Dom Pedro de Alcântara of Orléans-Braganza, Prince of Grão Pará (15 October 1875 – 29 January 1940) was the first-born son of Dona Isabel, Princess Imperial of Brazil and Prince Gaston of Orléans, Count of Eu, and as such, was born second-in-line to the imperial throne of Brazil, during the reign of his grandfather, Emperor Dom Pedro II, until the empire's abolition. He went into exile in Europe with his mother when his grandfather was deposed in 1889, and grew up largely in France, at a family apartment in Boulogne-sur-Seine, and at his father's castle, the Château d'Eu in Normandy. Early life Pedro was born on 15 October 1875 in the Imperial Palace of Petrópolis. He was the first son of Isabel, Princess Imperial of Brazil and her husband Prince Gaston, Count of Eu. As first son of the heiress to the throne, he was entitled Prince of Grão-Pará and was the presumptive heir to the Brazilian throne at his birth. Pedro was educated by preceptors, headed by the Baron of Ramiz, and lived in the Isabel Palace, in Rio de Janeiro with his younger brothers until The proclamation of the republic, on 15 November 1889, when he was fourteen years old. One of his most poignant gestures on the occasion of the departure of the Brazilian imperial family to exile was when he suggested to his grandfather Emperor Pedro II "the idea of letting go a white dove on the high seas, which would take the last missive of the Brazilian imperial family." The family signed a message and then attached it to a dove, which was released at the highest point of Fernando de Noronha. However, the dove ended up falling to the sea without fulfilling its purpose. Exile During the exile in 1890, Pedro moved along with their parents to the outskirts of Versailles. He reached the age of majority in 1893, and without desire to assume the monarchist cause, he left for Vienna, capital of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, to study in the military school at Wiener Neustadt. According to his own mother it was "clear that he must do something and a military career seems to us the only one he should follow". His younger brothers Luís and Antônio followed him at the same military school. Pedro was formed as Lieutenant of the Austro-Hungarian Army at the 4th Regiment of Uhlans and was later Captain on