An eclipse trip made Chulalongkorn king of Siam at fifteen
In August 1868 King Mongkut of Siam travelled south of Hua Hin with his son to watch a solar eclipse he had predicted, and his forecast beat those of some French astronomers. Both caught malaria on the trip. Mongkut died that October, and a council chose his 15-year-old son, Chulalongkorn, to succeed him.
Mongkut had 82 children by 39 wives and concubines, and Chulalongkorn, born on 20 September 1853, was neither the eldest child nor the eldest son. He became heir as the first son of Queen Debsirindra. From age seven his father kept him close to learn the business of government, and alongside Buddhism, Pali and fencing he studied science, English and French with Western tutors, among them Anna Leonowens, whose son Louis became a lifelong friend.
Power at first lay with the regent, Sri Suriyawongse of the Bunnag family, the strongest noble of the century. The young king toured Singapore, Java and British India in 1871 and 1872 to see how colonial administrations worked, and was crowned in his own right on 16 November 1873. Months earlier he had set up a central tax office, cutting into the nobles' income. How little real power he held became clear on the night of 28 December 1874, when a fire broke out near the palace gunpowder store and fully armed troops of the Front Palace, a kind of second king, turned up offering to help. They were refused entry.
When the Front Palace prince died in 1885, Chulalongkorn abolished the post and created a Western-style crown prince instead. He founded a Royal Military Academy in 1887, replaced a system of government largely unchanged since the fifteenth century with equal-status ministries by 1892, ended judicial torture and brought in a Western legal code with help from his Belgian adviser Gustave Rolin-Jaequemyns. He was also the first Siamese king to send princes to Europe for schooling.
Hemmed in by British Burma and Malaya and French Indochina, Siam gave up territory to both empires yet stayed independent. He died on 23 October 1910 and is remembered as the Great Beloved King.
Source: Chulalongkorn
