Haifa. She had told Martha at their
meeting in October 1929, “We shall surely go to Haifa.” The royal yacht, “The
Dacia,” took them from Romania to Constantinople, then to Athens, and finally
to Alexandria, Egypt, where they boarded a ship, “The Mayflower,” provided
by the Egyptian government.
In anticipation of her impending visit, Shoghi Effendi on February 21 cabled
the BaháTs of Tehran, requesting that the tablet B ahà’uTlàh revealed for
Marie’s grandmother Queen Victoria be copied in fine Persian calligraphy and
illuminated. Furthermore, he instructed that it should arrive in Haifa no later
than March 10. It was to have been a special gift for Queen Marie.
As the likely date approached for Marie’s arrival, Shoghi Effendi cabled her
twice, extending a “loving and heartfelt invitation . . . to visit His home in
Haifa” and cordially apprising her of the historical significance of such a visit,
and the strength and joy it would bring the persecuted BaháTs in Iran. No reply
came to his first cable on March 8 (Rabbani, Priceless Pearl 114).

8. The Shrine o f ‘AbduT-Bahá, the resting place of ‘AbduM-Bahá, and located in the
same structure as the Shrine o f the Báb, is sacred to BaháTs. Both are places o f
pilgrimage, prayer, and meditation.
Queen Mari e and the B a h d ’i Faith                                  77

The day Shoghi E ffendi’s telegram arrived in Egypt, though, it was
beginning to look as if the queen’s visit to the Holy Land might need to be
canceled. Politics in Romania and Palestine were making it increasingly
difficult for her to visit there. In her diary on March 8, Marie lamented how her
connection with the Bahà’i Faith had become a “political complication.”

But everything in this world is complication. O f all things my sympathy for the
BaháTs is also being brought up as a political complication. . . . Who would ever
have imagined such a thing. They consider it political propaganda!
It is really som etim es a curse to be a Queen. And one meets with almost no
comprehension. The world wishes to rule everything on hard-cut lines, there is to be
no enthusiasm, no deeper thought, no privacy, no poetry, no idea, only try reason and
selfish calculation. How discouraging it is— I would never have thought that even
this would be made a question. . . .

In the winter and spring of 1930, the possible return of Carol, M arie’s
prodigal son, to Romania was a burning political issue in the nation. He had
been in exile for five years, with little hope of ever being restored to the throne.
But, by 1930, conditions in the country had changed dramatically, and a
political crisis had developed. This crisis had been building since King
Ferdinand’s death in 1927, when C arol’s then four-year-old son Michael
ascended to the throne. In 1926, Michael had been made nominal head of the
country, backed by a three-person Regency Council established to administer
the country’s affairs until Michael was older.
But by 1930, the Regency had lost much of its authority and prestige, not to
mention public confidence. The Liberal Party, the political party associated with
Queen Marie that had established the Regency and had ruled Romania for sixty
years, had lost control of the government. A new political party, the National
Peasant Party, came into power. This party and like-minded people, all known as
Carolists, increasingly called for Carol’s return. Contributing to the political
storm were the depressed economic conditions in Romania brought on by the
Depression in Europe. Many Romanians longed for a strong hand, and many
believed that Carol might restore the nation to stability. To create favorable
public opinion for his return, the Carolists began discrediting the queen in the
news media. Along with the Liberals, Queen Marie was not in favor of Carol’s
return. Marie described the tense political conditions to a friend:

I frankly don’t see how w e’re going to labor through another ten-and-a-half years of
such an unnatural state o f affairs [referring to the boy King and the Regency]. No
head, no one responsible, no confidence, no prestige, the dynasty falling to pieces. I,
the only efficient member o f it, put on one side, insulted, calumniated, denied and
rejected so that I can’t be of any help. We can’t hold on like this. . . . (Quoted in
Elsberry, Marie 226)
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Above and beyond all political considerations, Marie also had to think of the trip
in terms of its impact on the person closest to her, her daughter Ileana. A few
months before the trip, Ileana fell deeply in love with Lexel of Pless, a young
German prince. They planned to marry and had already picked out a house.
Marie had high hopes for this marriage and was extremely pleased with her
daughter’s choice. However, upon investigation of Lexel, a standard practice for
a prospective spouse of a princess, a “black spot” in Lexel’s past— alleged
homosexual involvement—was discovered. This discovery made it impossible
for the marriage to take place. For Marie, the grief from such bad news was
such that it was almost physical pain. They undertook the trip in part to help
Ileana recover from this devastating experience (Pakula, Last Romantic 374).
One of Marie’s leading critics was Gregori Filipescu, whom the New York
Times called a “new Carolist” and a “well-known politician and particular critic
of the Dowager Queen Marie . . . who will use his newspaper, Epoca, in behalf
of the exiled Prince” (“General,” The New York Times 2). As Marie toured
Egypt that spring, Filipescu attacked her for an interview she gave to a Greek
newspaper and for her handling of Ileana’s engagement. It is highly likely that
he and his allies made Marie’s sympathy for the Bahà’is a political issue as
well, all to sway public opinion against her and the Liberals. There is little
question that someone was using this for political gain, and the Carolist camp
led by Filipescu would be the most likely group to make it a political liability to
their rivals.
Shoghi Effendi w ired Queen M arie again on M arch 26 at the Hotel
Semiramis in Cairo, renewing his invitation:

Fearing my former letter and telegram in which Family o f ‘Abdu'1-Bahá joined me in
extending invitation to Your Majesty and Her Royal Highness Princess Ileana may
have miscarried, we are pleased to express anew the pleasure it would give us all
should Your Majesty find it feasible to visit Bahà’u’ilàh’s and ‘Abdu’l-Bahà’s
Shrines and the prison-city o f ‘Akká. Deeply regret unauthorized publicity given by
the Press. (Quoted in Rabbani, Priceless Pearl 114)

On March 28, a day before Marie had planned to arrive in Haifa, Shoghi
Effendi received a cable from the Romanian Minister in Cairo: “Her Majesty
regrets that not passing through Palestine she will not be able to visit you”
(quoted in Rabbani, Priceless Pearl 114). However, the next day, the royal
party departed from Egypt for Palestine, where they traveled incognito for a few
days. Her diary entry for that day, March 29, partially explains the secrecy:

I was to avoid Palestine as much as possible only skirt it so to say which is a great
disapointment [sic]. To be so near & not to go either to Jerusalem or Akker [sic] is
indeed hard.
But authorities were afraid the visit of a queen might stir up passions & the state o f
the spirits is excited & unsettled. Besides some stupid press campaign started that I
Queen Mari e and the B a h d ’ i Faith                                  79

had become a Bahà’i . . . . I even had worry from at home on the subject. Unjustifiable
nonsense, but food to that curr [sic] Filipescu. Everything is disagreeable for me at
home just now. They have got their knife into me and behave like ungrateful servants.

Palestine was a tinderbox at this time, and British authorities feared that
Marie, a well-known cousin of George V, King of Great Britain, and a direct
descendant of the British monarchy, might be the spark that set off protests. The
New York Times, reporting on the ro y als’ tour, wrote            . . their trip is
understood to have been shortened at the request of the British Government
which feared that a longer stay might provoke unpleasant demonstrations”
(“Queen Marie,” The New York Times, 17 March 1930, 8). Two highly visible
events were then taking place concerning the Holy Land: a Palestinian Arab
delegation had traveled to London to plead before Parliament for equal rights
for all inhabitants in Palestine and the abandonment of British rule there. Also
the British government was to issue the Shaw Commission’s report, which
attempted to fix blame for the summer 1929 Palestinian racial disorders. It is
reported that 133 Jews were killed and 339 wounded during these conflicts
(Sears, Horizon History 451). The Arab delegation planned to be present when
the report was released. Officials in Palestine were so concerned about the
inflammatory conditions in Palestine that British troops were sent from Malta,
and British warships moved into Palestinian waters.
On March 30, Marie and Ileana reached Haifa by train and proceeded
through northern Palestine by car, visiting Nazareth, Capernaum, and Tiberias.
But to her great disappointment, she barely saw Haifa and completely missed
the Baha’i holy shrines, as well as Jerusalem and ‘Akká. In her personal diaries,
she described her feeling about not attaining her heart’s desire on that day:

On March 30th we arrived at Haifa, early in the morning incognito as I was not
supposed to travel through Palestine, but I could not reach Syria except through part
of Palestine unless I took a ship which would have been more complicated. My heart
ached at Haifa not to be able to stop and greet Shoghi Effendi now head o f the
Baha’is who had sent me a warm invitation to be their guest because although I am
not a B a h a i I am deeply interested by ‘AbduT-Bahà’s teachings and I would have
loved going to his grave. (Emphasis added.]
The stupid fuss the papers raised made this alas impossible and I felt like a coward
creeping past their holy shrines without giving sign of life. No one understood this
except Ileana. Those who look at you principally as Queen, a representative,
understand very little and care less for what you feel . . . or what are your inner
loyalties. They protect your outward prestige, so to say guard you from making
foolish mistakes but know none o f the inner ache their reasonableness leaves in your
heart. I do not blame them, they are there for that, their conscience is at rest, they
have civilized their rash & im pulsive Queen’s impulses, have spared her future
trouble so they have done their duty, there with all is well.
It is no good expecting Roumanians to understand any subversive religious
aspirations or even quite plausible ones, religion plays a small part in their plan of
80           T H E J O U R N A L OF B A H À ’Î S T U D I E S                6.2.1994

life & religious thoughts seldome (sp.) trouble them, but I am their Queen, I have no
right according to them to compromise them through my ununderstandable ideas &
ideally I belong to them and they are there to protect me against myself. I honour
their intentions.. . . I bow my head & submit, keeping my disappointment to myself.

Given the state of affairs back home and the negative press from the Carolists, a
visit to the BaháT World Centre would only appear to confirm reports that Marie
had become a BaháT. Obviously, those who were close to her and wanted to protect
her advised her not to visit the shrines. Marie was also duty bound, as a Romanian
monarch, to uphold the official religion, the Romanian Orthodox Church.
In a letter to Martha Root over a year later, Marie acknowledges that part of
the decision not to visit Shoghi Effendi in Haifa was related to Ileana:

Both Ileana and I were cruelly disappointed at having been prevented going to the
holy shrines and of meeting Shoghi Effendi, but at that time were going through a
cruel crisis and every movement I made was being turned against me and being
politically exploited in an unkind way. It caused me a good deal of suffering and
curtailed my liberty most unkindly. There are periods however when one must
submit to persecution, nevertheless, however high-hearted one may be, it ever again
fills one with pained astonishment when people are mean and spiteful. I had my child
to defend at the time; she was going through a bitter experience and so I could not
stand up and defte [sic] the world. (Quoted in Rabbani, Priceless Pearl 115)

Marie’s arrival in Syria four days later was in stark contrast to her low-key
entry into Haifa. At the Syrian frontier, she said, “. . . the English handed us
over to the French authorities who came in numbers as here I am quite officially
myself although there is nothing official about my journey. There was even a
detachment of cavalry and an officer has been attached to us. The French
Governor of Damascus came to meet us” (Marie, Diaries, April 3, 1930). She
reached Damascus on April 4.
March 30th passed and Shoghi Effendi had no indication at the time of
Marie’s arrival in Haifa. He and Bahiyyih KMnum, Bahà’uTlàh’s daughter, had
expected her any day. For Bahiyyih Khânum’s part, she waited patiently for hours
in ‘Abdu’l-Bahà’s house to receive the royals. By April 2, though, when Marie
still had not arrived, Shoghi Effendi feared the opportunity had passed and wrote
Martha Root to have her communicate to Marie what transpired on his end and to
ensure that there was no misunderstanding because of the media. He wrote: “I am
now writing to you quite confidentially regarding the projected visit of the Queen
to Haifa. Unfortunately it did not materialize. The reason, I absolutely ignore”
(quoted in Rabbani, Priceless Pearl 114). He explains to Martha how he had
cabled the queen twice (which he quoted) and how he had extended a written
invitation, but that the only reply he had received was a telegram from the
Romanian Minister (which he also quoted). He went on to express his concern
Queen Mari e and the B a h a ’i Faith                                     81

about the apparent widespread, unauthorized publicity in the media and the
misunderstanding this might have created. He then tells Martha that

reporters who called on me representing the United Press o f America telegraphed to
their newspapers just the opposite I told them. They perverted the truth. I wish we
could make sure that she would at least know the real situation! But how can we
ensure that our letters to her Majesty will henceforth reach her. I feel that you should
write to her, explain the whole situation, assure her of my great disappointment. (114)

Shoghi Effendi asked Martha to keep this matter confidential and reassured her:

I cherish the hope that these unfortunate developments will serve only to intensify the
faith and love of the Queen and will reinforce her determination to arise and spread the
C ause.. . . Be not sad or distressed, dearest Martha. The seeds you have so lovingly, so
devotedly and so assiduously sown will germinate. . . . (Quoted in Rabbani, Priceless
Pearl 114-15)

The reply from the queen delighted them both. She wrote: . . the beauty of
truth remains and I cling to it through all the vicissitudes of a life become rather
s ad. . . . I am glad to hear that your traveling has been so fruitful and I wish you
continual success knowing what a beautiful message you are carrying from land
to land.” Significantly, she added: “I enclose a few words which may be used in
your Year Book” (quoted in Rabbani, Priceless Pearl 115).9

The Final Years
After 1929, Martha did not see Queen Marie for three years. Then, in 1932 and
1933, Martha called on Marie in Austria. Both years the queen traveled there to
be with Ileana, who had married Archduke Anton of Austria and was living in
her new home just outside Vienna on an estate known as Sonneberg. Of their
meeting in 1933, Marie wrote in her diary for January 31, 1933:

Suddenly thaw, later even rain. Eager little Martha Root of the BaháT came to lunch.
Wonderful how that thin inconspicuous little middle-aged woman manages to spread
the teaching, to publish books and get into touch with so many . . . to make her quiet
way and in many ways to succeed. It is admirable. She is a touching person and
today we had her to ourselves.. . .

The last two audiences with the queen took place in Romania at the queen’s
Cotroceni Palace in Bucharest. Martha’s notes and Marie’s diary entries suggest
a warmth and intimacy about these meetings not present in the previous ones.
Martha described in detail their afternoon tea in 1934:

9. The Yearbook referred to here is The B ahď í World, which in the early years o f its
publication was produced on an annual basis.
82           T H E J O U R N A L OF B A H A ’ I S T U D I E S                 6.2.1994

How beautiful she looked that afternoon— as always— for her loving eyes mirror
her mighty spirit; a most unusual Queen is she, a consummate artist, a lover of beauty
and wherever she is there is glory. . . . She received me in her private library where a
cheerful fire glowed in the quaint, built-in fireplace; tea was served on a low table,
the gold service set being wrought in flowers. There were flowers everywhere, and
when she invited me into her bedroom where she went to get the photograph which I
like so much, as I saw the noble, majestic proportions o f this great chamber with its
arched ceiling in Gothic design, 1 exclaimed in joy, “Your room is truly a temple, a
MashriquT-Adhkár!” (Root, “Queen” 581)

The last audience, two years before the queen’s death in 1938, was a highly
significant one. In a real sense, from this meeting, Marie gave the world her
final spiritual legacy: an article written by Martha and approved by Queen
Marie, and her final appreciation written for Bahà’i World, volume six. When
Martha arrived in Bucharest in early February, she wrote to the palace asking
permission for an audience with the queen. In the same letter, she proposed the
article for World Order Magazine about Marie’s spiritual life, and on behalf of
Shoghi Effendi, she asked for another appreciation in the queen’s own
handwriting for volume six of B ahď í World.
All was granted. The two met in Marie’s “softly lighted library” at the palace
at 6 o ’clock in the evening. Martha records later how Marie spoke of several
Bahà’i books, “the depths of ‘íqán’ and especially of ‘Gleanings from the
Writings of Bahà’uTlàh’ which she said was a wonderful book!” And that
“even doubters would find a powerful strength in it, if they would read it alone
and would give their souls time to expand” (Root, “Queen” 582).
The queen told Martha that she had met Lady Blomfield, a prominent early
BaháT in London, who showed her the original message Bahà’u’ilàh had sent to
her grandmother Queen Victoria. Also, Marie spoke fondly to Martha of a
childhood friend, Mrs. Lilian McNeill who was then living near ‘Akká at
B ahà’u ’Uàh’s home of M azra‘ih. They both had recognized B ahà’uTlàh
separately and independently. Mrs. McNeill had sent Marie pictures of ‘Akká
and Haifa, and the two had corresponded. That Marie considered herself a
BaháT is evident from one letter she sent to her old friend. Queen Marie wrote;

. . . indeed nice to hear from you and to think that you are o f all things living near
Haifa and are, like me, a follower o f the BaháT' teachings. It interests me that you are
living in that special house . . . so incredibly attractive and made precious by its
associations with the Man we all venerate. (Quoted in M cN eill, “Treasured
Memories” 278)

Her Majesty promised to write a special appreciation and send it in four days.
Martha drafted notes based on the audience for the article and sent them to
Marie the next day (February 5, 1936) for approval, along with a touching and
powerful letter:
Queen Mar i e and the B a h d ’i Faith                                    83

Most beloved Majesty Queen Marie:

Alláh-u-Abhá! Deepest love to you precious Queen! I was so happy to see you
yesterday. Every time seems the best time yet. You are so lovable, so great, you are a
Queen! I believe always this servant will be more kind, more thoughtful to every one
whom she ever meets, because she saw how charming you are. Thanks with all my
heart for the dear audience yesterday, I shall remember it always. A lw ays too,
beloved Queen Marie, I pray for you.
Shoghi Effendi prays for you everyday, and how happy he will be to have your
beautiful greeting. He will be so delighted too, about the ‘Appreciation’ for Vol. VI,
and the audience and the article will be good news to him.
I shall write to him every word you said, for I know he thirsts to hear from you, for
just you are the soul who can understand Shoghi Effendi. I am sure that when you
two meet, you will be close friends all your lives. You will admire his spirit, his
intellect, understanding, his courage. Life is so short and not many people can be a
companion to your soul— nor to his— you fly too high in the spiritual realms, but he
will he. When you meet him, you will be sorry you did not go to Haifa sooner. Some
day you two will meet— and Bahà’uTlàh will do the rest. I do not mean just outer
friendship, pleasant as they are, but I mean soul friends, who see life and eternity and
act to bring again tranquility to humanity. . . .
Here are the notes o f the audience yesterday, but I shall rewrite them and “polish
them like diamonds” if I can, but I shall not say anything that is not in these notes. If
there are any changes in these two sheets, would you please correct & resend them
when you send the “Appreciation” before I leave Saturday.. . .
With dearest love to you and again thanks, most beloved Queen Marie, “Our
Queen” (When I left you, I glanced to be sure no one was in the hall, and I left a little
kiss on your door)

Yours most humbly
In His Covenant
Martha L. Root
(Root, Letters, Feb. 5, 1936)

Queen Marie did make a few changes in the article. Most significantly, though,
in this piece she expressed how in her heart she was “entirely Bahà’i.” Martha
wrote in this article, . . she mentioned an incident in Hamburg when she was
en route to Iceland in the summer of 1933. As she passed through the street, a
charming girl tossed a little note to her into the motor car. It was: ‘I am so happy
to see you in Hamburg, because you are a Bahà’i.’ . . . Her Majesty said to me
[Martha], ‘In my heart I am entirely B a h á T ... ” (qtd. in Root, “Queen” 582).
It was as if this was Marie’s final confession of faith. Never before had she
stated so explicitly that she was a Bahà’i, although she had, as we have seen,
expressed profound sympathy with the Bahà’i teachings and a deep love for
B aháV lláh and ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. At the same time, Martha said, it showed that
Marie stood "strong for the highest Truth, and as an historical record . . . of
84           T H E J O U R N A L O F B A H À ’Î S T U D I E S                6.2.1994

what the first Queen did for the Faith of Bahà’uTlàh” (Zinky, Martha Root
112). The seeds Martha had sown, as promised by Shoghi Effendi in 1931, had
germinated. The appreciation Marie offered for B ahď í World read:

More than ever today when the world is facing such a crisis o f bewilderment and
unrest, must we stand firm in Faith seeking that which binds together instead of
tearing asunder.
To those searching for light, the Baha’i Teachings offer a star which will lead them
to deeper understanding, to assurance, peace and good w ill with all men. (6:
frontispiece)

Queen Marie died July 18, 1938, at the age of sixty-three. Of her death,
Lilian McNeill wrote, “The world is poorer for the passing of such a noble lady,
and a blank, impossible to fill, is left in the lives of those who knew her
personally” (277-78).
Hand of the Cause of God, George Townshend later wrote eloquently of her
passing:

Her death and obsequies were attended with all the ceremonial that befits the passing
of a Queen. But who can tell what was the greeting that awaited her on the other side
where she learned in an instant how true had been her intuitions o f the manifestation
o f God and where she saw unobscured now by any mortal veil the white eternal
splendour of the Truth that she, alone among the earth’s queens, had risen to acclaim.
(“Queen” 275)

Shoghi Effendi gives us a glimpse of the blessing that was Queen Marie’s when
he wrote:

Queen Marie’s acknowledgement of the Divine Message stands as the first fruits
o f the vision which Bahà’u’ilàh had seen long before in His captivity, and had
announced in His Kitáb-i-Aqdas. “How great, . . . the blessedness that awaits the
King who will arise to aid My Cause in My Kingdom, who will detach himselffrom
all else but Me ! . . . ” (God Passes By 395)
Q u e e n M a r i e a n d t h e B a h d ’i F a i t h                 85

Works Cited

Braun, Eunice. From Strength to Strength: The First H alf Century o f the Formative Age
o f the Baha’i Era. Wilmette: Bahà’i Publishing Trust, 1978.
Ellis, William T. “Roumania’s Soldier Queen.” Century 96 (July, 1918): 330-38.
Elsberry, Terence. Marie o f Roumania: The Intimate Life o f a Twentieth Century Queen.
New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1972.
Freidel, Frank. “America Enters the Modern Era: Profiles of the Presidents: Part IV.”
National Geographic 128 (October, 1965): 537-77.
Garis, M. R. Martha Root: Lioness at the Threshold. Wilmette, 111.: Bahá’1 Publishing
Trust, 1983.
“General Averescu and Gregori Filipescu Join Nicholas in Seeking Return of Carol.”
New York Times, 11 May 1930: 2.
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-- Queen Marie and the Baha'i Faith (Used by permission of the curator)