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Renowned Baltimore beauty Elizabeth Patterson, the daughter of a wealthy businessman, scandalized elites on both sides of the Atlantic in 1803 when she married Jerome Bonaparte, the youngest brother of Napoléon. Her father objected, and Napoléon later annulled the marriage and banned Betsy from the family and France, but neither man could stop the headstrong young woman from pressing her rights, whatever it cost the U.S. in diplomatic controversy. Bored with life in Baltimore and defiant of her controlling father and the limited expectations of women at the time, Betsy spent much of her life in Europe, courted for her beauty, intelligence, and tragic circumstances. An outcast of a famously outcast family, once Napoléon was exiled, she never remarried and carried the cachet of the Bonaparte name, spending decades arguing for her son’s and grandson’s right of succession. Despite her scorn for the American preoccupation with moneymaking, Betsy amassed a fortune of her own when she was denied the fortunes of her father and the Bonapartes. Berkin renders a fascinating portrait of a determined woman who defied convention. --Vanessa Bush
Review
“Betsy Bonaparte, the beguiling belle of early Washington, disappears from most histories after she takes the fledgling capitol by storm. Carol Berkin tells us the rest of the surprising and fascinating story of the American girl whose rejection both by her Baltimore merchant father and by the European royalty she married into caused Betsy Bonaparte to become one of the few ‘self made women’ of the 19th Century. “
-Cokie Roberts, author of
Founding Mothers and
Ladies of Liberty “Carol Berkin’s
Wondrous Beauty reads like a fascinating novel, with a heroine whose intriguing life and trans-Atlantic travels practically defy belief. Betsy Bonaparte emerges as a complex, charming, and brilliant woman, courageous enough to defy her brother-in-law—the French emperor—astute enough to increase the value of her Maryland estate to more than one million dollars, and determined enough to sue the state in the Supreme Court. Berkin provides her trademark combination of meticulous research, original ideas, and elegant prose.
-Douglas R. Egerton, author of
The Wars of Reconstruction “A meticulously researched, accessible and fascinating account of a young, headstrong but naive beauty who led an extraordinary life first as a young bride, then an abandoned wife, a mother and finally a fiercely independent, entrepreneurial nineteenth century woman. Berkin brilliantly combines storytelling and scholarship, anecdotes and insights in this vividly written biography.”
-Barbara Winslow, author of
Shirley Chisholm and
Sylvia Pankhurst “A wonderful story of a woman who managed to achieve independence and leave her mark on a world not quite ready for her.”
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