Regina Kawānanakoa

Regina Abigail Mary Wahiʻikaʻahuʻula Kawānanakoa (born 1947) was a Princess of the House of Kawānanakoa of Hawaii.

She was born on July 16, 1947. She was the eldest child and only daughter of Prince Edward Abnel Keliʻiahonui Kawānanakoa by his first wife Lila de Clark Whitaker.

She had four brothers, two full-blood and two half-blood. Her full brothers were Prince Edward J. Abnel Keliiahonui Kawānanakoa and Prince David Claren Laʻamea Kaumualii Kawānanakoa. Prince Edward, severely disabled, was excluded from the succession by his father. Prince David renounced his rights in favour of his younger brother. Her half-brothers are Prince Quentin Kuhio Kawānanakoa, the next pretender; and Prince Andrew Piikoi Kawānanakoa, an estate agent.

Due to male primogeniture, she is the 9th in the Kawānanakoa line of the Hawaiian throne after five children of her half-brother Andrew. In the Line of Liliuokalani Kawānanakoa, headed by her first cousin once removed, Princess Abigail Kinoiki Kekaulike Kawānanakoa, she is 11th in line after her nieces and nephews.

Her names Abigail and Wahiʻikaʻahuʻula are old names of the family: after her grandmother, great grandmother, and great-great grandmother; Princess Abigail Kapiolani, Princess Abigail Wahiikaahuula and Abigail Kuaihelani Maipinepine Kalaikini Campbell Parker. In 1999 she published a book on her ancestor King Kaumualiʻ of Kauaʻi.^[1]

Princess Regina married twice. In November 1980, at Honolulu, Oahu, Regina married childhood friend and Henry James Bartels, a relative of Harry Montague Nuuanu Gooding Field, the late husband of Princess Abigail Kapiolani Kawānanakoa. The nuptial was featured in a November 1980 Honolulu Magazine story because of both of their ties to royal Hawaiian lineage.^[2] Her husband was Curator of ʻIolani Palace from 1975 to 1997, Director of Washington Place Museum from 1998 to 2003. Bartels and Regina divorced prior to 1990 but remained close friends until Bartels' death on April 20, 2003. Her former husband had overseen completion of the restoration of ʻIolani Palace. Regina was at his bedside in Hoag Memorial Presbyterian Hospital, Newport Beach, California, when he died. She was quoted as saying "I was playing the queen's (Liliuokalani's) music for him when he died, and 'Aloha 'Oe' came on."^[3] She later married Samuel Sanchez.^[4] She is beyond childbearing years, and her place in the line of succession would pass on to her other relatives.

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