Here's a picture I came across today that really struck a note with me. What a beautiful portrayal of a mother and son. No fake smiles. No stiff expressions. You can literally see the refuge they find in each other. It looks as though, THIS was "home." This mother, I've come to find was the empress of France. Empress Eugénie and her six-year-old son, Napoléon Eugène Louis Jean Joseph Bonapartein. She was the wife of Napoleon III. This photograph was taken by Benjamin Delessert, 1862.
Tenure 30 January 1853 – 11 January 1871. My friend Wikipedia told me. . ."When the Second French Empire was overthrown after France's defeat in the Franco-Prussian War (1870-1871), the empress and her husband took refuge in England, and settled at Chislehurst, Kent. After his death in 1873, and that of her son in 1879, she moved in 1885 to Farnborough, Hampshire, and to her villa "Cyrnos" (ancient Greek name of Corsica), that she had built at Cap-Martin between Menton and Nice, where she lived in retirement, abstaining from all interference in French politics. After the deaths of her husband and son her health started to deteriorate. Her physician recommended she visit Bournemouth which was, in Victorian times, famed as a health spa resort. During her visit a groundskeeper lit hundreds of little tea candles in the Bournemouth gardens to light her way to the sea at night. This event is still commemorated annually by the lighting of candle displays in the Bournemouth gardens every summer. The former empress died in July 1920 at the age of 94."
FYI her full name was María Eugenia Ignacia Augustina de Palafox de Guzmán Portocarrero y Kirkpatrick! And you thought my name was long ;)
For more information about her visit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eug%C3%A9nie_de_Montijo
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