May 2, 2024 • 45 mins
Host Becky Milligan hears about the king’s last supper and wonders if revenge really is a dish best served cold. She learns what happened to the royal children when they returned from exile and realizes nothing is ever quite what it seems. It’s time to reveal the whole truth. Can she finally lay King Boris III’s mystery to rest?
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
The Royal Palace Sofia, August nineteen forty three, and King
Boris is dining with a friend. The friends a tall
man about the same age as the king himself. From
the way he sits straight backed in his chair, you
(00:24):
can guess he's had a military past, and when he
stands up briefly to reach for the serving dish, it's
clear he has a stiff leg, a slight limp, probably
a war injury. It's just the two of them at
the table, a private dinner. The servants have been dismissed,
(00:47):
so it's the friend who offers the king a second helping.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
I'm convinced that something that was put into his soup,
you know, dinner with somebody alone, and fell ill after
dinner suddenly.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
So who did he have dinner with?
Speaker 2 (01:07):
I think some assistant who worked with him and fell
after that.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
The friend's name is Jordan Sevov. He's an architect by trade,
but in the last year or so he's somehow become
the king's closest advisor. Other more experienced assistants have been
pushed out. Zevov's very comfortable in the royal presence, and
(01:36):
we can make an educated guess about what was in
that serving dish.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
Nobody even remembered what the menu was. But my father
loved mushrooms, has no doubt.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
So mushrooms the King's favorite dish. Was it mushrooms that
made Boris ill? Because that meal it turned out to
be the king's last supper. The next morning, Boris collapsed
and as he lay on his sick bed, doctors noticed
(02:08):
his skin was covered in those brown blotches we've heard about,
as if he'd been poisoned.
Speaker 4 (02:16):
And never really recovered the thorn.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
It's a shocking possibility. Was the king betrayed by his
closest confidante from Blanchard House? And exactly right, media, this
is the Butterfly King. I'm Becky Milligan, Chapter eight. The
(03:22):
rest is history. We're in Q in West London, not
far from the National Archives actually, where we began our
search for evidence about who killed Boris. But today we're
not looking for dusty old documents. We're looking for plants,
(03:44):
poisonous plants, or to be more precise, poisonous mushrooms. Which
is why we're at Queues Royal Botanic Gardens, because it
happens to have the largest and most comprehensive fungy collection
in the world was mold. That's cue, senior researcher Arena Droganina.
(04:06):
And if you didn't catch that, because I sure didn't,
She said, mold.
Speaker 5 (04:12):
Yes, I'm mold.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
You know, for a moment I thought you said molds,
and then I thought you mess spies, and you thought something,
we're talking to someone in the spy world, all right,
So molds.
Speaker 5 (04:23):
Molds so interesting. And of course also mushrooms.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Arena works with all kinds of mushrooms, the good, the bad,
and the very bad, and.
Speaker 5 (04:36):
Those that produce antibiotics, and they also produce a lot
of toxins as well.
Speaker 6 (04:41):
Guess which mushrooms Arena's most keen.
Speaker 5 (04:43):
On, the really deadly ones. The thing is that mushrooms
they usually have not a single toxin, but they have
a cocktail of toxins.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
In other words, if they get into the wrong hands
and the right mouth, poisonous mushrooms are pretty effective killers.
But there aren't as many lethal varieties as you might think.
Speaker 5 (05:04):
If we talk about all really deadly poisonose fungi that
can kill, there maybe less than one hundred.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
So if King Boris was poisoned by mushrooms. Are there
any obvious suspects in that top one hundred?
Speaker 5 (05:22):
There is a particular poisonous one that is called Amanita.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
Following this in plain English, it goes by the name
of death cap. Basically, the death cap does exactly what
it says on the tin.
Speaker 6 (05:36):
It kills you. Then there's another prime suspect.
Speaker 5 (05:40):
We can also talk about a very interesting and the
very dangerous fungus that is called whip cup.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
So we have the webcap and the death cap, twin
toxins with a single murderous aim, and they're pretty commonplace.
Speaker 5 (05:59):
Where do I find them in the forest?
Speaker 7 (06:01):
Really?
Speaker 5 (06:02):
Any forests? Any forest?
Speaker 4 (06:04):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (06:04):
Why not in Bulgaria as well? Of course.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
So somebody wanting to kill Boris, somebody like his architect
friends Sevov for example, would have had easy access to
deadly mushrooms. I mean, Arana Palace has its own mini forest.
We went walking in it with the King's aid Jarvil
and guess what he pointed out, it's a fall.
Speaker 5 (06:29):
Of mushrooms in the garden.
Speaker 1 (06:31):
Now, But are these lethal mushrooms easy to spot?
Speaker 6 (06:35):
What does a death cap look like?
Speaker 5 (06:38):
That's usually peel in color, slightly greenish whiteish and looking
similar to classical mushroom.
Speaker 1 (06:47):
That's goordinary mushroom that you'd chop up much in an
oblot stambols.
Speaker 5 (06:51):
There is this possibility to confuse them.
Speaker 4 (06:56):
Ah.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
Now that's interesting, and it makes me think I need
to consider a much less dramatic scenario. What if Boris
accidentally poisoned himself. We already know that Boris loved to
spend time in the forests among the flora and fauna,
looking for rare plants. Perhaps he also did a bit
(07:19):
of foraging. Now, Simeon told us that Boris was knowledgeable
about fungi.
Speaker 3 (07:25):
My father knew a lot about mushrooms.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
But Boris had a lot on his mind, the war,
the unhappy alliance with Hitler, how to protect Bulgaria's Jews.
Is it possible he just got distracted and picked her
poisonous mushroom by mistake, then unwittingly just handed it to
the royal cook. It's certainly possible, but Arena doesn't believe
(07:52):
that a botanist like Boris would make such a basic error.
Speaker 5 (07:56):
If the person has an even super visual knowledge, I
believe that this mistake is very unlikely because usually people
that like to collect the big mushrooms in the forest.
They should know them. So I don't think the king
do this mistake.
Speaker 1 (08:13):
Okay, I think we can rule out Boris accidentally poisoning himself,
but that puts Boris's architect friend back in the frame.
I want to tell you a bit more about Jordan Severov,
because there's definitely something fishy about him. In the last
(08:33):
three years of Boris's life, it was Severov who had
the king's ear, and he'd infiltrated the palace in the
most extraordinary way. Here's how it happened. When Boris married
Queen Giovanna and she moved into Varana Palace. The king's
(08:53):
sister Eudoxia, felt well a bit of a spare part,
so he decided to move out, and it was the
well known Bulgarian architect Jorden Sevov who was commissioned to
build a villa for Eudoxia. Suddenly, Sevov found himself at
(09:14):
the heart of the royal circle, and once the war started,
Sevov frequently began showing up at the palace unannounced for
private audiences with King Boris, and Boris really took to him.
He was impressed by Sevov's intelligence. He started to ask
(09:34):
Sevov's opinion on the political dilemmas of the day, and
it wasn't long before he began asking Sevov for his advice.
The king's other aids and advisers felt squeezed out, and
they started to become seriously worried. In fact, Sevov had
such power over King Boris that behind his back people
(09:58):
called him the bull Gary and Rasputin. He came to
the palace whenever he chose to. He practically had his
own key.
Speaker 6 (10:08):
But here's the thing.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
It turns out that Seveov was a staunch admirer of
Germany and of Hitler. Now, the royal children grew up
in difficult times, murderous times when trust was hard to
come by, so they'd been schooled in keeping stum whenever
(10:30):
there were any visitors at home.
Speaker 3 (10:33):
What I remember is that mother will tell us that, well,
we just should know how to keep our mouth shut.
Speaker 4 (10:42):
But I think it was more for.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
Is anybody eavesdropping or I don't know.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
Did the Queen suspect that Seveov was not entirely trustworthy?
Was Sevov being paid to infiltrate royal circles. Boris had
fallen out with Hitler. Remember, So is it possible that
sever Off bumped off Boris maybe to hand power to
(11:12):
his brother, Kirol, who might be more sympathetic. The reason
I say that is because just a few weeks after
Boris died, Kirol went to meet Hitler. It's really eerie
watching the newsreels Boris's little brother, down cast walking in
(11:34):
his big brother's footsteps, saluting the Fura. It's particularly chilling
because Kirol and Boris look incredibly alike. You can only
really tell them apart because Kirol's wearing a black armband.
You almost feel like you're watching a ghost. So did
(11:57):
the Nazis hope Kirol would be more pliant to their demands?
Did they think the little brother would be easier to
manipulate once their big brother was out of the way.
It sounds plausible. So let's return to the night in
question that supper. One thing is nagging me about it.
(12:21):
I mean, kings have food tasters, don't they?
Speaker 3 (12:25):
No, no, no, never never. This was a sort of
I don't know, in Roman days.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
I think he means Julius Caesar might have had a
food taster, but the king of Bulgaria not so much.
Turns out Boris was pretty lax about his personal security.
Speaker 3 (12:44):
And also he liked to move around, I mean without
any fuss or bodyguards or what have you, which is
so necessary nowadays. The only rule he had he would
never be done on the same route that he had
onto a place, because he had had a dents on
his life.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
But if Boris was poisoned, wouldn't it have been pretty
obvious to him? I mean, doesn't a toxic toadstool taste
pretty foul? Arena Droger Nina is our mycologist or mushroom expert.
Speaker 5 (13:18):
Some poisonous founded they are known to have some bitter tastes,
but the ones that are really poisonous they had tasteless.
They're tasteless. They don't even taste.
Speaker 1 (13:27):
N You can't die having had a beautiful mushroom pie
or something. It'd just be a tasteless mess. God, how awful.
I know, I'm getting carried away again. But of course,
what arena really means is that the deathly mushrooms would
have been undetectable. The king just wouldn't have noticed them
mixed into a saucer a pie. He'd have tucked in
(13:48):
as usual with Gusto, So time to ask Arena. The
crucial question. Is mushroom poisoning though a reliable way to
kill someone to carry out murder.
Speaker 5 (14:01):
Yes, it is reliable. They could increase the concentration and
make a powder, of course, because for the dead cup,
you need only a quarter of the cup to kill person.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
So Seveov could have even sprinkled a toxic mushroom powder
onto the food. And once more, those killer mushrooms cover
their tracks like nothing else, because you can eat one,
feel a bit dodgy for about twenty four hours, and
then feel fine again until it's way, way too late.
Speaker 5 (14:35):
They are very dangerous because the poisoning appears sometimes two
weeks or three weeks after.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
The poisoning, So Sevov could have slipped Boris that poison
weeks before the last supper. He was a regular at
the royal dinner table. But how come the doctors didn't
clock that Boris had food poisoning? I mean, that's pretty
basic first aid, isn't it asking someone what they've eaten?
And the symptoms of mushroom poisoning include nausea, headache, flushing,
(15:11):
and heart palpitations.
Speaker 5 (15:14):
It's really difficult to prove because you know, you film
seek you see the doctor, and doctor asked what did
you do yesterday? What did he did? They before? But
nobody asks you what did you two weeks ago or
three weeks ago or a month ago? Right, yeah, they did.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
They would just say, oh, heart attack. They wouldn't have
detected the mushroom toxins. They that's very interesting because they
could get away with murder.
Speaker 5 (15:40):
Whoever it was?
Speaker 6 (15:42):
Yep, have I just solved this murder? Was it?
Speaker 1 (15:46):
The architect seven on behalf of the Nazis in the
dining room with toxic mushrooms?
Speaker 6 (15:53):
In theory, that seems perfectly possible.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
But did he really have the opportunity to orchestrate his
murderous plan?
Speaker 5 (16:03):
Obviously you have.
Speaker 6 (16:04):
To administer it.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
Well, yes, that's because they could just push that little
bit of the nice pasta with that lovely mushroom source
to one side and stick to the potatoes.
Speaker 6 (16:14):
And then what do you do?
Speaker 5 (16:15):
Because comedy of errors there, how do you get rid
of it?
Speaker 2 (16:18):
Then?
Speaker 1 (16:19):
The problem is Sevov would need to have eaten exactly
the same dish as the king, or the king would
have become suspicious. So if Sevov ate the same thing
as the king. How come he didn't die too. I
guess it's possible he took an antidote, except Erna tells
(16:41):
me there are no reliable antidotes for death cap or
webcap mushrooms. Even today, I'm starting to feel less convinced.
And isn't it all a bit too convenient? Because there's
a very real possibility that Sevov was framed. The other
(17:04):
Palisades were jealous of him. They hated his influence, his
bad influence as they saw it, over their beloved king.
So when Boris died, a rumor began to spread, a
rumor that Severov had been found at home counting out
gold bars Nazi blood money for bumping off Boris. Simeon
(17:30):
thinks that's all buncom bunkom put out by the communists.
Speaker 3 (17:35):
Afterwards, the propaganda tried to, of course blame him for
all sorts of things, and said that they were ingots
of Nazi gold with the what you call it the swastika,
as though the Nazis, if they had poisoned my father,
would be that idiotic as to give ingot with their
(17:58):
signature on it.
Speaker 6 (18:00):
Well, come to think of it.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
I suppose it does sound a bit like a bad movie,
a tad obvious.
Speaker 3 (18:08):
You know, that's all part of propaganda, which people who
are in this propaganda things sometimes think that the rest
of human beings are idiots because they try and sell
such absurdities. But they drum it in, drum it in,
drum it in. Finally it sort of becomes half truth.
Speaker 6 (18:26):
Point taken.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
I'm ruling out several and the Nazis, but the mushrooms,
I have to say, I'm now certain that was how
Boris was killed.
Speaker 6 (18:39):
As for who did it.
Speaker 1 (18:40):
Well, I now have a very clear idea, and we'll
come back to that very soon. I want to pause
our murder investigation for a moment because I need to
(19:02):
tie up some other loose ends. We've been focused on
Boris's murder, But Simeon and Maria Louisa have lived whole
lifetime since then, long and extraordinary lifetimes, despite being haunted
by their father's death. So you'll remember that a year
(19:23):
after Boris died in nineteen forty three, the Red Army
marched into Bulgaria. Simeon and Maria Louisa were seven and
eleven years old. The Soviets promptly shot most of Boris's
old government and the royal household, including Kirol and several
Actually poor Queen Giovanna and her children were pretty much
(19:46):
kept under house arrest, and then in September nineteen forty six,
a referendum, albeit heavily rigged, abolished the monarchy. Bulgaria was
declared a republic and the queen and her children were
asked to leave the country.
Speaker 6 (20:02):
Asked to leave is a bit of a euphemism.
Speaker 1 (20:06):
Let's face it, they didn't really have a choice. At first,
The royal trio went to Alexandria in Egypt, where the
queen's own father was also in exile. Later, General Franco,
the nationalist dictator of Spain, granted them asylum, so the
(20:26):
family settled there. Simeon stayed and Maria Luisa eventually married
and moved to New York, but their hearts stayed firmly
in Bulgaria. They wondered if they would ever be able
to go home.
Speaker 4 (20:39):
Well, it's hoped.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
One day was against hope, and then one day the
Virlin Wall fell in eighty nine, and shortly thereafter the
Bulgarians got rid of that regime and the possibility was there.
Speaker 1 (20:55):
After the war came down, communist regimes across Eastern Europe relapsed.
Simeon was desperate to return to his homeland, to his kingdom, Bulgaria,
but Simeon knew he had to be cautious. He had
no idea how he'd be received so many years after
he'd left. Would he be welcomed or met with hostility?
(21:18):
During Maria Louisa and Simeon's exile, the Communists had painted
a dark picture of the royal family. The Bulgarians were
told they were thieves who didn't care a jot about Bulgaria.
Simeon was made out to be an arch villain.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
People were told all kinds of derogatory or hostile things
or silence.
Speaker 1 (21:42):
When Simeon thought about returning home after half a century
of absence, he wondered if anyone would even show up.
So in nineteen ninety one, he sent a special envoy
to test the water to see how the Bulgarian people,
newly emerged from the Iron Curtain would react to blue
blood in the country. And Simeon knew just the right
(22:06):
person for the job.
Speaker 2 (22:09):
So my brother called me and said to me, how
would you like to go and I said, by my God,
and then it came through.
Speaker 1 (22:21):
Maria Louisa arrived at night. The remnants of the old
communist regime were not happy. The old Party loyalists turned
off all the street lamps from the airport to Sofia
to make her journey as difficult as possible. Not a
good omen perhaps, but the Bulgarian people felt very differently.
(22:45):
They lined the streets, waving torches and lighting her path
with bonfires. Remember the last time Maria Louisa had seen
her homeland, she was just thirteen years old.
Speaker 4 (22:58):
The crowds were unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (23:01):
I never expected anybody to sort of, you know, remember anything,
because it's almost two generations, fifty years, it's two generations.
And I went out on not on the balcony like
the queen, but on a terrace and said to them,
you know, you're not here for me because I was
a child, but you remember my parents, and it's the
(23:22):
love for my parents that you are here applauding.
Speaker 4 (23:25):
It's very moving, very very moving.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
It was an unbelievable, you know dream that came through.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
And then in nineteen ninety six it was her brother's turn.
When the people learned Simeon had touched down. The bells
of Alexander Nevsky Cathedral rang out in his honor. The
last time Simeon had heard those bells, he was six
years old, a little boy in shorts and white knee socks,
(23:58):
trying not to cry at his father's funeral.
Speaker 3 (24:01):
Actually, it's I mean, paradoxical, got such such a joy,
But the sound of those bells was when my father died.
So there was a sudden return to precisely that very
sad moment in forty three, they realized that it brought
me back, all of a sudden, with half a century
(24:22):
For a few minutes.
Speaker 1 (24:24):
The boy King finally returned home, aged fifty nine. Even now,
Simeon stares at the ground when I asked him about
that moment. He's still humbled by the welcome he received.
Speaker 3 (24:39):
To me, it was a very personal moment. It was
unbelievably or undescribably moving, because after all fifty years in exile,
finally to set foot back on the country when I
was born.
Speaker 1 (24:56):
In Watching the news footage is credible. Crowds literally weep
for joy. Women run alongside Simeon's train, pressing flowers into
his hands. It's as if they're welcoming the Messiah or
King Boris himself.
Speaker 3 (25:14):
One of the major factors was that it was Boris's son,
the Little King, who was coming back. You see, it
was a tremendous reception. Nobody had expected this, and it
was really quite extraordinary.
Speaker 1 (25:30):
Sounds like a fairy tale ending, doesn't it? A happily
ever after? Except this was only the beginning. Simeon's homecoming
wasn't plain sailing. After fifty years behind the Iron curtain.
He knew Bulgaria certainly didn't have the stomach for another monarchy.
(25:54):
He knew he couldn't claim the throne again.
Speaker 4 (25:57):
And I thought, that's not fair.
Speaker 3 (26:00):
These people have been fifty years under an totalitarian system,
so fifty years of such a system. Who am I
to tell them? Looks, my system is better. Let's have
it go.
Speaker 1 (26:14):
But people really believed the Little King, as he was
still known, could help them. Simeon had spent his exile
largely in Spain. He was a Westerner, He'd done military
training in Pennsylvania, He'd worked in finance in Europe. The
Bulgarians felt sure he'd be able to turn their fortunes around,
(26:35):
and Simeon. Well, Simeon wanted to help. He wanted to
continue his father's legacy. It's what he felt he was
born for.
Speaker 3 (26:46):
The sense of duty is something which is hammered into us,
that one can or should help one's country. It's part
of the monarchs thinking. It might sound old fashioned, but
that's what it is.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
Okay, there's something I've kept back from you, but I'll
let Simeon tell you himself.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
No way.
Speaker 3 (27:09):
Want to sound derogatory, but I I demoted myself by
becoming prime minister.
Speaker 1 (27:16):
Yep, you heard that correctly. In the summer of two
thousand and one, King Simeon, On, a landslide victory, became
Bulgaria's Prime minister. His party was called the National Movement
for Stability in Progress. He helped Bulgaria become a member
of NATO and paved the way for Bulgaria to join
(27:36):
the European Union. So at first things went well, and
then they didn't. The Bulgarians wanted much more progress than
they got. They wanted a big boost to their living standards,
but that didn't happen. So in two thousand and five,
Simeon was ousted as prime minister and his party became
(27:59):
a Dune, your partner in a coalition government. Four years later,
his party failed to win any seats at all, and
Simeon resigned from politics.
Speaker 3 (28:11):
The fact that we had a democracy is this ancient,
and the fact that we're in the Eel is just
as important.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
But there was another problem. You'll remember that when the
Royal siblings went into exile, the Communist Party nationalized all
their palaces and properties. Simeon and Maria Louisa wanted them back,
so they went to the European Court of Human Rights,
and that infuriated many Bulgarians. They argued Simeon was only
(28:41):
interested in enriching himself, not his people.
Speaker 6 (28:45):
Simeon's hurt by.
Speaker 3 (28:46):
That we serve, we don't duuse the system for ourselves.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
The Royal siblings lost their court case. They didn't get
all their palaces back, but they got the one they
really wanted, Varana Palace, King Boris's sanctuary, the place where
he loved to spend time with his two little children.
Maria Louisa and Simeon right back to who killed King Boris,
(29:21):
The question that Maria Luisa and Simeon have never stopped asking. Well,
there's been a development because something rather extraordinaries happened.
Speaker 6 (29:33):
When back in the summer.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
Of twenty twenty three, Russia launched her first lunar mission
in nearly fifty years. It was a pretty big deal
in terms of national pride. The unmanned spacecraft was due
to land on the south side of the Moon, but
the rocket crashed the mission ended in complete failure. It
(30:02):
was a massive blow for Russia's prestige. Fast forward a
few weeks and the man responsible for that embarrassment suddenly
finds himself gravely ill in hospital for two weeks, leading
space scientist Vitalie Melnikov battled a very strange illness, and
(30:26):
then he died, and Russian state media reported he died
of mushroom poisoning. Sounds very suspicious to me, and very
familiar in recent years there's been a huge spit of
mysterious deaths in Russia. But Irina Drojinina, our mushroom expert,
(30:52):
believes she knows where the inspiration came from.
Speaker 5 (30:56):
These attempts to poison thee all come from the Cold
War KGB, and I think that all started before the
World War Two. I think that all started in late
thirties for sure.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
Why does she think that, Well, remember what our Bulgarian
historian George Bosdiganoff told us.
Speaker 8 (31:16):
From ninety thirty eight to nineteen fifty three, the Anchovid
that's Russian Special Service, maintained two laboratories for the production
of deadly poisonous toxicological one and bacteriological one.
Speaker 1 (31:32):
And remember those laboratories had a specific brief, not just
to silence Stalin's enemies, but to do.
Speaker 4 (31:40):
It without leaving any traces.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
In other words, they fatally poisoned people and made it
look like they're victims had died of a heart attack,
which is of course what's written on King Boris's death certificate.
And it turns out our mushroom expert, Arena, who's based
(32:03):
at the Royal Botanic Gardens in London, knows quite a
lot about those poison laboratories.
Speaker 5 (32:10):
The war laboratories with very bad intentions.
Speaker 1 (32:14):
Very bad intentions indeed, and Irena should know. She's Russian.
She knew people, not friends of hers, who worked in
those labs. That's how she knows they were specifically working
on mushrooms. Yes, mushrooms.
Speaker 5 (32:33):
I believe crime related to mushrooms are connected to mushrooms.
Speaker 1 (32:38):
Irena thinks that in their secret pre war laboratories, the
Soviets were tinkering with fungi toxins, making them more concentrated,
trying to mimic them, basically creating a chemical weapon based
on mushrooms, perhaps one that was fit to kill a king.
Speaker 5 (33:00):
I think the Russian stey maybe learned from nature about
the stocksins and tried to optimize them and synthesize something similar.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
Okay, deep breath, I'm going to ask Arena outright. So,
knowing what you know about the KGB, the laboratories and
so on, and what we've told you about Boris and
how he died all those symptoms, do you think he
was murdered.
Speaker 5 (33:28):
I cannot exclude this could be. It could be. I
cannot exclude this, ladies and gentlemen. I'm going to call it.
Speaker 1 (33:40):
After months of investigation, I believe King Boris was murdered
by the Soviets. Boris's murder has the Soviet hallmark stamped
all over it. They had the means, and with their
embassy next to the palace, the Soviets had plenty of
opportunity to slip the synthetic mushroom poison into the king's
(34:05):
food or drink.
Speaker 6 (34:07):
As for their motive.
Speaker 1 (34:08):
Remember, Stalin dreamed of spreading communism across Eastern Europe, and
Bulgaria was a vital foothold for anyone trying to consolidate
their power in the region. The only problem was that
there was a king in the way, a very popular king,
(34:29):
and if it was the Soviets, the plan worked. Just
one year after the king's death, the Red Army marched
into Sofia and the Iron Curtain swallowed up Bulgaria.
Speaker 6 (34:43):
So I believe King.
Speaker 1 (34:44):
Boris was murdered by the Soviets or by the Bulgarian
communists with help from the Soviets, using synthetic mushroom based
poisons from those dreadful chemical weapons labs. That certainly coincides
with Maria Louisa's suspicions when I spoke to her a
(35:05):
few months ago, when she said that she was convinced
something had been put in the king's soup, and about
who she thought did.
Speaker 2 (35:14):
It, who had the greatest advantage, who gets rid of
him the Soviet Union.
Speaker 1 (35:21):
But although Simeon admits he has questions over his father's death,
he wouldn't point the finger at anyone. He wouldn't even
allow himself to say the word murder. However hard I
tried to catch him out.
Speaker 6 (35:35):
I know you might want.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
To keep it private, but just for us in your guts,
who do you suspect may have if your father was murdered,
who could have mated him?
Speaker 3 (35:50):
I'm sorry, I cannot even to myself because it would
be cheating. Really, yes, because again I say, I like
to have things dougmented, broom tested, what have you? I
have never let myself into thinking, ah, really, because then
(36:16):
where does objectivity go? I'm sorry, very disappointing.
Speaker 1 (36:22):
But then I listened to the tape again and I
realized I'd missed something.
Speaker 3 (36:29):
But still I think that there must have been foul
playing as much as that he died in a strange
I mean, the pathology itself is a bit strange.
Speaker 1 (36:39):
So there you have it. There must have been foul play.
How can foul play mean anything other than murder? And
as we were packing up, the royal siblings were chatting
real Louisa suggested to her brother they may never find
out the truth until they died themselves and find themselves
(37:02):
in heaven or the other place.
Speaker 2 (37:05):
And we'll never know until we go up there. If
we go and find out really what.
Speaker 4 (37:10):
It was, that's where we might find some of the
people who are down there. Yes, they know what it is.
Speaker 1 (37:26):
Six months on from that original interview, I want to
tell Maria Louisa what I've discovered, So I discussed the
idea of telling her with my producer e J. She
must want to know where we've got to with this investigation,
so it would be really interesting just to say this
is where we've got to.
Speaker 5 (37:45):
So you know, she called me.
Speaker 9 (37:47):
Oh really, her Royal Highness called me on the phone.
On the phone, this number came up that I didn't know,
and all of a sudden and it was a royal highness.
Speaker 1 (37:59):
Is there a reason why she didn't call me?
Speaker 7 (38:02):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (38:03):
I mean no, really? Was it just she likes you better?
She heard about you using the King's cone Becky.
Speaker 9 (38:08):
Oh no, and almost you know, pushing that was you.
Speaker 6 (38:12):
Wasn't No, I didn't do that.
Speaker 1 (38:14):
I didn't It was you.
Speaker 6 (38:17):
You you?
Speaker 9 (38:19):
So she's only been calling me, Oh my god, it
was you, wasn't it?
Speaker 5 (38:23):
It was you?
Speaker 1 (38:24):
For the record, it wasn't me. Anyway, here goes I
make the call and what we also turned out it
could be more specifically mushroom poisoning.
Speaker 4 (38:39):
It's fascinating.
Speaker 2 (38:41):
We've never heard the mushroom version that you are bringing up,
so that's that's something totally new and I'd love to
hear more about it.
Speaker 1 (38:50):
I tell Maria Luisa too about the recent death of
the Russian rocket scientist Vitalie Melnikoff, who displeased Moscow and
who mysteriously died of suspect mushroom poisoning eighty years after
Boris's death.
Speaker 6 (39:04):
She's not surprised.
Speaker 4 (39:05):
Yeah, you are sure that the Russians are experts.
Speaker 2 (39:08):
Well, we've seen it in the last years, how many
people they managed to poison or half poison, etc.
Speaker 4 (39:16):
I mean, that's their specialty.
Speaker 2 (39:17):
That's a mushroom powder might have been put in his
food that evening and he fell ill after that and
never you know, came back that I believe.
Speaker 1 (39:27):
Precisely how they did it isn't really important for Maria Louisa.
Speaker 2 (39:32):
They achieved what they wanted. If it's the mushrooms who
killed him, that's it.
Speaker 4 (39:37):
And you know that's part of history, I guess.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
Part of history, but a part of history that's perhaps
been overlooked forgotten. And I think King Boris's story is
an important one. Yes, there's a stain on his legacy.
There'll always be a remark in some people's minds over
whether he could have done something to save the eleven
(40:05):
thousand Jews of Thrace and Macedonia, over whether he should
have been more outspoken about the plight of the Jews
in Bulgaria itself. But no one can dispute one fact
that under Boris's watch, not a single Bulgarian Jew was
deported to the death camps.
Speaker 4 (40:25):
For the country.
Speaker 2 (40:26):
He kept the Bulgaria out of the war, saved the population,
saved the Jewish population.
Speaker 4 (40:31):
What more you want? A saint is maybe too much,
but the hero for sure.
Speaker 1 (40:36):
There's no doubt Boris's children loved him, and both Maria,
Luisa and Simeon have been deeply marked by their father's
sudden death. But how should history remember King Boris, the
third of Bulgaria. People have really strong opinions about the king.
He reigned in such difficult times during the deadliest conflict
(40:58):
in human history, was forced to make impossible choices which
were applauded by some and abhorred by others. Perhaps that's
why it's so hard to uncover the truth about Boris's death,
because even after eighty years, everyone, every witness, has an agenda,
(41:19):
and everyone can vilify or exalt Boris's story to match
their own chosen narrative. There are historians who admire King
Boris's courage, his diplomacy, his kindness, while others deplore his cowardice,
his underhandedness, his indifference. Our historian Tessa Dunlop has often
(41:44):
been critical of Boris, but she believes he has something
important to teach us, particularly today.
Speaker 7 (41:52):
The headlines never really went big on Boris because he
was what we might call in today's terms as a
bit of a sort of tech crap monarch, a little
bit dull.
Speaker 1 (42:03):
She means, he was really into the nitty gritty, a
guy who liked detail.
Speaker 7 (42:09):
When we talk about today's world of nationalism, you know,
of populism, and if we want to understand how to
manage that nationalism, we need to not look at the
flamboyant figures, but actually at the techna crat monarchs like
Boris who managed to hold down the excesses on both
the left and the right. He is your model man
(42:33):
in an era of intolerant nationalism.
Speaker 1 (42:37):
And That's what's most important to Maria Luisa and Simeon
that history will remember their father in context generously. I
think we've come close to solving the mysterious death of
Czar Boris the Third, as close as history will allow
(42:57):
us to come to us. He's Boris to Maria Louisa.
He's her much missed papa as.
Speaker 2 (43:06):
A loving father and very patient father. But all that
other stuff you know about who and when you know.
Speaker 4 (43:16):
It doesn't change anything. You know we lost him.
Speaker 2 (43:19):
So to dwell for eighty years over that subject, I
really don't.
Speaker 4 (43:26):
I pray for his soul.
Speaker 2 (43:27):
I feel him very close many times, but.
Speaker 4 (43:32):
The rest is unfortunately history.
Speaker 1 (43:39):
Let's leave King Boris where he was happiest, at Varana Palace,
strolling in the grounds in his old floppy hat, waving
his butterfly net.
Speaker 6 (43:51):
Behind him.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
Two little children run barefoot through the tree line, chasing
their father's shadow. The Butterfly King is a production of
(44:37):
Blanchard House and Exactly Right Media, hosted by me Becky Milligan.
It's written and produced by Emma Jane Kirby. Original music
is by Daniel Lloyd Evans, Louis nank Manew and Toby Mattimoon.
Sound design and engineering by Toby Mattamoon and Daniel Lloyd Evans.
(44:58):
Artwork by Lilac, Voice acting by Mark Umbers. Special thanks
to Yona PEYOFSKA and Vessel Vlav. The Managing producer is
a Mika Schortino Noo. The creative director of Blanchard House
is Rosie Pye. The executive producer and head of Content
(45:20):
at Blanchard House is Lawrence Grizzel. For Exactly Right Media,
the executive producers are Karen Kilgareth Georgia Hardstark and Daniel Kramer,
with consulting producer Kyle Ryer. The Butterfly King is inspired
by the book Hitler and the King by John Haul Spencer.
The Royal Palace Sofia, August nineteen forty three, and King
Boris is dining with a friend. The friends a tall
man about the same age as the king himself. From
the way he sits straight backed in his chair, you
(00:24):
can guess he's had a military past, and when he
stands up briefly to reach for the serving dish, it's
clear he has a stiff leg, a slight limp, probably
a war injury. It's just the two of them at
the table, a private dinner. The servants have been dismissed,
(00:47):
so it's the friend who offers the king a second helping.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
I'm convinced that something that was put into his soup,
you know, dinner with somebody alone, and fell ill after
dinner suddenly.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
So who did he have dinner with?
Speaker 2 (01:07):
I think some assistant who worked with him and fell
after that.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
The friend's name is Jordan Sevov. He's an architect by trade,
but in the last year or so he's somehow become
the king's closest advisor. Other more experienced assistants have been
pushed out. Zevov's very comfortable in the royal presence, and
(01:36):
we can make an educated guess about what was in
that serving dish.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
Nobody even remembered what the menu was. But my father
loved mushrooms, has no doubt.
Speaker 1 (01:48):
So mushrooms the King's favorite dish. Was it mushrooms that
made Boris ill? Because that meal it turned out to
be the king's last supper. The next morning, Boris collapsed
and as he lay on his sick bed, doctors noticed
(02:08):
his skin was covered in those brown blotches we've heard about,
as if he'd been poisoned.
Speaker 4 (02:16):
And never really recovered the thorn.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
It's a shocking possibility. Was the king betrayed by his
closest confidante from Blanchard House? And exactly right, media, this
is the Butterfly King. I'm Becky Milligan, Chapter eight. The
(03:22):
rest is history. We're in Q in West London, not
far from the National Archives actually, where we began our
search for evidence about who killed Boris. But today we're
not looking for dusty old documents. We're looking for plants,
(03:44):
poisonous plants, or to be more precise, poisonous mushrooms. Which
is why we're at Queues Royal Botanic Gardens, because it
happens to have the largest and most comprehensive fungy collection
in the world was mold. That's cue, senior researcher Arena Droganina.
(04:06):
And if you didn't catch that, because I sure didn't,
She said, mold.
Speaker 5 (04:12):
Yes, I'm mold.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
You know, for a moment I thought you said molds,
and then I thought you mess spies, and you thought something,
we're talking to someone in the spy world, all right,
So molds.
Speaker 5 (04:23):
Molds so interesting. And of course also mushrooms.
Speaker 1 (04:28):
Arena works with all kinds of mushrooms, the good, the bad,
and the very bad, and.
Speaker 5 (04:36):
Those that produce antibiotics, and they also produce a lot
of toxins as well.
Speaker 6 (04:41):
Guess which mushrooms Arena's most keen.
Speaker 5 (04:43):
On, the really deadly ones. The thing is that mushrooms
they usually have not a single toxin, but they have
a cocktail of toxins.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
In other words, if they get into the wrong hands
and the right mouth, poisonous mushrooms are pretty effective killers.
But there aren't as many lethal varieties as you might think.
Speaker 5 (05:04):
If we talk about all really deadly poisonose fungi that
can kill, there maybe less than one hundred.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
So if King Boris was poisoned by mushrooms. Are there
any obvious suspects in that top one hundred?
Speaker 5 (05:22):
There is a particular poisonous one that is called Amanita.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
Following this in plain English, it goes by the name
of death cap. Basically, the death cap does exactly what
it says on the tin.
Speaker 6 (05:36):
It kills you. Then there's another prime suspect.
Speaker 5 (05:40):
We can also talk about a very interesting and the
very dangerous fungus that is called whip cup.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
So we have the webcap and the death cap, twin
toxins with a single murderous aim, and they're pretty commonplace.
Speaker 5 (05:59):
Where do I find them in the forest?
Speaker 7 (06:01):
Really?
Speaker 5 (06:02):
Any forests? Any forest?
Speaker 4 (06:04):
Yeah?
Speaker 5 (06:04):
Why not in Bulgaria as well? Of course.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
So somebody wanting to kill Boris, somebody like his architect
friends Sevov for example, would have had easy access to
deadly mushrooms. I mean, Arana Palace has its own mini forest.
We went walking in it with the King's aid Jarvil
and guess what he pointed out, it's a fall.
Speaker 5 (06:29):
Of mushrooms in the garden.
Speaker 1 (06:31):
Now, But are these lethal mushrooms easy to spot?
Speaker 6 (06:35):
What does a death cap look like?
Speaker 5 (06:38):
That's usually peel in color, slightly greenish whiteish and looking
similar to classical mushroom.
Speaker 1 (06:47):
That's goordinary mushroom that you'd chop up much in an
oblot stambols.
Speaker 5 (06:51):
There is this possibility to confuse them.
Speaker 4 (06:56):
Ah.
Speaker 1 (06:56):
Now that's interesting, and it makes me think I need
to consider a much less dramatic scenario. What if Boris
accidentally poisoned himself. We already know that Boris loved to
spend time in the forests among the flora and fauna,
looking for rare plants. Perhaps he also did a bit
(07:19):
of foraging. Now, Simeon told us that Boris was knowledgeable
about fungi.
Speaker 3 (07:25):
My father knew a lot about mushrooms.
Speaker 1 (07:28):
But Boris had a lot on his mind, the war,
the unhappy alliance with Hitler, how to protect Bulgaria's Jews.
Is it possible he just got distracted and picked her
poisonous mushroom by mistake, then unwittingly just handed it to
the royal cook. It's certainly possible, but Arena doesn't believe
(07:52):
that a botanist like Boris would make such a basic error.
Speaker 5 (07:56):
If the person has an even super visual knowledge, I
believe that this mistake is very unlikely because usually people
that like to collect the big mushrooms in the forest.
They should know them. So I don't think the king
do this mistake.
Speaker 1 (08:13):
Okay, I think we can rule out Boris accidentally poisoning himself,
but that puts Boris's architect friend back in the frame.
I want to tell you a bit more about Jordan Severov,
because there's definitely something fishy about him. In the last
(08:33):
three years of Boris's life, it was Severov who had
the king's ear, and he'd infiltrated the palace in the
most extraordinary way. Here's how it happened. When Boris married
Queen Giovanna and she moved into Varana Palace. The king's
(08:53):
sister Eudoxia, felt well a bit of a spare part,
so he decided to move out, and it was the
well known Bulgarian architect Jorden Sevov who was commissioned to
build a villa for Eudoxia. Suddenly, Sevov found himself at
(09:14):
the heart of the royal circle, and once the war started,
Sevov frequently began showing up at the palace unannounced for
private audiences with King Boris, and Boris really took to him.
He was impressed by Sevov's intelligence. He started to ask
(09:34):
Sevov's opinion on the political dilemmas of the day, and
it wasn't long before he began asking Sevov for his advice.
The king's other aids and advisers felt squeezed out, and
they started to become seriously worried. In fact, Sevov had
such power over King Boris that behind his back people
(09:58):
called him the bull Gary and Rasputin. He came to
the palace whenever he chose to. He practically had his
own key.
Speaker 6 (10:08):
But here's the thing.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
It turns out that Seveov was a staunch admirer of
Germany and of Hitler. Now, the royal children grew up
in difficult times, murderous times when trust was hard to
come by, so they'd been schooled in keeping stum whenever
(10:30):
there were any visitors at home.
Speaker 3 (10:33):
What I remember is that mother will tell us that, well,
we just should know how to keep our mouth shut.
Speaker 4 (10:42):
But I think it was more for.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
Is anybody eavesdropping or I don't know.
Speaker 1 (10:51):
Did the Queen suspect that Seveov was not entirely trustworthy?
Was Sevov being paid to infiltrate royal circles. Boris had
fallen out with Hitler. Remember, So is it possible that
sever Off bumped off Boris maybe to hand power to
(11:12):
his brother, Kirol, who might be more sympathetic. The reason
I say that is because just a few weeks after
Boris died, Kirol went to meet Hitler. It's really eerie
watching the newsreels Boris's little brother, down cast walking in
(11:34):
his big brother's footsteps, saluting the Fura. It's particularly chilling
because Kirol and Boris look incredibly alike. You can only
really tell them apart because Kirol's wearing a black armband.
You almost feel like you're watching a ghost. So did
(11:57):
the Nazis hope Kirol would be more pliant to their demands?
Did they think the little brother would be easier to
manipulate once their big brother was out of the way.
It sounds plausible. So let's return to the night in
question that supper. One thing is nagging me about it.
(12:21):
I mean, kings have food tasters, don't they?
Speaker 3 (12:25):
No, no, no, never never. This was a sort of
I don't know, in Roman days.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
I think he means Julius Caesar might have had a
food taster, but the king of Bulgaria not so much.
Turns out Boris was pretty lax about his personal security.
Speaker 3 (12:44):
And also he liked to move around, I mean without
any fuss or bodyguards or what have you, which is
so necessary nowadays. The only rule he had he would
never be done on the same route that he had
onto a place, because he had had a dents on
his life.
Speaker 1 (13:04):
But if Boris was poisoned, wouldn't it have been pretty
obvious to him? I mean, doesn't a toxic toadstool taste
pretty foul? Arena Droger Nina is our mycologist or mushroom expert.
Speaker 5 (13:18):
Some poisonous founded they are known to have some bitter tastes,
but the ones that are really poisonous they had tasteless.
They're tasteless. They don't even taste.
Speaker 1 (13:27):
N You can't die having had a beautiful mushroom pie
or something. It'd just be a tasteless mess. God, how awful.
I know, I'm getting carried away again. But of course,
what arena really means is that the deathly mushrooms would
have been undetectable. The king just wouldn't have noticed them
mixed into a saucer a pie. He'd have tucked in
(13:48):
as usual with Gusto, So time to ask Arena. The
crucial question. Is mushroom poisoning though a reliable way to
kill someone to carry out murder.
Speaker 5 (14:01):
Yes, it is reliable. They could increase the concentration and
make a powder, of course, because for the dead cup,
you need only a quarter of the cup to kill person.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
So Seveov could have even sprinkled a toxic mushroom powder
onto the food. And once more, those killer mushrooms cover
their tracks like nothing else, because you can eat one,
feel a bit dodgy for about twenty four hours, and
then feel fine again until it's way, way too late.
Speaker 5 (14:35):
They are very dangerous because the poisoning appears sometimes two
weeks or three weeks after.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
The poisoning, So Sevov could have slipped Boris that poison
weeks before the last supper. He was a regular at
the royal dinner table. But how come the doctors didn't
clock that Boris had food poisoning? I mean, that's pretty
basic first aid, isn't it asking someone what they've eaten?
And the symptoms of mushroom poisoning include nausea, headache, flushing,
(15:11):
and heart palpitations.
Speaker 5 (15:14):
It's really difficult to prove because you know, you film
seek you see the doctor, and doctor asked what did
you do yesterday? What did he did? They before? But
nobody asks you what did you two weeks ago or
three weeks ago or a month ago? Right, yeah, they did.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
They would just say, oh, heart attack. They wouldn't have
detected the mushroom toxins. They that's very interesting because they
could get away with murder.
Speaker 5 (15:40):
Whoever it was?
Speaker 6 (15:42):
Yep, have I just solved this murder? Was it?
Speaker 1 (15:46):
The architect seven on behalf of the Nazis in the
dining room with toxic mushrooms?
Speaker 6 (15:53):
In theory, that seems perfectly possible.
Speaker 1 (15:56):
But did he really have the opportunity to orchestrate his
murderous plan?
Speaker 5 (16:03):
Obviously you have.
Speaker 6 (16:04):
To administer it.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
Well, yes, that's because they could just push that little
bit of the nice pasta with that lovely mushroom source
to one side and stick to the potatoes.
Speaker 6 (16:14):
And then what do you do?
Speaker 5 (16:15):
Because comedy of errors there, how do you get rid
of it?
Speaker 2 (16:18):
Then?
Speaker 1 (16:19):
The problem is Sevov would need to have eaten exactly
the same dish as the king, or the king would
have become suspicious. So if Sevov ate the same thing
as the king. How come he didn't die too. I
guess it's possible he took an antidote, except Erna tells
(16:41):
me there are no reliable antidotes for death cap or
webcap mushrooms. Even today, I'm starting to feel less convinced.
And isn't it all a bit too convenient? Because there's
a very real possibility that Sevov was framed. The other
(17:04):
Palisades were jealous of him. They hated his influence, his
bad influence as they saw it, over their beloved king.
So when Boris died, a rumor began to spread, a
rumor that Severov had been found at home counting out
gold bars Nazi blood money for bumping off Boris. Simeon
(17:30):
thinks that's all buncom bunkom put out by the communists.
Speaker 3 (17:35):
Afterwards, the propaganda tried to, of course blame him for
all sorts of things, and said that they were ingots
of Nazi gold with the what you call it the swastika,
as though the Nazis, if they had poisoned my father,
would be that idiotic as to give ingot with their
(17:58):
signature on it.
Speaker 6 (18:00):
Well, come to think of it.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
I suppose it does sound a bit like a bad movie,
a tad obvious.
Speaker 3 (18:08):
You know, that's all part of propaganda, which people who
are in this propaganda things sometimes think that the rest
of human beings are idiots because they try and sell
such absurdities. But they drum it in, drum it in,
drum it in. Finally it sort of becomes half truth.
Speaker 6 (18:26):
Point taken.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
I'm ruling out several and the Nazis, but the mushrooms,
I have to say, I'm now certain that was how
Boris was killed.
Speaker 6 (18:39):
As for who did it.
Speaker 1 (18:40):
Well, I now have a very clear idea, and we'll
come back to that very soon. I want to pause
our murder investigation for a moment because I need to
(19:02):
tie up some other loose ends. We've been focused on
Boris's murder, But Simeon and Maria Louisa have lived whole
lifetime since then, long and extraordinary lifetimes, despite being haunted
by their father's death. So you'll remember that a year
(19:23):
after Boris died in nineteen forty three, the Red Army
marched into Bulgaria. Simeon and Maria Louisa were seven and
eleven years old. The Soviets promptly shot most of Boris's
old government and the royal household, including Kirol and several
Actually poor Queen Giovanna and her children were pretty much
(19:46):
kept under house arrest, and then in September nineteen forty six,
a referendum, albeit heavily rigged, abolished the monarchy. Bulgaria was
declared a republic and the queen and her children were
asked to leave the country.
Speaker 6 (20:02):
Asked to leave is a bit of a euphemism.
Speaker 1 (20:06):
Let's face it, they didn't really have a choice. At first,
The royal trio went to Alexandria in Egypt, where the
queen's own father was also in exile. Later, General Franco,
the nationalist dictator of Spain, granted them asylum, so the
(20:26):
family settled there. Simeon stayed and Maria Luisa eventually married
and moved to New York, but their hearts stayed firmly
in Bulgaria. They wondered if they would ever be able
to go home.
Speaker 4 (20:39):
Well, it's hoped.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
One day was against hope, and then one day the
Virlin Wall fell in eighty nine, and shortly thereafter the
Bulgarians got rid of that regime and the possibility was there.
Speaker 1 (20:55):
After the war came down, communist regimes across Eastern Europe relapsed.
Simeon was desperate to return to his homeland, to his kingdom, Bulgaria,
but Simeon knew he had to be cautious. He had
no idea how he'd be received so many years after
he'd left. Would he be welcomed or met with hostility?
(21:18):
During Maria Louisa and Simeon's exile, the Communists had painted
a dark picture of the royal family. The Bulgarians were
told they were thieves who didn't care a jot about Bulgaria.
Simeon was made out to be an arch villain.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
People were told all kinds of derogatory or hostile things
or silence.
Speaker 1 (21:42):
When Simeon thought about returning home after half a century
of absence, he wondered if anyone would even show up.
So in nineteen ninety one, he sent a special envoy
to test the water to see how the Bulgarian people,
newly emerged from the Iron Curtain would react to blue
blood in the country. And Simeon knew just the right
(22:06):
person for the job.
Speaker 2 (22:09):
So my brother called me and said to me, how
would you like to go and I said, by my God,
and then it came through.
Speaker 1 (22:21):
Maria Louisa arrived at night. The remnants of the old
communist regime were not happy. The old Party loyalists turned
off all the street lamps from the airport to Sofia
to make her journey as difficult as possible. Not a
good omen perhaps, but the Bulgarian people felt very differently.
(22:45):
They lined the streets, waving torches and lighting her path
with bonfires. Remember the last time Maria Louisa had seen
her homeland, she was just thirteen years old.
Speaker 4 (22:58):
The crowds were unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (23:01):
I never expected anybody to sort of, you know, remember anything,
because it's almost two generations, fifty years, it's two generations.
And I went out on not on the balcony like
the queen, but on a terrace and said to them,
you know, you're not here for me because I was
a child, but you remember my parents, and it's the
(23:22):
love for my parents that you are here applauding.
Speaker 4 (23:25):
It's very moving, very very moving.
Speaker 2 (23:28):
It was an unbelievable, you know dream that came through.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
And then in nineteen ninety six it was her brother's turn.
When the people learned Simeon had touched down. The bells
of Alexander Nevsky Cathedral rang out in his honor. The
last time Simeon had heard those bells, he was six
years old, a little boy in shorts and white knee socks,
(23:58):
trying not to cry at his father's funeral.
Speaker 3 (24:01):
Actually, it's I mean, paradoxical, got such such a joy,
But the sound of those bells was when my father died.
So there was a sudden return to precisely that very
sad moment in forty three, they realized that it brought
me back, all of a sudden, with half a century
(24:22):
For a few minutes.
Speaker 1 (24:24):
The boy King finally returned home, aged fifty nine. Even now,
Simeon stares at the ground when I asked him about
that moment. He's still humbled by the welcome he received.
Speaker 3 (24:39):
To me, it was a very personal moment. It was
unbelievably or undescribably moving, because after all fifty years in exile,
finally to set foot back on the country when I
was born.
Speaker 1 (24:56):
In Watching the news footage is credible. Crowds literally weep
for joy. Women run alongside Simeon's train, pressing flowers into
his hands. It's as if they're welcoming the Messiah or
King Boris himself.
Speaker 3 (25:14):
One of the major factors was that it was Boris's son,
the Little King, who was coming back. You see, it
was a tremendous reception. Nobody had expected this, and it
was really quite extraordinary.
Speaker 1 (25:30):
Sounds like a fairy tale ending, doesn't it? A happily
ever after? Except this was only the beginning. Simeon's homecoming
wasn't plain sailing. After fifty years behind the Iron curtain.
He knew Bulgaria certainly didn't have the stomach for another monarchy.
(25:54):
He knew he couldn't claim the throne again.
Speaker 4 (25:57):
And I thought, that's not fair.
Speaker 3 (26:00):
These people have been fifty years under an totalitarian system,
so fifty years of such a system. Who am I
to tell them? Looks, my system is better. Let's have
it go.
Speaker 1 (26:14):
But people really believed the Little King, as he was
still known, could help them. Simeon had spent his exile
largely in Spain. He was a Westerner, He'd done military
training in Pennsylvania, He'd worked in finance in Europe. The
Bulgarians felt sure he'd be able to turn their fortunes around,
(26:35):
and Simeon. Well, Simeon wanted to help. He wanted to
continue his father's legacy. It's what he felt he was
born for.
Speaker 3 (26:46):
The sense of duty is something which is hammered into us,
that one can or should help one's country. It's part
of the monarchs thinking. It might sound old fashioned, but
that's what it is.
Speaker 1 (27:01):
Okay, there's something I've kept back from you, but I'll
let Simeon tell you himself.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
No way.
Speaker 3 (27:09):
Want to sound derogatory, but I I demoted myself by
becoming prime minister.
Speaker 1 (27:16):
Yep, you heard that correctly. In the summer of two
thousand and one, King Simeon, On, a landslide victory, became
Bulgaria's Prime minister. His party was called the National Movement
for Stability in Progress. He helped Bulgaria become a member
of NATO and paved the way for Bulgaria to join
(27:36):
the European Union. So at first things went well, and
then they didn't. The Bulgarians wanted much more progress than
they got. They wanted a big boost to their living standards,
but that didn't happen. So in two thousand and five,
Simeon was ousted as prime minister and his party became
(27:59):
a Dune, your partner in a coalition government. Four years later,
his party failed to win any seats at all, and
Simeon resigned from politics.
Speaker 3 (28:11):
The fact that we had a democracy is this ancient,
and the fact that we're in the Eel is just
as important.
Speaker 1 (28:17):
But there was another problem. You'll remember that when the
Royal siblings went into exile, the Communist Party nationalized all
their palaces and properties. Simeon and Maria Louisa wanted them back,
so they went to the European Court of Human Rights,
and that infuriated many Bulgarians. They argued Simeon was only
(28:41):
interested in enriching himself, not his people.
Speaker 6 (28:45):
Simeon's hurt by.
Speaker 3 (28:46):
That we serve, we don't duuse the system for ourselves.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
The Royal siblings lost their court case. They didn't get
all their palaces back, but they got the one they
really wanted, Varana Palace, King Boris's sanctuary, the place where
he loved to spend time with his two little children.
Maria Louisa and Simeon right back to who killed King Boris,
(29:21):
The question that Maria Luisa and Simeon have never stopped asking. Well,
there's been a development because something rather extraordinaries happened.
Speaker 6 (29:33):
When back in the summer.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
Of twenty twenty three, Russia launched her first lunar mission
in nearly fifty years. It was a pretty big deal
in terms of national pride. The unmanned spacecraft was due
to land on the south side of the Moon, but
the rocket crashed the mission ended in complete failure. It
(30:02):
was a massive blow for Russia's prestige. Fast forward a
few weeks and the man responsible for that embarrassment suddenly
finds himself gravely ill in hospital for two weeks, leading
space scientist Vitalie Melnikov battled a very strange illness, and
(30:26):
then he died, and Russian state media reported he died
of mushroom poisoning. Sounds very suspicious to me, and very
familiar in recent years there's been a huge spit of
mysterious deaths in Russia. But Irina Drojinina, our mushroom expert,
(30:52):
believes she knows where the inspiration came from.
Speaker 5 (30:56):
These attempts to poison thee all come from the Cold
War KGB, and I think that all started before the
World War Two. I think that all started in late
thirties for sure.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
Why does she think that, Well, remember what our Bulgarian
historian George Bosdiganoff told us.
Speaker 8 (31:16):
From ninety thirty eight to nineteen fifty three, the Anchovid
that's Russian Special Service, maintained two laboratories for the production
of deadly poisonous toxicological one and bacteriological one.
Speaker 1 (31:32):
And remember those laboratories had a specific brief, not just
to silence Stalin's enemies, but to do.
Speaker 4 (31:40):
It without leaving any traces.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
In other words, they fatally poisoned people and made it
look like they're victims had died of a heart attack,
which is of course what's written on King Boris's death certificate.
And it turns out our mushroom expert, Arena, who's based
(32:03):
at the Royal Botanic Gardens in London, knows quite a
lot about those poison laboratories.
Speaker 5 (32:10):
The war laboratories with very bad intentions.
Speaker 1 (32:14):
Very bad intentions indeed, and Irena should know. She's Russian.
She knew people, not friends of hers, who worked in
those labs. That's how she knows they were specifically working
on mushrooms. Yes, mushrooms.
Speaker 5 (32:33):
I believe crime related to mushrooms are connected to mushrooms.
Speaker 1 (32:38):
Irena thinks that in their secret pre war laboratories, the
Soviets were tinkering with fungi toxins, making them more concentrated,
trying to mimic them, basically creating a chemical weapon based
on mushrooms, perhaps one that was fit to kill a king.
Speaker 5 (33:00):
I think the Russian stey maybe learned from nature about
the stocksins and tried to optimize them and synthesize something similar.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
Okay, deep breath, I'm going to ask Arena outright. So,
knowing what you know about the KGB, the laboratories and
so on, and what we've told you about Boris and
how he died all those symptoms, do you think he
was murdered.
Speaker 5 (33:28):
I cannot exclude this could be. It could be. I
cannot exclude this, ladies and gentlemen. I'm going to call it.
Speaker 1 (33:40):
After months of investigation, I believe King Boris was murdered
by the Soviets. Boris's murder has the Soviet hallmark stamped
all over it. They had the means, and with their
embassy next to the palace, the Soviets had plenty of
opportunity to slip the synthetic mushroom poison into the king's
(34:05):
food or drink.
Speaker 6 (34:07):
As for their motive.
Speaker 1 (34:08):
Remember, Stalin dreamed of spreading communism across Eastern Europe, and
Bulgaria was a vital foothold for anyone trying to consolidate
their power in the region. The only problem was that
there was a king in the way, a very popular king,
(34:29):
and if it was the Soviets, the plan worked. Just
one year after the king's death, the Red Army marched
into Sofia and the Iron Curtain swallowed up Bulgaria.
Speaker 6 (34:43):
So I believe King.
Speaker 1 (34:44):
Boris was murdered by the Soviets or by the Bulgarian
communists with help from the Soviets, using synthetic mushroom based
poisons from those dreadful chemical weapons labs. That certainly coincides
with Maria Louisa's suspicions when I spoke to her a
(35:05):
few months ago, when she said that she was convinced
something had been put in the king's soup, and about
who she thought did.
Speaker 2 (35:14):
It, who had the greatest advantage, who gets rid of
him the Soviet Union.
Speaker 1 (35:21):
But although Simeon admits he has questions over his father's death,
he wouldn't point the finger at anyone. He wouldn't even
allow himself to say the word murder. However hard I
tried to catch him out.
Speaker 6 (35:35):
I know you might want.
Speaker 1 (35:36):
To keep it private, but just for us in your guts,
who do you suspect may have if your father was murdered,
who could have mated him?
Speaker 3 (35:50):
I'm sorry, I cannot even to myself because it would
be cheating. Really, yes, because again I say, I like
to have things dougmented, broom tested, what have you? I
have never let myself into thinking, ah, really, because then
(36:16):
where does objectivity go? I'm sorry, very disappointing.
Speaker 1 (36:22):
But then I listened to the tape again and I
realized I'd missed something.
Speaker 3 (36:29):
But still I think that there must have been foul
playing as much as that he died in a strange
I mean, the pathology itself is a bit strange.
Speaker 1 (36:39):
So there you have it. There must have been foul play.
How can foul play mean anything other than murder? And
as we were packing up, the royal siblings were chatting
real Louisa suggested to her brother they may never find
out the truth until they died themselves and find themselves
(37:02):
in heaven or the other place.
Speaker 2 (37:05):
And we'll never know until we go up there. If
we go and find out really what.
Speaker 4 (37:10):
It was, that's where we might find some of the
people who are down there. Yes, they know what it is.
Speaker 1 (37:26):
Six months on from that original interview, I want to
tell Maria Louisa what I've discovered, So I discussed the
idea of telling her with my producer e J. She
must want to know where we've got to with this investigation,
so it would be really interesting just to say this
is where we've got to.
Speaker 5 (37:45):
So you know, she called me.
Speaker 9 (37:47):
Oh really, her Royal Highness called me on the phone.
On the phone, this number came up that I didn't know,
and all of a sudden and it was a royal highness.
Speaker 1 (37:59):
Is there a reason why she didn't call me?
Speaker 7 (38:02):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (38:03):
I mean no, really? Was it just she likes you better?
She heard about you using the King's cone Becky.
Speaker 9 (38:08):
Oh no, and almost you know, pushing that was you.
Speaker 6 (38:12):
Wasn't No, I didn't do that.
Speaker 1 (38:14):
I didn't It was you.
Speaker 6 (38:17):
You you?
Speaker 9 (38:19):
So she's only been calling me, Oh my god, it
was you, wasn't it?
Speaker 5 (38:23):
It was you?
Speaker 1 (38:24):
For the record, it wasn't me. Anyway, here goes I
make the call and what we also turned out it
could be more specifically mushroom poisoning.
Speaker 4 (38:39):
It's fascinating.
Speaker 2 (38:41):
We've never heard the mushroom version that you are bringing up,
so that's that's something totally new and I'd love to
hear more about it.
Speaker 1 (38:50):
I tell Maria Luisa too about the recent death of
the Russian rocket scientist Vitalie Melnikoff, who displeased Moscow and
who mysteriously died of suspect mushroom poisoning eighty years after
Boris's death.
Speaker 6 (39:04):
She's not surprised.
Speaker 4 (39:05):
Yeah, you are sure that the Russians are experts.
Speaker 2 (39:08):
Well, we've seen it in the last years, how many
people they managed to poison or half poison, etc.
Speaker 4 (39:16):
I mean, that's their specialty.
Speaker 2 (39:17):
That's a mushroom powder might have been put in his
food that evening and he fell ill after that and
never you know, came back that I believe.
Speaker 1 (39:27):
Precisely how they did it isn't really important for Maria Louisa.
Speaker 2 (39:32):
They achieved what they wanted. If it's the mushrooms who
killed him, that's it.
Speaker 4 (39:37):
And you know that's part of history, I guess.
Speaker 1 (39:44):
Part of history, but a part of history that's perhaps
been overlooked forgotten. And I think King Boris's story is
an important one. Yes, there's a stain on his legacy.
There'll always be a remark in some people's minds over
whether he could have done something to save the eleven
(40:05):
thousand Jews of Thrace and Macedonia, over whether he should
have been more outspoken about the plight of the Jews
in Bulgaria itself. But no one can dispute one fact
that under Boris's watch, not a single Bulgarian Jew was
deported to the death camps.
Speaker 4 (40:25):
For the country.
Speaker 2 (40:26):
He kept the Bulgaria out of the war, saved the population,
saved the Jewish population.
Speaker 4 (40:31):
What more you want? A saint is maybe too much,
but the hero for sure.
Speaker 1 (40:36):
There's no doubt Boris's children loved him, and both Maria,
Luisa and Simeon have been deeply marked by their father's
sudden death. But how should history remember King Boris, the
third of Bulgaria. People have really strong opinions about the king.
He reigned in such difficult times during the deadliest conflict
(40:58):
in human history, was forced to make impossible choices which
were applauded by some and abhorred by others. Perhaps that's
why it's so hard to uncover the truth about Boris's death,
because even after eighty years, everyone, every witness, has an agenda,
(41:19):
and everyone can vilify or exalt Boris's story to match
their own chosen narrative. There are historians who admire King
Boris's courage, his diplomacy, his kindness, while others deplore his cowardice,
his underhandedness, his indifference. Our historian Tessa Dunlop has often
(41:44):
been critical of Boris, but she believes he has something
important to teach us, particularly today.
Speaker 7 (41:52):
The headlines never really went big on Boris because he
was what we might call in today's terms as a
bit of a sort of tech crap monarch, a little
bit dull.
Speaker 1 (42:03):
She means, he was really into the nitty gritty, a
guy who liked detail.
Speaker 7 (42:09):
When we talk about today's world of nationalism, you know,
of populism, and if we want to understand how to
manage that nationalism, we need to not look at the
flamboyant figures, but actually at the techna crat monarchs like
Boris who managed to hold down the excesses on both
the left and the right. He is your model man
(42:33):
in an era of intolerant nationalism.
Speaker 1 (42:37):
And That's what's most important to Maria Luisa and Simeon
that history will remember their father in context generously. I
think we've come close to solving the mysterious death of
Czar Boris the Third, as close as history will allow
(42:57):
us to come to us. He's Boris to Maria Louisa.
He's her much missed papa as.
Speaker 2 (43:06):
A loving father and very patient father. But all that
other stuff you know about who and when you know.
Speaker 4 (43:16):
It doesn't change anything. You know we lost him.
Speaker 2 (43:19):
So to dwell for eighty years over that subject, I
really don't.
Speaker 4 (43:26):
I pray for his soul.
Speaker 2 (43:27):
I feel him very close many times, but.
Speaker 4 (43:32):
The rest is unfortunately history.
Speaker 1 (43:39):
Let's leave King Boris where he was happiest, at Varana Palace,
strolling in the grounds in his old floppy hat, waving
his butterfly net.
Speaker 6 (43:51):
Behind him.
Speaker 1 (43:52):
Two little children run barefoot through the tree line, chasing
their father's shadow. The Butterfly King is a production of
(44:37):
Blanchard House and Exactly Right Media, hosted by me Becky Milligan.
It's written and produced by Emma Jane Kirby. Original music
is by Daniel Lloyd Evans, Louis nank Manew and Toby Mattimoon.
Sound design and engineering by Toby Mattamoon and Daniel Lloyd Evans.
(44:58):
Artwork by Lilac, Voice acting by Mark Umbers. Special thanks
to Yona PEYOFSKA and Vessel Vlav. The Managing producer is
a Mika Schortino Noo. The creative director of Blanchard House
is Rosie Pye. The executive producer and head of Content
(45:20):
at Blanchard House is Lawrence Grizzel. For Exactly Right Media,
the executive producers are Karen Kilgareth Georgia Hardstark and Daniel Kramer,
with consulting producer Kyle Ryer. The Butterfly King is inspired
by the book Hitler and the King by John Haul Spencer.
Hosts And Creators
Emma Jane Kirby
Becky Milligan
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