The morning call., 1891-06-20
TOOK AN UNLUCKY NAME.
Unhappy Women who Married Into The Bona
partG Family.

at GRENADA, May D, 1910, just I'VE years alter
| the death of Napoleon l. at st. Helena.
This date, doubly historic for the Napol-
comic dynasty by the death of the first
Emperor and the birth of the last Empress,
has suggested to a French writer some
interesting reflections upon the women
who have become the wives of the Bona
parties. Not one or these wives was contin-
uously happy. for their passing moments of
spendor and joy were eXpiated by cruel re-
verses. Other Queens have not been spared.
but it seems as though sort OF fatality
weighed upon the Bonapartes.
OF the FIVE sons Of Charles B0naparte and
Letitia RamOlino, Joseph. the eldest, mar
Tied Julia Clary, daughter of rich trades
man of MarseileS. In May, 1903, Joseph
was made King of Spain in spite of him
self and started unwillingly for his king
dom, where he was received by his subjects
in the same manner as the strikers were by
the soldiers at Fourmies at the beginning of
the month of May. After coming to grief
with the downfall of his powerful brother
Joseph wandered with his wife about the
two worlds, and finally died at Florence,
leaving widow, old, isolated and pro-
scrbed
Josephine's fate was still more sorrowful,
for she had the bitter cbagrin of seeing dur
ing five years a foreigner occupy her place
at the side OF the man she HAD so fOndy
loved Maria Louisa of Austria, who be-
came Empress after Josephine had been
sacrificed, suffered cruelty in her pride. if
not in her tenderness, in falling from the
dizzy heights where an extraordinary genius
had raised her TO the narrow prison of a
petty and huniliating principality.
Lucien BOnaDarte married in 1894 an OBJ
scure girl named Christine Boyer. by whom
he had two sons, and after her death in
1902 Alexandrine JOuberthon. the divorced
wife of a StockbrOker. Napoleon was
f,,.sr - I.E-
forgave his brother for marrying a COM
mOner when he had dreamed of forming
royal alliances for his relatives. Alexan-
dTine was beautiful and ambitious, and
hoped by her marriage to eventually wear
a crown. Lucien's calm and unaspiring
nature deprived her of this qualification,
and she died in oblivion at Snigagla in
1895, perceiying in the distance the rays of
daWning empire in which she had no place.
The fourth son, Louis, was married
against his will to Hortense Beduharnias,
daughter OF the Empress Josephine by her
first husband. To avoid this marriage he
ran away to Prussia and believed be had es-
capped the peril "A second time by joining the
expedition 10 Portugal. But Napoleon had
set his heart upon this match, and Louis
was finally obliged to yield to the deSp0tic
will Of his master. If the union was an i'll
starred one for Louis it also ended badly for
Hortense. Separated from her husband in
1867 she was obliged three years later, at the
marriage ceremony of Napoleon and Maria
Louisa, to sustain with the other queens Of
her family the mantle of the new Empress,
who had succeeded her own mother in Ma
poleon's affections. When the allies entered
Paris she was banished from France and
died an exile at the chateau of Arenberg.
Jerome the youngest son, married in 1903
Elizabeth Patterson of Baltimore. and in
Cured Nap0leon'S wrath the same as Lucen
had done. But not having Lucien'S strength
ahlnnOnp6
young wife, and ObeYed all the commands
Of his powerful brother. Miss Patterson
was as beautiful and as ambitious as Alex
andrne J0uberthOn, and the dlSapp0int-
ment at seeing her marriage treated as
naught by the First Consul, and aftsrward
annulied by the Council Of State, cast a
blight over her whole life. All the flattery
and attentions that she received from the
highest nobility in Europe after the EN-
per0T's downfall never entirely consoled
her. Although she lived to a great age, she
always bore the secret suffering OF a victim
Of despotic power. Catherine OF Wurtem-
berg, whom Jerome took as his second wife,
was only for an instant Queen at Westphala,
kingdom that Napoleon had carved out of
his conquests III Germany, as wedding
gift for his obrdient brother. Dethroned in
1913, eXiled and reduced to comparative in
dlgence, Catherine wandered with her huS-
band through Austria, Italy and SWitZrr-
land, diving at Lausanne thirty years before
her nckle companion, VINO soon conS0led
himself with mOrganatir vile.
The two living examples OF the fatality
which seems to have weighed upon the
women whose fortunes have been linked,
either by affection or interest, to the Bona
parties, are less tragical than the others.
First in point of years and position is the
eX-Empress Eugene, who, notwithstanding
her uudoubted nobility, was looked upon
almost as an adventures when she came TO
Paris with her mother from Madrid, where
she had failed TO attract any special notice.
Her beauty alone captivated Prince Louis
| Napoleon, who, against all the protests of
his political advisers, made her his c0nsort
after the coup etat For thirteen years the
life of the Empress was a series of triumphS
1t seemed as though the golden dream
would never end, when, suddenly, all
her hopes were swept away with the rapid
ity and brutality OF a thunderbOlt. Obliged
to quit her adopted country by the aid of
the court dentist, she has since passed her
life in keeping up a semblance of royalty,
first at CbislehurSt and now at Farnbor-
ough, and in wandering from the English
mists to the Mediterranean sun, always
mourning over the loss of her former great
ness and the void made in her declining
widnwhOOd by the death of her only son.
If she occasionally visits Paris inc0Enita
she never has the courage to remain long in
a capital where at every step she meets Wis
| ions of her former splendor and not few
Il
Tie Princess Clotilda has never occupied
! 4 throne, but her life was associated with
a Bonaparte, who always hoped that his
turn to rule France would eventually come
There is no reason to suppose that her ex-
| istence would have been happier had the
political fortunes Of her husband raised her
to higher position. Her marriage with
! Prince jerome, son or the eX-king OF West
| phala, was a political bargain, the price of
which was Italian unifcation by French
arms. Sold by her father when almost a
| child, sacrificed by her country, deceived
and offended by libidinous husband, the
| Princess was constantly wounded aud dis
dained al a frivolous court, where her simple
| virtues formed a striking contrast, not Only
to those of her husband, but to those of
| the butterflies that lowered about the more
| genie. Obliged by the notorious misconduct
| of Prince jerome to live apart from him.
| the Princess Clotilda retired to the old
| chateau of Monchalieri, near Turin, where
| she has resided for the last twenty years
| rarely, but when he was taken Ill at Rome
| show an admirable devotion to the end For
all this zeal she had the supreme sorrow Of
finding that she was nsulted in the Princes
he owed in great part TO the liberaity of her
father and her brother. The Princess
Clotilda, who was married when she was 49,
is now As years OLD, but her sorrows have
long ago whitened her once blonde hair and
given her prematurely old look.--Francis
Leland IN Epoch.