Italian troops enter Tirana; the royal family flees

APR 08 1939

Italian troops entered Tirana at about 9.30am on 8 April 1939 and seized the government buildings. Zog, Queen Géraldine and the infant Leka fled to Greece that day. The queen had given birth three days earlier. Sources disagree on whether the royal family left on 7 or 8 April; the invasion article says 8 April, the day Italian troops reached Tirana. Accounts of the newborn prince being carried out of the country by night are dramatised but the underlying fact, a three-day-old heir on the escape route, is documented.