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Wightwick's royal connections
Wightwick is rich in stories that are just as inspiring today, as they were at the time. The story of Wightwick’s royal connections started well over 100 years ago, when Lionel and Alan Mander, the younger brothers of Sir Geoffrey Mander, married sisters, Princess Pretiva and Princess Sudhira of Cooch Behar, West Bengal, India. Discover more below.
Lionel and Pretiva
Lionel and Alan Mander were the youngest sons of Theodore and Flora Mander, who built Wightwick Manor.
Lionel (Miles) was just 12 years old when his father died in 1900 and was just 17 when Flora died 5 year later. He was a restless and colourful personality and soon broke away from the mould of business and civic life.
In 1908 he set out to New Zealand to farm sheep at the station of his uncle, Martin Bertram Mander. The following year he started flying early Bleriot planes in the Pyrenees, and also later learned ballooning.
In the First World War he was captain in the Royal Army Service Corps, before eventually establishing himself a successful Hollywood film actor, producer and novelist. He often portrayed an English cad, and his film credits include Wuthering Heights (1939), staring alongside Lawrence Olivier.
It is unclear how they initially met, but in February 1912, Lionel married Princess Pretiva Devi Narayan, at Woodlands, Calcutta, a palace that belonged to her father, His Highness Sir Nripendra Narayan, the Maharajah of Cooch Behar. The two had no children and 10 years later in 1922 the couple divorced, with Pretiva, sadly passing the following year at the age of 31.
Alan and Sudhira
Alan Mander met Princess Sudhira, known as ‘Baby’, in a very romantic way. She had been ill in a London nursing home, and with his sister-in-law, Pretiva, he called to the home and there began a friendship which blossomed into a romance.
Maharani Suniti Devi, Pretiva and Sudhira's mother, was initially opposed to the marriage and arranged an extended cruise to separate the couple but Alan 'simply followed them around the world.' In February 1914, Alan and Sudhira married, as Lionel and Pretiva had before them, at Woodlands in Calcutta.
In September 1914, during the First World War, and just months after the wedding, Alen was sent to Flanders. Sudhira who was young and a London socilite, trained as a nurse and was a Voluntary Aid Detachment member (VAD) at the Westminster Hospital in London. Thankfully Alan escaped physical injury but was discharged from the Army with severe shell shock. Alan and Sudhira had three children, with Alan passing in 1967 and Sudhira in 1968.
The royal family
Pretiva and Sudhira, were the daughters of Maharajah Nripendra Narayan and Maharani Suniti Devi, of Cooch Behar, West Bengal, India. The Maharajah and his wife were supporters of the British Raj and the royal family and often travelled to England.
In 1887 the Maharajah and his wife attended Queen Victoria’s Jubilee and during this visit the couple met the Queen and socialised with other members of the royal family. The Maharajah also attended the Coronation of King Edward VII. They had 7 children in total, including Pretiva and Sudhira, and their son Victor Nityendra Narayan, was godson to Queen Victoria.
The Maharajah, died in September 1911 in Bexhill-on-Sea, East Sussex. A special military funeral was ordered by His Majesty King George V, who had visited Wightwick Manor in 1900, when he was the Duke of York. The copper beech tree he planted during his visit can still be seen today. Coincidentally, Cooch Behar Palace, was built the same year as Wightwick Manor, in 1887.
Forces of change
Both families had a history of being progressive in their thinking and their actions. The Maharani Suniti Devi was a pioneering women’s rights campaigner and passionate about women’s education.
In 1881 Suniti set up a girls school – the Suniti Academy. Sudhira campaigned for better relations between England and India, spoke out for Indian women’s right to vote, and was associated (both pre-war and through Red Cross activism) with the Indian suffragette Princess Sophia Duleep Singh (1876–1948), known as the ‘only’ British Asian suffragette. Maharajah Nripendra Narayan, is also cited as banning the practice of slave-keeping (Kritadas Pratha) in his State by introducing a law in 1884.
From the 1870s the Manders were vocal supporters of women’s suffrage and held Suffragist meetings at their home. They fought in parliament for women’s rights, especially for female domestic servants and later collected the works of 11 professional female artists, which are still within Wightwick’s collection today.
The Manders also had a long-documented history of improving the conditions of those who worked for them, as well as working-class people in general, including advocating for better access to green spaces.
Geoffrey Mander and his first wife, Rosalind Florence Caverhill, were members of the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies (NUWSS) and gave their support to the 1913 NUWSS pilgrimage.
Geoffrey, a Liberal MP, was also vocal in parliament, regarding Italy’s invasion of Abyssinia (modern day Ethiopia) and met with His Imperial Majesty Emperor Haile Selassie, while he was exiled in the UK.
Telling the story
Through archiving Wightwick’s visitor book which spans to the 1800’s, there are no entries from either Pretiva or Sudhira, although Alan and Lionel can be spotted a couple of times, meaning it is difficult to determine whether the Princesses ever visited Wightwick. We are also in the process of digitising large amounts of historic family photographs, so there is still hope, we will unearth some pictures of the Princesses in the house that we care for today.
Between 2005–2007 Wightwick was involved in project called ‘Whose Story?’, supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund, with the aim of telling the diverse stories associated with some of the places we care for in the West Midlands. At Wightwick, we worked with a local Punjabi Ladies Group to interpret the story of the Princesses, and hosted a performance by Khatak dancers and a theatrical performance bringing the story of the Princesses to life.
In 2023, we worked with local writer Amarjit Nar, who with the help of Arts Council England funding, ran a series of writing workshops for local South Asian women. Through these workshops, fictional stories based on true historical context were created, focusing on the lives of Pretiva and Sudhira and their marriages to Lionel and Alan. These were printed in the Wightwick Princesses Anthology and we celebrated this by inviting people from the local South Asian community to visit Wightwick and hear the brilliant writers read their stories in person.
Discover more
Scroll through the album to find out more
Growing up at Wightwick Manor
Alan (top) and Lionel Mander (bottom) were the younger brothers of Sir Geoffrey Mander, donor of Wightwick Manor. they grew up at Wightwick Manor, Wolverhampton, which was the family home.
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