Buckingham Palace Refuses to Return Remains of Ethiopian Prince Buried at Windsor Castle

After bringing him to the United Kingdom, the royal house took care of the prince, who died in 1879 at the age of 18 of a respiratory illness, on the orders of Queen Victoria.

In a statement sent to the BBC, a Buckingham Palace spokesman said the exhumation could affect the remains of other people buried nearby in the tombs beneath St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle.

“It is very unlikely that it would be possible to exhume the remains without disturbing the final resting place of a good number of the dead buried nearby,” the statement said.

The statement added that the church authorities are keen to respect the memory of Prince Alemayehu, but at the same time they have a responsibility to “preserve the dignity of the dead.”

The statement also said that the royal house was keen in the past to “meet requests for Ethiopian delegations to visit the church.”

The reason Prince Alemayehu ended up residing in the United Kingdom at such a young age was a colonial military act and the failure of diplomatic efforts.

In 1862, in an effort to strengthen his empire, the Emir’s father, Emperor Tawadros II, wished to establish an alliance with the United Kingdom, but received no response to his letters explaining the feasibility of his demand from Queen Victoria.

The Ethiopian emperor was angry at that silence, and decided to respond to it in his own way, so he took some Europeans hostage, including the British consul. This prompted the Queen to launch a massive military campaign involving about 13,000 British and Indian soldiers, with the aim of saving European citizens.

An official from the British Museum also participated in the campaign.

In April 1868, the forces besieged the mountain fortress of Magdala, in which Emperor Tawadros II took refuge in northern Ethiopia, and within hours, the fort fell to British forces.

The emperor decided that death was easier for him than becoming a prisoner of the British, so he committed suicide, which led to Tawadros II becoming a hero in the eyes of his people.

After the battle ended, the British looted thousands of cultural and religious artifacts. These included crowns, scrolls, necklaces, and vestments.

Historians say that those treasures, which are currently in various European museums and libraries, as well as in private collections, were carried on the backs of dozens of elephants and hundreds of mules.

The British also brought with them Prince Alemayehu and his mother, the Empress Tirwerk Wobi.

From the British point of view, the purpose was to keep them safe and prevent them from being captured, and perhaps even killed, by the Tawadros’ enemies near Magdala, according to Andrew Heavens, author of The Prince and the Plunder, who recounts what It happened to Alemayehu.

Upon his arrival in Britain in June 1868, the Prince’s tragedy and his situation as an orphan child were sympathized by Queen Victoria. The two met at the Queen’s holiday residence on the Isle of Wight, off the south coast of England.

The Queen agreed to bail him financially and placed him under the guardianship of Captain Tristram Charles Sawyer Speedy, an officer who had accompanied the prince on his journey from Ethiopia to Britain.

At first, the two lived on the Isle of Wight, then Captain Speedy took him with him to other parts of the world, including India. But it was later decided that the prince needed to receive a formal education.

The Prince was enrolled in Ragby School ( Rugby), a British private school, but he was not happy there. He was later transferred to the Royal Military College Sandhurst, where he was bullied.

The prince was “longing” to return to his homeland, as stated in some of the letters quoted by Heavens in his book, but that idea was quickly rejected.

“I feel sympathy for him, as if I know him,” says Abibich Kassa, who comes from the prince’s family. “He was uprooted from Ethiopia, uprooted from Africa, the home of black people, and he stayed there.” [في بريطانيا] As if he has no home.

Ultimately, Alemayehu was tutored by tutors in a private home in Leeds. But he contracted a respiratory disease, possibly pneumonia, and was refusing treatment at one stage because he thought he had been poisoned.

After spending a decade in exile, the prince died at the age of 18 in 1879.

His illness was the subject of many articles in the national press, and his death was mourned by Queen Victoria.

On hearing the news of his passing from the world, the Queen wrote a letter of lamentation in her diary, which read: “His life was not a happy one, but was full of hardships of every shape and color. He was a very sensitive person, who thought people stared at him because of the color of his skin.” Everyone feels sorry for his death.”

The Queen then arranged for him to be buried at Windsor Castle.

Demands for the return of the prince’s remains are not new.

In 2007, then-Ethiopian President Grima Wolde-Gyorges sent an official request to Queen Elizabeth II to retrieve his body, but his efforts failed.

“We want to take him back. We don’t want him to be in a foreign country,” says Abibic.

“He lived a sad life. I cry every time I think of him. If they agree to return his remains, for me it will be like him coming back to life.”

She hoped to receive a positive response from the newly crowned King Charles III.

Professor Alola Pankhurst, who specializes in British-Ethiopian relations, says: “Returning rights to their owners is used as a means of acknowledging the wrongs of the past.”

Pankhurst believes that the return of the remains will serve as “a way for Britain to reconsider its past, like contemplating and accepting a colonial past.”