An American and Napoleonic Romance: Jerome Bonaparte and Elizabeth Patterson

In my post on Prince Charles Napoleon the great great nephew of Napoleon, I promised to write about the great grandfather of the "latest Bonaparte" on the scene.

Prince Charles Napoleon's grandfather was Jerome Bonaparte the youngest sibling of Napoleon. He was born in Ajaccio, Corsica in 1784. Jerome entered the French navy, and while on a stop over in Maryland, he was welcomed into Baltimore high society where he met a beautiful young woman named Elizabeth "Betsy" Patterson (born 1785).

Betsy was the daughter of the second richest man in the state, William Patterson, a merchant who was an immigrant from Ireland. When they met in August 1803 it was love at first sight for the handsome, dashing Jerome and the lovely, witty, and cultured Betsy who was fluent in French. The two were captivated with each other, but Betsy's father was extremely cautious. Though he did not entirely doubt the sincerity of Jerome's love for Betsy, he doubted that the ambitious Napoleon who was rapidly rising in Europe would approve of his young brother marrying an American without noble blood and without his permission. Jerome's prospects seemed too good for him to get bogged down in America, so Betsy's father hesitated for at least for awhile. However, by Christmas Eve 1803 William Patterson's reluctance had evaporated, and Jerome and Betsy were married. Jerome had just turned 20, and Betsy was 18.

Once Jerome's family had learned about the union, almost everyone seemed to approve, except Napoleon. Even though Napoleon was not the eldest Bonaparte child, he had long before pushed aside his older brother Joseph to establish himself as the family's head. He made the final decision on everything including whom his brothers and sisters could marry.

When Napoleon declared himself Emperor of the French in May 1804 he ordered Jerome to come home, "without the young person to whom you have connected yourself." Sympathic to your younger brother's plight, Joseph and another brother Lucien encouraged Jerome to get American citizenship, as did also Betsy's brother. However, Napoleon was having none of it and ordered Jerome to come home immediately and for Betsy to not even think of setting foot in France.

The couple finally realized that they could not continue to ignore Napoleon's demands, so they sailed from America in one of William Patterson's ships. Betsy was pregnant. Once they arrived in Lisbon, Portugal, they saw to their dismay that Napoleon had sent a French frigate to prevent Betsy from disembarking. During their journey, Betsy had been convinced that with her charm and learning she might be able to plead their cause with Napoleon since Jerone had told her that his older brother was very susceptible to feminine beauty. But adamant, Napoleon had shown by sending a frigate to block her way, he did not want to see or speak to Betsy.

Reluctantly, Jerome left his wife to go on alone to Paris to beg Napoleon to allow them to stay together. In the meantime, Napoleon had been working fiercely to get the marriage annulled. He had gone to the pope with his demands, but had been rejected. Nevertheless, cowed by Napoleon, the imperial council of state had agreed to have the marriage declared null and void. On hearing that Jerome was on his way to Paris to see him, Napoleon wrote this letter to him:

My brother,

Your letter of this morning informs me of your arrival in Alexandria. There are no faults that a true repentance will not efface in my eyes.

Your union with Mademoiselle Paterson is null, alike in the eyes of religion and of the law. Write Mademoiselle Paterson to return to America. I will grant her a pension of 60,000 francs during her lifetime, on condition that she will under no circumstances bear my name,--she has no right to do so owing to the non-existence of her marriage.

You must yourself give her to understand that you are powerless to change the nature of things. Your marriage being thus annulled by your own consent, I will restore to you my friendship and continue to feel for you as I have done since your infancy, hoping that you will prove yourself worthy by the efforts you make to acquire my gratitude and to distinguish yourself in armies.

After Jerome's departure, Betsy's ship sailed to Amsterdam, but once again she was not allowed entry on land since now two men-of-war ships blocked her way. Seeing that she could not receive entry on this route as well, Betsy's ship sailed to England where she gave gave birth to a baby boy, Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte, whom she called "Bo."

Jerome and Betsy were to never see one another again. Jerome was remarried on Napoleon's orders to a German princess, Catherine of Wurttemburg, and he was crowned King of Westphalia also in Germany. Prince Charles Napoleon whom I wrote about comes from this union of Jerome and his German princess.

Betsy never remarried. After the fall of the Napoleonic dynasty under Napoleon I, she left America for awhile and traveled in Europe being welcomed and feted in European high society as a beautiful, tragic, and intelligent curiosity. For decades she fought to have her marriage to Jerome recognized as legal and her son listed as legitimate. Oddly enough, Jerome seemed to had forgotten all feeling he once had for Betsy because he actively fought against Betsy's son having the surname of Bonaparte. With three children from his royal wife, he wanted Betsy's son to be known only as Jerome Patterson. After Jerome's death in 1860, Betsy's case was resolved and her son was recognized as a legitimate child of France. Still Betsy's long time desire that her son be accepted as a member of the Napoleonic dynasty of Europe would never come to pass. She died in 1879.

Because of the short lived union of these star-crossed lovers, there was the American Bonapartes, the line of which ended in 1945 when the last male Bonaparte died. Betsy's grandson, also named Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte, was a soldier who served on the Texas frontier and who also joined the imperial French army. He received medals for his valiance in the Crimean War from not only France and the queen of England, but he even received a medal from the sultan of Turkey. Another grandson, Charles Joseph Bonaparte, served as US Secretary of the Navy and US Attorney General and was the founder of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

The Latest Bonaparte

This man is the pretender to the imperial throne of France, but he knows there will be no imperial throne again. The age of the old empires ended with the first world war. Nevertheless, His Imperial Highness Charles Marie Jerome Victor Napoleon is the great great great nephew of Napoleon I. The remaining bloodline of the Bonapartes comes from Napoleon's youngest brother Jerome and his second wife from which Prince Charles Napoleon comes. I plan in a future post to write about Jerome's American connection.

Prince Charles Napoleon who was born in 1950 in France holds a doctorate in economics from the Sorbonne. He is an author, essayist, and a politician. Over the years he has worked in banking, financial planning, and real estate. He has been married twice and has four children. In Ajaccio, Corsica which is the birthplace of his great grandfather and uncle, Prince Charles Napoleon has also been politically active.

Can you see a resemblance between him and his great grandfather Jerome?

Carla Bruni: The Finale

Okay, I am going to leave Carla Bruni alone after this. I have low rated her enough, so now I will say a few positive things about her in closing. Instead of condemning her (which she probably gets all the time) some of us of the female sex need to sit her down and tell her in a kind manner to try and meet a sweet natured, mature guy who loves her for herself and not as a trophy or sex icon. She should drop the eternal boy types off her list and get her a real man. And if she is thinking about reforming Nicholas, guess again. Too many women think they can reform bad boys, or in Nick's case an old bad boy. Men have to see the need to reform.

Fellow blogger Internation Musing/Hans posted more private photos of the new first lady of France yesterday. In looking for more interesting photos of her, I found her own website on which one of her songs is played. I actually like the song and the layout of her website. Her voice is rather good, with a kind of mellow huskiness. Hans did say she is multi-talented.

Here is the Carla Bruni website with more of her private photos. She has even put some of Emily Dickinson's and Christina Rossetti's poems to music. These two women were exact opposites to her in behavior, but she must identify with them in a way, because why would she bother to put some of their poems to music? Perhaps she has a hidden wish to be a little purer.

Even though I disagree with her lifestyle and life decisions, I have to admit the woman is intriguing.

Here are more photos of her alone and with Sarko in Egypt.

The Empress Josephine @ MySpace.com

While looking up information on Josephine's best friend during her society "girl" years, whom I will present in an upcoming post, I happened to run across on Google information about a MySpace page for the empress. The page is a beautiful and delightful place to explore for those who are Josephine lovers and other things and people who are French. Here you can also see some of Josephine's personal treasures.

I feel I am too mature to haunt places like MySpace, but in the future, I will be seeking out other historical figures there.

Enjoy, and also read my other two posts for today;)!

Empress Josephine de Beauharnais

For some reason Josephine's surname from her first marriage is used more often even in history books than her maiden name or her surname from her second marriage to Napoleon.

Aimee du Buc de Rivery: Cousin of the Empress Josephine & The Ottoman Turkish Connection

No one will know the actual fate of Aimee du Buc de Rivery who was the empress Josephine's cousin. Nevertheless for almost two hundred years there has been so much speculation that the story of two empresses who were related and ruled simultaneously has captured the imaginations of writers as diverse as Prince Michael of Greece to the African-American fiction writer Barbara Chase-Riboud.

The story of Aimee du Buc de Rivery runs basically that she was a cousin of the empress Josephine, and like her more well-known cousin was born on the island of Martinique . When both were 12 they went to a famous black fortune teller on their island who told Josephine that her second husband would be so powerful and glorious that she would be more prestigious than the queen of France. Aimee was told an even more incredible prophesy. She would be captured by pirates and sold to a powerful ruler who because of her beauty, would make her his mistress and favorite. When she had a son by this ruler this would increase her position. Through her son, she would have great power and influence.

The legend of Aimee goes on to say that when she was returning to Martinique from studying in a convent in France, her ship was hijacked by Barbary pirates. She was captured and given to the Bey of Algiers. In order to garner favor with the Ottoman sultan, this girl of great beauty was sold into the harem in Topkapi Palace in Istanbul. There Aimee captured the eye of the sultan and became his wife. She was given the name of Nakshedil, and is said to have taught her husband French, thus opening up the Ottoman Empire to France and ultimately the west. Because of her, other reforms were introduced during her husband's and son's reign.

Aimee proved to be a survivor in the violent, political atmosphere of the harem and Topkapi Palace. Though she converted to Islam, she was always in her a heart a Christian. When she was dying, her son allowed for the first time for a priest to come into the palace to administer the last rites to his mother. So ends the story of the girl whom history and legend says was a cousin of Josephine, born to a wealthy family on Martinique and who died in a palace in Istanbul, the most powerful woman among the Turks.

I first heard about Aimee du Buc de Rivery when I read Barbara Chase-Riboud's novel, Valide: A Novel of the Harem while I was a graduate student. A black Muslim woman, whom I am not sure was orthodox or a member of The Nation of Islam, told me about Aimee and the book. Life is unpredictable, so when I read this novel of Romance, violence, and intrigue, I had no way of knowing that Turkey would become a part of my life in so many ways years later.

In conclusion, here is a long, but interesting article from Journal of World History entitled Royal French Women in the Ottoman Sultans' Harem .

The Original French Romance: Napoleon and Josephine

My title is not quite accurate because really the original French Romance could be said to have been between the medieval Heloise and Abelard, which hopefully I will get around to writing about in the future.

The present first couple of France Nick Sarkozy and Carla B. seem to have inflated egos too along with all their other unappealing qualities, so I would not be surprised if they start advertising themselves as the new Napoleon and Josephine. Well, these two do not have an ounce of class compared to Napoleon I and his first empress.

Napoleon and Josephine are my favorite of all the Romantic couples of history. Their's was a passionate, but extremely rocky Romance. In the beginning Josephine was the one who supposedly cheated. Disillusioned and angered by her unfaithfulness, Napoleon took on a string of lovers, but his attachment to them was never as passionate or enduring as his feelings for Josephine. In the 1987 Emmy nominated mini-series, Napoleon and Josephine: A Love Story, Napoleon played by Armand Assante tells Josephine played by Jacqueline Bisset, "You are my obsession; my addiction." To me, Assante and Bisset will always be Napoleon and Josephine. They brought the two historical lovers completely to life.

Both Napoleon and Josephine were born on islands. Napoleon was born on the island of Corsica in 1769. His family was of the minor Italian nobility. Josephine was born on the Caribbean island of Martinique in 1763. Her family was also well to do, but had fallen on hard times after a hurricane wiped out their sugar plantation. Napoleon's family had also fallen on difficult times when his father, and attorney, died. However he was rescued some from hardship at home when he was sent as a child to study at a military academy in France. Napoleon's first language was Italian. He was never able to relinquish his Italian accent even though he ruled the French people, and actually became more French than the French. Josephine was rescued from her family's circumstances by marriage to a cousin, Alexandre de Beauharnais, who was a part of the French nobility. Josephine had two children, but had to endure the unhappiness of having a husband who was a habitual womanizer. Once the French Revolution brewed, she, her husband, and their children were imprisoned. Her husband was condemned to death and was executed on the guillotine. Josephine and her children just narrowly escaped the knife.
After the Revolution and she was freed, Josephine become a celebrated socialite and the reputed mistress of several men in the French government. While being kept by the top man in the government at the time, Paul Barras, Josephine met Napoleon. For the younger, extremely serious and ambitious Napoleon, it was love at first sight. He was already a general in his 20s when he met the older more sophisticated Josephine. For Josephine, it was just another seduction. She had been hurt so much in her marriage and had gone through so much doing the Revolution, that she had developed a carefree cynicism about life and men. But undeterred by her slight indifference, Napoleon wrote to her not long afterwards:

"I awake full of you. Your image and the memory of last night’s intoxicating pleasures has left no rest to my senses."

The painfully passionate love letters would keep pouring in. In this, Paul Barras saw his chance. He really wanted Josephine off his hands because she was proving too expensive to keep, so he encouraged the affair between Napoleon and Josephine, keeping his fingers crossed that the end result would be marriage. They did marry, and the rest is history.

Napoleon eventually divorced Josephine, not because of the turbulence in their relationship, but because she could not produce the heir he needed to carry on the Napoleonic line. Napoleon had wrestled with the issue of Josephine's or his possible infertility for years. He had even designated Josephine's daughter Hortense's son as his heir. Hortense was married to Napoleon's younger brother Louis. Steadfast in his hope for an heir, Napoleon coaxed Josephine into seeing his logic, and so she agreed to a divorce.

When Napoleon divorced Josephine, it seemed that his star began to wan. Before he had been unstoppable in his conquests and moves to unite Europe. After the divorce came the disasterous Russian campaign, which destroyed his Grand Army. Of the 690,000 men who marched in this army only 93,000 survived the retreat from the Russian steppes.

Josephine did not live to see Napoleon go into his final defeat and second exile. She caught a chill and died in 1814 at age 50. Napoleon died in exile on the island of St. Helena off the coast of Africa in 1821 of stomach cancer. There have been occasional disputes that he was not ill with the disease but was actually poisoned. On his deathbed Napoleon's final words were:

"France, the Army, the Head of the Army, Josephine."

In 2003 another mini-series was shown in the US. It was called Napoleon and starred Isabella Rossellini as Josephine and the French actor Christian Clavier as Napoleon. These two were not as softly cute and youthful as Assante and Bisset had been in the 1987 mini-series; plus I did not get to watch this version of the lives of my favorite Romantic couple. I still have the series with Assante and Bisset on a cassette which I recorded from the original program. I plan to eventually buy or rent the Napoleon DVD. I hope also that Amazon will eventually offer the 1987 series before my cassette disintegrates.

This video with scenes from Napoleon is wonderful to watch if you are a fan of N & J and a Romantic. The song Anytime, Anywhere is sung by Sarah Brightman.

More of Carla Bruni

Internation Musing/Hans posted private photos of the new first lady of France, Carla Bruni, on his new blog. They can be accessed here. Please note the apparent themes of the photos: primness, purity, the intellect, modernity, music, and a hint of sensuality...

Are these photos a prelude to a better, responsible, and dignified Bruni, a woman worthy of her position? Let's hope that if she changes, her husband will have sense enough to realize that he needs to grow up and be responsible too.

There is an old saying, "There's no fool like an old fool."

Shameless "Romance"

Nicholas Sarkozy, the current president of France, and his new wife former model Carla Bruni are not the kind of people I have warm feelings for or respect. In this day and age I can understand where some people who see themselves as progressive and hip might feel enthusiasm for these two. One blogger mentioned in a post weeks ago "that the only good thing about Nicholas Sarkozy was Carla Bruni." Another one who seems to see himself as Don Juan but is really a Don Quixote or perhaps better Sancho Panza, said he would love to go with Sarkozy on a tour of the wine country in his area. I am being cruel here... But these comments were written.

Some people don't know how to pick friends or spouses carefully, which Sarkozy showed last weekend when he married Ms. Bruni after only knowing her for 11 weeks. Perhaps the times have moved too fast for me and I am out of touch, but Carla Bruni with an illegitimate child and past numerous lovers including Donald Trump and Mick Jagger is just not first lady material. Sarkozy's mama must not have told him that "son, there are some you marry, and others just you have a good time with."

I see Sarkozy and Bruni as the king and queen of shameless "Romance" and just bad taste. There is an arrogance about both that is very unsavory. Bruni luxruriates in her bad and shallow reputation. On her man-eating persona she has said:

“I’d rather be called a predator than an old flea-bag. Predator — it’s not that bad for a woman.”

and

“I’m monogamous occasionally but I prefer polygamy and polyandry.

MADAM, it is not about being a stuffed shirt, but it is about having class and being a lady. But perhaps my ideas on life like beauty, truth, class, and dignity are concepts that are alien to this era and therefore, gone with the wind. And I will not even bring up the term honor, because that went out in the 19th century, but still it should apply to your position, MADAM.

Sarkozy has shown a level of immaturity and recklessness which has already hurt his position with the older French citizenry. Most French presidents have conducted discreet affairs. The late Francois Mitterand even had an illegitimate child. With French men, c'est la vie la affaire. Nicholas Sarkozy needs to know that when you are in a position of leadership, you should try to set a good example. Have some dignity, and stop intentionally creating a public soap opera!

Nicholas Sarkozy has tried to bring the office of the president of France far too down to earth. Sadly, President Bush has shown himself to be too down to earth also at inappropriate times on several occasions, but not in the unfaithfulness department. Bush's last publicly shocking faux pas was winking at the Queen when she was here in 2007. The queen played it off well with only an, "Oh dear." I cringed.

So will this quicky marriage between "Speedy Sarko" with his Napoleonic height (5'5") and his femme fatale with the lovely eyes last? I doubt it. Some have predicted that it will be over with "Sarbruni" or "Brunkozy" (my own inventions:)) by 2009.

Other heads of state have married shady dames but some of the dames calmed down considerably and became honest women. Look at Evita, once she settled down with Juan Peron. Or remember the Byzantine emperor Justinian the Great who married Theodora? Both Evita and Theodora were actresses who were said by some to have slept their way to the top. Both women cleaned up their acts. Theodora made such a monumental change that she is a saint in the Eastern Orthodox church. Some have even pushed to have Evita canonized as saint in the Catholic church because of her philanthropy and kindness to the poor.

Being in the current generation, I do not see Carla Bruni moving beyond a selfish, self serving vision of herself. I may be wrong, but when one has a husband like Nicholas Sarkozy whose ex-wife Cecilia, whom he recently divorced, and who has accused him of being a stingy philanderer who is indifferent to his children, I do not see anything good happening in the end for these two. There is no one on either side doing rational thinking. They do not strike me as two people who want to change their ways. At their ages (Sarkozy is 52 and Bruni just turned 40) they are probably too set in their ways to really change.

France is having economic problems, but its' president continues to live a trivial jetsetting lifestyle. I guess for Nicholas Sarkozy and Carla Bruni, Paris can burn. Here in America, we witnessed a train wreck on a different level for 8 years next year. For the French people who have had Sarkozy for their leader for less than a year, I seems the train wreck has just begun.

Here is a video of little Nicky in all his glory.



Here is the new first lady of the French showing one of her talents outside the bedchamber.

Kenize Mourad: A Romantic Heritage Discovered

From time to time here I will continue to compose posts about books that have made a profound impression on me. In her bestselling memoir on books, Reading Lolita in Tehran, Iranian author and professor Azar Nafisi wrote about the freeing power of books in an oppressive society. Books can free us and change our lives.

A few years back before a planned trip to Turkey I decided to read Regards from the Dead Princess: Novel of A Life (1989) which I had taken off the shelf several times at our public library over a two year period, but had not pushed myself to reading. One day I finally decided to check it out it and read it. Once I got it home, I devoured the novel.

The author of Regards from the Dead Princess is Kenize Mourad. Kenize Mourad is a French journalist and writer with an extraordinarily Romantic background that she learned about when she was 20. She discovered that she is the daughter of an Ottoman princess named Selma who was the granddaughter of the last Sultan of Turkey, Murad V. Mourad's father was an Indian rajah. Regards is Kenize Mourad's fictionalized effort to sort out her background. It must have been earth moving to find out as an adult that one is descended from royalty and one of the longest ruling familys in world history, the Ottoman or Osmanli family who ruled Turkish for 500 years.

Mourad's mother Selma grew up in Ortakoy Palace in Istanbul. She is pampered and spoiled by family and servants. Her mother is a princess, and her father is her mother's second husband, a magnificently handsome man which Selma's mother picks for his manly beauty. Inside this insulated environment, Selma is unaware that her country is in turmoil. She hears of a man whom everyone is hoping will be Turkey's saviour, a general named Mustafa Kemal. People call him "the Golden Rose," because unlike most Turks he has blonde hair. Selma dreams that one day she will marry Mustafa Kemal who will become known to world history as Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founder of modern day Turkey. Little does she know that in a very short time once he assumes power, in order to drag Turkey into the modern world and the west, Mustafa Kemal will erase from his country most links the Turks have with their Ottoman past. He sends Selma and her family into exile. Selma and her mother go to Lebanon. Her father decides to seek his fortune alone and becomes a drifter and adventurer cutting all ties to Selma and her mother.

As a young woman, Selma discovers that she can rather relate to the French community in Lebanon. Still there is the aching feeling that she is an outsider. Her mother retreats further into herself and her memories. Though they are losing their wealth fast, she is determined that Selma makes a good marriage. First she looks to European nobility. When hopes there fade, she turns to a Muslim rajah in India. During this time, Selma lives with the hope that her beloved handsome father will return. He writes occasionally, promising to see her, but he never keeps his promises and never sees his daughter again. Feeling rejected and the emptiness of the exile, Selma suffers a nervous breakdown. She eventually recovers and goes on to India to marry a man she has never seen before.

Her Indian husband is handsome and kind, but for years Selma had lived freely, going out to parties and socializing in western dress in Beirut. Though her mother lived the life of a recluse, she allows Selma to have a degree of freedom. In her husband's house, Selma is put in purdah. Though her husband is kind and patient, she is sexually frigid. She tries with all her power to adjust to being in this restrictive world. She learns about the poverty and squalor of so many people who live near by and dreams of helping the poor. In her own way she tries, but she is so terribly unhappy and restricted that her husband agrees to let her go to Paris on a vacation. Selma does not tell him she is finally pregnant because she knows he might not let her go and breathe if he knows her secret.

In Paris the Nazis are near and they finally occupy Paris. Selma meets an American business man who falls in love with her. She decides to never return to her husband. But under the occupation it becomes a struggle for survival, and Selma has her baby one day. She dies nearly alone with only the baby and an aging black eunuch who had become her surrogate father.

Being only a few days old when her mother died, Kenize Mourad, of course, does not remember her beautiful, auburn haired mother. However, after writing Regards, she later had the opportunity to meet her Indian father, and writes about him in the second half of her family's life story, The Garden of Badalpur, which has apparently not been translated into English.

Regards From the Dead Princess is a magnificent portrait of several cultures, and a tragic tale of a young woman who is never really able to find her place in the world.