India’s Australian ‘Queens’: Bride and Prejudice

‘Martanda’ and ‘Molly’ were not names you were likely to find on a wedding invitation in the early 20th century. So it was no surprise that the fairytale wedding of this Indian king and his Australian bride shook the British establishment – and even outraged King George V!

Molly Fink was one of two Australian royal wives in British India, the other being Joan Falkiner, whose equally fascinating story, a generation later, made waves on three continents. They were not the first Caucasian women to marry into Indian royalty but they broke the unwritten code that the British had for the marriage alliances of Indian princes and kings.