Peter II of Yugoslavia

Peter II Karađorđević (Петар II Карађорђевић; 6 September 1923 – 3 November 1970) was the last king of Yugoslavia, reigning from October 1934 until he was deposed in November 1945.

He was the last reigning member of the Karađorđević dynasty.

Peter II was born on 6 September 1923 in Belgrade, Yugoslavia.

He was the eldest son of Alexander I of Yugoslavia and Maria of Romania.

His godparents were Queen Elizabeth of Greece, King Ferdinand of Romania and King George V of the United Kingdom, for whom his son, the Duke of York, stood proxy.

Prince Peter was initially tutored at the Royal Palace, Belgrade, before attending Sandroyd School then in Cobham, Surrey where Reed's School now stands.

The eldest child of King Alexander I and Maria of Romania, Peter acceded to the Yugoslav throne in 1934 at the age of 11 after his father was assassinated during a state visit to France.

A regency was set up under his cousin Prince Paul.

When he was 11 years old, Prince Peter succeeded to the Yugoslav throne on 9 October 1934 upon his father's assassination in Marseille during a state visit to France.

In view of the new monarch's youth, a regency was set up under his father's cousin Prince Paul.

On 20 August 1939, Paul permitted the prime minister, Dragiša Cvetković, to sign an agreement with Vladko Maček, the leader of the Croatian Peasant Party, which created a new Banovina of Croatia with substantial autonomy and a much greater size, covering much of what is now Bosnia and Herzegovina, and satisfying at least in part the long-standing demands of the Croats.

The agreement was very unpopular with the Serbs, especially when reports emerged that the prečani Serbs were being discriminated against by the authorities of the autonomous banovina.

The tense international situation of August 1939 with the Danzig crisis pushing Europe to the brink of war meant Paul wanted to settle one of the more debilitating internal disputes in order to make Yugoslavia more capable of surviving the coming storm.

The agreement came at the cost of both Paul and Cvetković being condemned by Serbian public opinion for "selling out" to the Croats, all the more so as many Croats made it clear that they saw the banovina of Croatia as only a stepping stone towards independence.

After Paul declared Yugoslavia's accession to the Tripartite Pact in late March 1941, a pro-British coup d'état deposed the regent and declared Peter of age.

In response, Axis forces invaded Yugoslavia ten days later and quickly overran the country, forcing the king and his ministers into exile.

A government-in-exile was set up in June 1941 following Peter's arrival at London.

Prince Regent Paul took the view that he must not change the kingdom from the way that King Alexander had left it so that his son could take possession of it unaltered when he turned 18 in September 1941, and resisted any attempts to revise the 1931 constitution.

The unpopularity of the agreement and the Cvetković government, was one of the reasons for the coup d'état of 27 March 1941 as many Serbs believed that Peter, the son of King Alexander, would continue with his father's centralising policies when he reached his majority.

Prince Regent Paul declared that the Kingdom of Yugoslavia would join the Tripartite Pact on 25 March 1941.

Two days later, King Peter, at age 17, was proclaimed of age after a pro-British coup d'état.

The initially bloodless coup was led by General Dušan Simović on 27 March 1941 in the name of Peter.

As General Simović led his men toward the Royal Compound, which was surrounded by guards loyal to the Regent, Peter climbed down a drain-pipe to greet the rebels.

As the Regent's guards surrendered without fighting, Simović arrived to tell Peter: "Your Majesty, I salute you as King of Yugoslavia. From this moment you will exercise your full sovereign power".

The coup was very popular in Belgrade and Peter was well received by the crowds.

The people who had come out in Belgrade to show their support for the coup had a very pro-Allied character, many of the protesters waving British and French flags.

The crowds in Belgrade cheered Peter wildly as the 17-year-old king drove his car down the streets without his bodyguards to be greeted by his subjects.

The new government that Peter swore in on 27 March 1941 was headed by General Simović and comprised members of the People's Radical Party, the Croatian Peasant Party, the Democratic Party, the Croatian Independent Democrats, the Slovene People's Party, the Yugoslav Muslim Organization, the Agrarian Party and the Yugoslav National Party.

With the exception of the Yugoslav Radical Alliance and the banned Yugoslav Communist Party and the Ustashe, all of the main political parties were represented in the new government.

Postponing Operation Barbarossa, Nazi Germany simultaneously attacked Yugoslavia and Greece on 6 April 1941, Orthodox Easter Sunday.

The Luftwaffe bombed Belgrade, killing between 3,000 and 4,000 people.

Within a week, Germany, Bulgaria, Hungary and Italy invaded Yugoslavia, and the government was forced to surrender on 17 April.

Parts of Yugoslavia were annexed by Italy, Bulgaria, Hungary and Germany.

The remaining parts were governed by two German-controlled puppet governments, the Independent State of Croatia and the Serbian Government of National Salvation.

In March 1944, he married Princess Alexandra of Greece and Denmark.

Their only son, Alexander, was born a year later.

In November 1945, the Yugoslav Constituent Assembly formally deposed Peter and proclaimed Yugoslavia a republic.

Peter settled in the United States after his deposition.

Suffering from depression and alcoholism later in his life, he died of cirrhosis in November 1970 at the age of 47.

His remains were buried at the Saint Sava Monastery Church in Libertyville, Illinois, before being transferred to the Royal Mausoleum of Oplenac in 2013.