When he acceded to the throne as Constantine II at the age of 23 in 1964, the youthful monarch, who had already achieved glory as an Olympic gold medalist in sailing, was hugely popular.
By the following year he had squandered much of that support with his active involvement in the machinations that brought down the popularly elected Center Union government of prime minister George Papandreou.
The family, which had ruled in Greece from 1863 apart from a 12-year republican interlude between 1922-1935, was descended from Prince Christian, later Christian IX of Denmark, of the House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg branch of the Danish ruling family. King Paul I died of cancer on March 6, 1964 and Constantine succeeded him, weeks after the Center Union party had triumphed over the conservatives with 53% of the vote.
Eventually, Constantine made a truce of sorts with Papandreou and, with his agreement, appointed a government of technocrats and, then, a conservative-led government to hold an election in May 1967. On December 13, 1967, Constantine and his family flew to the northern city of Kavala with the intent to march on Thessaloniki and set up a government there. The counter-coup, badly managed and infiltrated, collapsed and Constantine was forced to flee to Rome the following day. He would never return as reigning king.
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