Empress Marie-Louise. Photo: Bonhams.
LONDON.- A pocket watch originally owned by Napoleon’s wife, the Empress Marie-Louise, is to be sold at the Bonhams Fine Watch Auction on June 11th in London’s New Bond Street.
Estimated at £25,000-£35,000, the unique Empress Marie-Louise Pocket Watch is one of two royal items to be featured in the sale, both dating back over 200 years.
Presented in gold, enamel and split pearl, the piece features the Napoleonic insignia of the bee on one side, and bears the cipher “ML” for Marie-Louise on the other. This is surmounted by the royal crown, and adorned with laurel leaves in an intricate circle of pearls – a visual cue to its unique historic importance.
The exceptionally pretty pocket watch has a fascinating history, having belonged to the same family since Napoleon's wife, the Empress Marie-Louise, presented it to four-year-old Emilie de Pellepra at Cherbourg harbour in 1813. Not only was the watch made for Napoleon's wife, but it has also been in the private collection of the same family for just over two hundred years. This is the first time that it has been offered for sale.
An additional royal time piece is also available in the upcoming Fine Watch sale – an open-faced pocket watch originally owned by Prince of Wales, George IV. Featuring the Royal Coat of Arms on its gilt brass exterior, the Josiah Emery pocket watch dates back to 1785 and is estimated at £60,000-£80,000.
Paul Maudsley, Director of the Bonhams Watch Department, said:”We’re delighted to have not one but two significant watches of Royal importance available in one sale, each with its own intriguing history and beautiful design.”
The Bonhams Fine Watch sale features almost 200 lots with some very rare wristwatches including makes such as Rolex, Patek Philippe, Vacheron Constantin and Cartier to name a few.
The Empress Marie-Louise of France Pocket Watch. Estimate £25,000 - 35,000 (€31,000 - 43,000). Photo: Bonhams.
A very fine, rare and historically important gold, enamel and split pearl decorated pocket watch bearing the cipher ML within a laurel crown. Presented by Empress Marie-Louise at the opening of Cherbourg harbour in 1813 to Emilie de Pellepra.
Gilt full plate verge movement, pierced and engraved balance cock, silver regulation, white enamel dial with Arabic numerals and winding through the dial, blued steel Breguet moon hands, gold full hunter case numbered 61 over 16 on the inside case with translucent light blue enamel front cover, decorated with the cypher "ML" Marie-Louise surmounted by the Royal Crown and framed by laurel leaves in a half circle of pearls. With translucent blue enamel background, decorated with a Bee set with pearls and framed with laurel leaves and bordered by further split pearls, attributed to Francois-Regnault Nitot; 35mm.
Provenance: Made for the Empress Marie-Louise of France (1791-1847), second wife of Napoleon 1st;
Presented by her to Emilie de Pellepra (c.1809-1871) on 24 August 1813; by descent to her daughter Valentine de Riquet, Comtesse de Caraman Chimay (1839-1914);
Given to her daughter-in-law Princess Marthe Bibesco (1886-1973) on the occasion of her marriage in 1902;
Inherited by their daughter Valentine Bibesco (1903-1976);
thence by descent to the present owner.
This exceptionally pretty pocket watch has a fascinating history, having belonged to the same family since Napoleon's wife, the Empress Marie-Louise, presented it to four-year-old Emilie de Pellepra in 1813. Not only was the watch made for Napoleon's wife, but it has also been in the private collection of the same family for just over two hundred years. This is the first time that it has been offered for sale.
The touching account of the moment when the Empress met the little Emilie, and gave her the watch, is recorded in contemporary letters and diaries, several of which were translated and published in 1922, after the centenary of Napoleon's death.
Marie-Louise was Empress of the French for only four years (1810-1814) during which time she gave birth to a son, who later became Napoleon II. We know the watch was made during this period, since it bears the Napoleonic insignia of the bee on one side and her crowned initials on the other. As such, it is of unique historic importance.
The Presentation of the Watch, Caen, August 1813.
In August 1813 the Emperor Napoleon and Empress Marie-Louise made their way separately to the port of Cherbourg which was due to be opened at the end of the month. Marie-Louise set out from St. Cloud on the morning of August the 23rd and travelled to Cherbourg via Caen, which was en route. Her movements were widely reported not only in France, but also in the British papers such as the Times which reported in a piece headed, Caen, August 20th: 'we are in expectation of her Majesty the Empress Queen and Regent. Everything is prepared for her reception' (Times, 1st September, 1813).
Marie-Louise kept a diary of her journeys as Empress, which the French historian and Napoleonic expert Frédéric Masson (1847-1923) published in 1921 entitled 'The Private Diaries of the Empress Marie-Louise'. They make interesting reading, not least for the full account of Marie-Louise's journey to Cherbourg. She arrived in Caen on the evening of the 24th having stopped in Lisieux on the way. She records, 'after dinner I undertook my habitual task of receiving the local authorities....' She goes on to talk about the moment at which she met the little Emilie:
'After this a delightful fête was given for me in the garden of M.Michin, at which all the ladies of Caen, dressed as Cauchoises, were arranged in a circle. Madame Michin sang some verses in honour of me, accompanied by a choir. After this, one of the Guard of Honour in peasant dress offered me a bull, meanwhile making a speech delivered with much enthusiasm, and the prettiest little girl imaginable was brought seated between two barrels, one of cider and the other of milk, of which she scattered some drops.'
Many of the same details are recorded in Emilie's own memoires, set out in 1849 and published by Marthe Bibesco some years later. She describes the 'rustic festivity' where she remembers it was planned that she should appear as Europa seated on the white bull, but owing to her mothers anxiety over her safety, it was decided she should be dressed in a miniature peasant costume instead, 'which they said, suited me to perfection.'
Emilie continues the narrative:
I was carried in quite safely in a flowered litter, between two gilt tubs, up to the foot of the throne, holding two cups of milk and cider in my hand....whereupon I made a deep curtsy, but they would not bear me off again, because the Empress had asked for me. The chamberlain came over for me, and I remember that, as I came near he wanted me to bend my knee; but he could not get me to make the movement because, I told him I had already said my prayers in the morning! Apart from this small rebelliousness, I behaved very properly and received a beautiful watch with a monogram of the Empress, which I still preserve and which has kept much younger than myself!
The watch, together with a later key and chain were illustrated in Emilie's published memoirs and the event itself well-remembered and passed down through the family.
As a young woman Emilie was a striking beauty, she was sculpted by Canova when she was fifteen and painted by Franz Xaver Winterhalter in 1849. She married firstly Count Louis-Marie de Brigode and secondly Prince Joseph de Riquet de Caraman, 17th Prince of Chimay – Minister for Foreign Affairs. They had four children, the third of whom, Valentine de Riquet inherited the watch. As an adult Emilie moved in Royal circles and was entertained by Napoleon II at Fontainebleau and also by Queen Victoria at Windsor. The family lived at the Chateau de Chimay in Belgium, which is still owned by her descendents.
Princess Marthe Bibesco.
The next important point in the history of the watch was the moment it was inherited by Valentine's daughter-in-law, Princess Marthe Bibesco. Born a Romanian aristocrat, she spent her childhood in Paris and the rest of her life moving between France, Romania and England. She had a successful literary career as a writer of the Belle Epoque and she counted Jean Cocteau, Winston Churchill, Charles de Gaulle and several European monarchs amongst her friends. She was painted by Giovanni Boldini (see illustration) and photographed by the Lafayette Studio in 1920. She kept extensive diaries during her lifetime which are preserved with her papers at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Centre, University of Texas at Austin.
Marthe was the daughter of Jean Lahovary, Minister of Foreign Affairs in Romania; in 1902, she married a distant cousin Georges Valentin Bibesco and received the watch as a wedding gift from her mother-in-law. The loving and warm relationship Marthe had with Valentine de Riquet undoubtedly fostered the interest she developed in Valentine's own mother Emilie de Pellepra and especially in her memoirs of 1849. The centenary of Napoleon's death in 1921 gave Marthe an excuse to publish the memoirs and to 'confirm' the widely held belief at the time, that Emilie was an illegitimate child of the Emperor.
Napoleon's Daughter.
There is little firm evidence to prove that Emilie was the natural daughter of the Emperor Napoleon, although it is clear that her mother had met Napoleon on several occasions prior to 1813, and it would also account for the fact that Emilie's legal father refused to see her for the first few years of her life. If it were true, the moment that the Empress met Emilie must have seemed ironic to those who knew about the affair.
As well as receiving the watch from Marie-Louise, Emilie also inherited several other Napoleonic gifts including a ruby and gold bracelet and a solitaire diamond which, in turn, were passed on to Marthe on the eve of her wedding in 1902.
Bibliography: Bibesco, Princesse Marthe (intro) and Miller, Katherine (transl.) A Daughter of Napoleon, Memoirs of Emilie de Pellapra, New York, 1922 (illustrated p.144)
Chimay, Princesse de, Marthe Bibesco and Miles, Hamish (transl.), Letters from the French and English Courts 1853-59, London, 1934
Levalley, Gaston, Trois journées de Napoléon à Caen en 1811 et Passage de Marie Louise en 1813, Caen, France, 1913
Masson, Frédéric , The Private Diaries of the Empress Marie-Louise, wife of Napoleon 1, New York, 1922
Normington, Susan, Napoleon's Children, Gloucestershire, 1993
Sutherland, Christine, Enchantress, Marthe Bibesco and her World, London, 1977
Harry Ransom Research Centre, Research Section 'Princess Marthe Bibesco: An Inventory of her papers athte Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center' at http://norman.hrc.utexas.edu/fasearch/findingAid.cfm?eadid=00372p1 [accessed 01 May 2014]