Archduchess Blanca, Archduchess Leopold Salvator of Austria

Princess Blanca of Bourbon (; 7 September 1868 – 25 October 1949) was the consort of the pretender to the Croatian throne and the wife of Archduke Leopold Salvator. She was a Spanish and French princess by birth, and also became an archduchess by marriage.

As a member of the House of Bourbon and - according to the Carlists and to the Legitimists- an Infanta of Spain and a Fille de France by birth. In 1889, she married Archduke Leopold Salvator of Austria, Prince of Tuscany, with whom she had ten children. The family left Austria after the end of the monarchy and finally settled in Barcelona. When the male line of Blanca's family died out at the death of her uncle, Alfonso Carlos, Duke of Anjou and San Jaime, some of the Carlists recognized her as the legitimate heiress to the Spanish throne.

Family Blanca (centre) with her first cousins Louise (left) and Marie Louise (right).Blanca was the eldest child of Prince Charles of Bourbon (Don Carlos), and Princess Margherita of Bourbon-Parma. Her father was a great-grandson of King Charles IV of Spain, and the grandson of Infante Carlos, Carlist claimant to the throne of Spain (1788-1855). In 1868, shortly after Blanca's birth, her paternal grandfather, Prince Juan of Bourbon, formally renounced to his "spanish rights" and Blanca's father became the new Carlist claimant to the throne of Spain. The family was expelled from the country some time after Princess Elvira's birth, due to Don Carlos's Carlist activities However, the legitimists recognized Blanca's grandfather, Prince Juan of Bourbon, as the rightful King of France and Navarra . The couple became very popular in Croatia, especially because they learned croatian and started to educate their children as croatian princes. Leopold Salvator was known as one of the strongest supporter of Trialism, he was regularly considered to become the emperor's official representative in Zagreb. Faced with this support, which disturbed Hungary, the archduke was moved from Zagreb to Vienna in 1900. In 1914, Leopold Salvator was the target of an assassination attempt at the Zagreb theatre.

War-time nurse During World War I her husband took on the provision of food for the Austrian Army in the front and was inspector general of Artillery until 1918. Blanca's two eldest sons also joined the Austrian army fighting in the Italian front, while with her daughters Archduchess Immaculata and Archduchess Margaretha, Blanca worked for the Austrian red cross.

Titular Queen of Croatia After the war and proclamation of the Republic, the properties of the imperial family were confiscated by the new Austrian government. Wilheminenberg was converted into a military hospital and then sold to a Swiss banker. With the loss of their wealth, they had to live in exile with meager means. The family could live neither in France nor in Italy, countries that had been Austria's enemies during the war. In 1919, a plot to make Croatia an independent kingdom with Archduke Leopold Salvator as king failed. During the following 14 years her position on the issue kept changing and her stand falls into 4 different periods;

in 1935, when Blanca’s paternal uncle and at the time the Carlist claimant to the throne Don Alfonso Carlos promptly disauthorised the Zaragoza gathering, she publicly distanced herself from the enterprise in May 1936, after Don Alfonso Carlos had decided to sort the succession issue by appointing a distant relative, Javier de Borbón-Parma, the future regent, Blanca issued a new statement; she declared that after the future death of her uncle, she would accept her hereditary rights to transmit them to her youngest son in 1940 she declared full loyalty to the regent Don Javier; the declaration did not amount to explicit renouncement of her hereditary claims, but implicitly suggested that they were at least parked or otherwise suspended in May 1943 she reverted to her 1936 stand and claimed first assuming and then transmitting heritage rights to her youngest son As he declared himself the legitimate Carlist heir a month later, Doña Blanca effectively supported his cause until her death.

She died, aged 81, in Viareggio, Tuscany, Italy.

Ancestry