What was josephine real name

Whilst Napoleon often went there often to relax, he also used it as a place to work with his ministers. The property became famous for its rose gardens, its greenhouses full of rare plants, and its exotic animals, such as kangaroos, monkeys, black swans, zebras, and ostriches.

Rivalry arose between the Bonapartes and the Beauharnais. The Bonapartes openly told Napoleon to leave Josephine because she had not produced an heir, and Josephine, faced with the threat of divorce, had to use all the allies that she could find to try to prevent that from happening. This was a relief for Josephine, as a divorce would now be more difficult to carry out.

Napoleon defended and protected Josephine from the pressure coming from his family by making his sisters carry her train in during the coronation and consecration ceremony, and insisting upon being the one to crown his wife Empress.

But once the Empire had been established, Napoleon himself also put pressure on Josephine to deliver an heir. Although she was upset, she agreed to the annulment of their marriage, and on 15 December an official family council was brought together to confirm its dissolution.

Napoleon promised in a declaration that he would not forget the Empress and would safeguard her future. In May Napoleon remarried, this time to the Archduchess of Austria, Marie-Louise, but he carried on writing to Josephine and continued to show concern for her health. This provoked jealousy from his wife to the extent that Napoleon presented his son, known as the little king of Rome, to Josephine in secret.

Malmaison as the last refuge for Josephine When she had been dispensed of her official duties, Josephine devoted herself to her passions at Malmaison. She pursued work and embellishments on the house and its gardens, and expanded her art collection, which consisted of more than two hundred canvases, taking pleasure in presenting them to her guests, both to those who planned to visit her in advance and those who came on the spur of the moment.

The Emperor sometimes came unannounced to Malmaison, like he did on 30 April before he left for his campaign in Russia. In France was invaded, and on 30 March Paris surrendered, before being occupied by the troops of Tsar Alexander I for a year. Josephine kept up to date with these events whilst she was staying at Malmaison, then when she moved to the stately home of Navarre, near Evreux in Normandy. The family struggled financially after hurricanes destroyed their estate in However, when Catherine died in , she was replaced by her older sister, Josephine, who married Alexandre in in France.

The couple had two children. The marriage was an unhappy one, leading to a court-ordered separation. In , during the Reign of Terror, Alexandre was arrested and jailed and Josephine, considered too close to the counter-revolutionary financial circles, was also imprisoned. Josephine met Napoleon, six years her junior, in Napoleon was enamored with Josephine, with whom he had a passionate affair.

Until meeting Bonaparte, Josephine was known as Rose, but Bonaparte preferred to call her Josephine, the name she adopted from then on.

His mother and sisters were especially resentful of Josephine as they felt clumsy and unsophisticated in her presence. Two days after the wedding, Bonaparte left to lead the French army in Italy. During their separation, he sent her many love letters. To say that Napoleon was head-over-heels in love with her is almost an understatement; she, on the other hand, an experienced woman of the world, gave his emotions a rough ride.

They married nevertheless on 9 March From the Italian peninsula, he penned magnificent, and occasionally raunchy, missives. Still not having understood that with a man such as he, she could have an extraordinary future, the flighty new wife took a new lover, played hard to get, and only came to be with her husband in Italy after much insistence. Dresses and tunics were modelled after the ancient Greeks and Romans.

With loosely pinned-up curls and sandals, they wanted to look like Diana, the Roman goddess of the hunt. The dresses were also inspired by the terror.

Women who were led to the guillotine also wore a simple, white nightgown. The fact that you had been imprisoned during this period gave status after the revolution. Napoleon was not amused by his wife squandering money like that. But each time as he came home from his campaigns and was able to enjoy the results of her spending, he would usually come around.

He would even throw dresses into the fireplace if he did not like them, or thought she had worn it on too many occasions. Josephine possessed high social intelligence and could interact with people of all standards. Both she and Napoleon did not take marital fidelity too serious. But that they were devoted to one another is shown by the thousands of letters they wrote, or in fact, he wrote. Despite this great love between Napoleon and Josephine the marriage ended prematurely anyway.

In Napoleon realized Josephine would not be able to give him the long-expected heir to the throne. She was 43 years old and had never been pregnant since they got together.

He divorced her but showed his love by giving her several rights. She was allowed to continue to use the title Empress. And he gave her the beloved Chateau de Malmaison where, with some interruptions, she lived until her death. Napoleon married the young Marie Louise of Austria, who finally gave him a son.

Ironic is the fact that Napoleon II never ruled over France as his father would have wished. He died childless while in exile in Austria at the age of The two children that Josephine had with her first husband provided descendants in many European royal families. This happy couple had seven children, who all ended up in aristocratic and royal families around Europe. On February 26, he manages to escape and return to France.

This was the start of his hundred days, which ended with the battle of Waterloo on June 18, Now he was exiled to the other side of the world on the tiny Island of St.