Sabiha Sultan

Rukiye Sabiha Sultan (; after 1952 legally Sabiha Osmanoğlu; 19 March 1894 – 26 August 1971) was an Ottoman princess, the third and last daughter of Sultan Mehmed VI and his main wife Nazikeda Kadın. She was the first wife of Şehzade Ömer Faruk, son of Caliph Abdulmejid II and Şehsuvar Hanım.

Early life Sabiha Sultan was born on 19 March 1894 in her father's Ortaköy Palace in Ortaköy, Istanbul. Her father was Mehmed VI, son of Abdulmejid I and Gülistu Kadın. Her mother was Nazikeda Kadın, daughter of Prince Hasan Ali Marshania and Princess Fatma Horecan Aredba and first wife of her father. She was the third and last daughter born to her father and mother. She had two sisters, Münire Fenire Sultan, six years older than her, born and died in 1888, and Fatma Ulviye Sultan, two year older than her. Her birth was difficult, so that later her mother could not have any more children. She had a younger half-brother, Şehzade Mehmed Ertuğrul, born in 1912 by the Second Consort Müveddet Kadın.

Refik Bey, the son of Mihrifelek Hanım, the second Kalfa of Sultan Abdulmejid I, was appointed teacher to Sabiha, and her elder sister Ulviye Sultan. The two learned to play piano from Mlle Voçino.

Marriage

Suitors When her father ascended the throne in 1918, Sabiha was still unmarried, but had several admirers. Those who knew her always said that she was not like the other women of the Ottoman family. "Sabiha Sultan was different", said the Turkish poet Yahya Kemal.

Her first suitor is thought to be Rauf Orbay, a relative of one of Sultan Abdul Hamid II's consorts, Sazkar Hanım. He was followed by Mahmud Kemal Pasha. Another was Fuad Bey of the Babanzade clan. Captain Safvet Arıkan and Lieutenant Suphi Bey from Damascus were other suitors, but none of them were accepted. Another suitor was Mehmed Ali Pasha, the nephew of Ahmed Muhtar Pasha.

Her betrothal to Ahmad Shah Qajar, the last ruling member of the Qajar dynasty, and Mustafa Kemal Atatürk was forfeited in favor of her second cousin Şehzade Ömer Faruk, thus missing her chance of becoming the first "First Lady" of the nascent Turkish Republic.

Wedding

Sabiha and Şehzade Ömer Faruk, who was four years her junior, the son of Abdulmejid II, the last Caliph of the Ottoman Caliphate and Şehsuvar Kadın, were in love with each other. Initially the marriage was rejected because between the descendants of Abdülmecid I (as Mehmed VI) and those of Abdulaziz (as Şehzade Ömer Faruk) there was no friendship due to Abdulaziz's violent death. Şehsuvar Hanım, the prince's mother, called on Nazikeda, and succeeded in convincing her.

The marriage took place on 29 April 1920, in the pavilion of the sacred relics at the Topkapı Palace. The marriage was performed by Şeyhülislam Hayrizade Ibrahim Efendi. Sabiha Sultan's deputy was Başkatip Ali Fuad Bey, and Ömer Faruk's deputy was Ömer Yaver Pasha. The wedding reception took place at the Yıldız Palace.

In May 1920, ten days after their wedding, Sabiha and Faruk moved to the mansion of Rumelihisarı. In October of the same year, her father bought two houses for his daughters in Nişantaşı. He gave one house to Ulviye Sultan, and the other to Sabiha. The mansions were known as the Twin Palaces. Sabiha and Faruk decided to live in Nişantaşı during the winter and in Rumelihisarı during the summer.

Issue and exile

The couple's eldest daughter, Fatma Neslişah Sultan was born on 2 February 1921 in the Nişantaşı Palace. She was followed two years later by Zehra Hanzade Sultan, born on 12 September 1923 in the Dolmabahçe Palace.

Upon the exile of the imperial family in March 1924, Sabiha and her two daughters left Turkey. On 11 March, she left her mansion in Rumelihisarı and took the Orient Express to join her husband and father-in-law in Switzerland. Later they moved to Nice, France, where her youngest daughter Hibetullah Necla Sultan was born on 16 May 1926, the same day of Mehmed VI's death. Order of Medjidie, Jeweled

Ancestry