Bernardine Eugénie Désirée Clary (Swedish: Eugenia Bernhardina Desideria; 8 November 1777 – 17 December 1860) was Queen of Sweden and Norway from 5 February 1818 to 8 March 1844 as the wife of King Charles XIV John. Charles John was a French general and founder of the House of Bernadotte. Désirée Clary, the mother of Oscar I, was the one-time fiancée of Napoleon Bonaparte. She was also the sister of Julie Clary, the queen consort of Spain and Naples. Her name was officially changed in Sweden to Desideria although she did not use that name.
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Background and education
Désirée Clary was born in Marseille, France, the daughter of François Clary (Marseille, St. Ferreol, 24 February 1725 – Marseille, 20 January 1794), a wealthy French silk manufacturer and merchant, by his second wife (m. 26 June 1759) Françoise Rose Somis (Marseille, St. Ferreol, 30 August 1737 – Paris, 28 January 1815). Eugénie was normally used as her name of address. Her father had been previously married, at Marseille on 13 April 1751, to Gabrielle Fléchon (1732 – 3 May 1758).
Clary had a sister and brother to whom she remained very close all her life. Her sister, Julie Clary, married Joseph Bonaparte; she later became Queen of Naples and Spain. Her brother, Nicolas Joseph Clary, was created Count Clary. He married Anne Jeanne Rouyer, by whom he had a daughter named Zénaïde Françoise Clary (Paris, 25 November 1812 – Paris, 27 April 1884). Zénaïde would marry Napoléon Alexandre Berthier (the son of Marshal Louis Alexandre Berthier) and have several children, among them the first wife of Joachim, 4th Prince Murat.
As a child, Clary received the convent schooling usually given to daughters of the upper classes in pre-revolutionary France. However, when she was barely 11 years old, the French Revolution (starting in 1789) took place, during which convents were closed. Clary returned to live with her parents, where she was perforce home-schooled thereafter. Later, her education was described as shallow. It has been observed by several historians that Clary was devoted to her birth-family her entire life.
Meeting the Bonapartes
In 1794, Clary's father died. Shortly after, it was discovered that in the years before the revolution, he had made an appeal to be ennobled, a request that had been denied. Because of this, Désirée Clary's brother Etienne, now the head of the family and her guardian, was arrested. Désirée Clary went to talk on his behalf and seek his release from the holding. In the process, she met Joseph Bonaparte, inviting him back to their home. Joseph was soon engaged to her elder sister Julie, while Napoleon was engaged to Désirée Clary on 21 April 1795. In 1795–1797, Clary lived with her mother in Genoa in Italy, where her brother-in-law Joseph had a diplomatic mission; they were also joined by the Bonaparte family. In 1795, Napoleon became involved with Joséphine de Beauharnais and broke the engagement to Clary on 6 September. He married Joséphine in 1796.
In 1797, Clary went to live in Rome with her sister Julie and her brother-in-law Joseph, who was French ambassador to the Papal States. Her relationship with Julie remained close. She was briefly engaged to Mathurin-Léonard Duphot, a French general. The engagement has been assumed to be Napoleon's idea to compensate her with a marriage, while Duphot was attracted to her dowry and position as sister-in-law of Napoleon. She agreed to the engagement though Duphot had a long-term relationship and a son with another woman. On 30 December 1797, on the eve of their marriage, Duphot was killed in an anti-French riot outside of their residence Palazzo Corsini in Rome. In later years, Clary vehemently denied that her engagement to Duphot had ever existed.
Madame Bernadotte
After her return to France, Clary lived with Julie and Joseph in Paris. In Paris, she lived in the circle of the Bonaparte family, who sided with her against Josephine after Napoleon had broken off their engagement. She herself did not like Josephine either, as she has been quoted calling her an aged courtesan with a deservedly bad reputation, but she is not believed to have shown any hostility toward Josephine as did the members of the Bonaparte family. She received a proposal from General Junot, but turned it down because it was given through Marmont. Clary eventually met her future spouse, Jean Baptiste Jules Bernadotte, another French general and politician. They were married in a secular ceremony at Sceaux on 17 August 1798. In the marriage contract, Clary was given economic independence. On 4 July 1799, she gave birth to their only child, a son named Oscar.
During the coup of 1799, when Napoleon took power, she was exposed to manipulation from both the Bonaparte family, who wanted Bernadotte to support Napoleon, and the Bernadotte faction, who wanted him to take action for himself. Both sides tried to use her to influence Bernadotte and extract information from him about his attitudes. Aware of this, he did not tell her of his plans, but he was later to say that it was because of family influence that he had been passive during the coup. During the coup, the couple were forced to take refuge in the country villa of General Sarrazin at Villeneuve St. Georges: she apparently dressed as a man during the escape. She kept in contact with Julie all the time, and Napoleon accepted Bernadotte apparently because of her.
In 1800, Désirée Bernadotte was present at a failed assassination attempt on Napoleon, when a bomb exploded between the carriage of Napoleon and the carriage where she and Caroline Bonaparte were sitting. She was not interested in politics, but her good connections made her a puppet in the hands of her husband and Napoleon, who both used her to influence each other and to pass messages. In 1801, her husband had her interfere in favor of General Ernouf through Joseph. In 1802, a conspiracy against Napoleon was discovered. Napoleon suspected Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte, and interrogated his wife, who naively told him that her spouse had not been involved, though he had met Moreau in their home and mumbled his name as well as the word conspiracy in his sleep. After this, Napoleon appointed her husband governor of Louisiana. The couple was ready to sail, when the appointment was retracted.
Crown Princess
On 22 December 1810, Desideria arrived with her son Oscar in Helsingborg in Sweden, and the 6 January 1811, she was introduced to the Swedish royal court at the Royal Palace in Stockholm. She had been met in Helsingborg by her appointed Mistress of the Robes Countess Caroline Lewenhaupt and the maid of honor Mariana Koskull. The Swedish climate was reportedly a shock for her: she arrived during the winter, and she hated the snow so much that she cried. Her spouse had converted upon his election as heir to the Swedish throne, and upon their arrival, her son was also to do so, as was required, and was taken from her to be brought up a Lutheran. There was, in accordance with the Tolerance Act, no demand that she should convert, and a Catholic chapel was arranged for her use. Desideria was not religious, but the Catholic masses served to remind her of France, and she had the birth of Napoleon II celebrated by a Te Deum in her chapel.
Desideria was unable to adapt to the demands of formal court etiquette or participate in the representational duties which were required of her in her position of Crown Princess. Her French entourage, especially Elise la Flotte, made her unpopular during her stay in Sweden by encouraging her to complain about everything. She did not have a good relationship with Queen Charlotte, though the Dowager Queen Sophia Magdalena was reportedly kind to her. In her famous diaries, Queen Charlotte described her as good hearted, generous and pleasant when she chose to be and not one to plot, but also an immature "spoiled child", who hated all demands and was unable to handle any form of representation, and as "a French woman in every inch" who disliked and complained about everything which was not French, and "consequently, she is not liked."
Queen Charlotte, who wanted to remain the center of attention at her own court, was not pleased with Desideria and also influenced King Charles against her.
Desideria left Sweden in the summer of 1811 under the name of Countess of Gotland, officially because of her health, and returned to Paris, leaving her husband and her son behind. She herself said that the Swedish nobility had treated her as if they were made of ice: "Do not talk with me of Stockholm, I get a cold as soon as I hear the word." In Sweden, her husband took a mistress, the noblewoman Mariana Koskull.
Under the same alias, Desideria officially resided incognito in Paris, thereby avoiding politics. However, her house at rue d'Anjou was watched by the secret police, and her letters were read by them. She had no court, just her lady's companion Elise la Flotte to assist her as hostess at her receptions, and she mostly associated with a circle of close friends and family. Her receptions were frequented by Talleyrand and Fouché, who upon the mission of Napoleon tried to influence her consort through her. In 1812, she acted as mediator when Napoleon negotiated with her consort through the Duke de Bassano. Her consort liked her to be placed in Paris, where she could calm Napoleon's rage over the politics of Sweden and keep him informed about the events in the center of European politics, but as their correspondence has been lost, it is not known how political it was. During the meeting between her husband and Tsar Alexander I of Russia in Åbo in 1812, the Tsar suggested that Charles John divorce her and marry one of his sisters, but the King turned down the proposal.
Queen consort
In 1818, her husband became King of Sweden, which made Desideria queen. However, she remained in France, officially for health reasons, which caused speculations in the press in Paris and by her visitors. After she became queen, the queen dowager wrote to her and suggested that she should have Swedish ladies-in-waiting, but she replied that it was unnecessary for her to have a court since she still resided incognito. She officially kept herself incognito and did not host any court, but she kept in contact with the Swedish embassy, regularly visited the court of Louis XVIII, and often saw Swedes at her receptions, which she hosted on Thursdays and Sundays, unofficially in her role as queen, though she still used the title of countess.
During this period, she fell in love with the French prime minister, the Duc de Richelieu, which attracted attention. According to one version, she fell in love with him after Louis XVIII had assigned him to deny her regular appeal for her sister Julie in the most charming way possible. True or not, she did fall in love with him, but the affection was not returned by Richelieu, who referred to her as his "crazy Queen". According to Laure Junot, she did not dare to speak to him or approach him, but she followed him wherever he went, tried to make contact with him, followed him on his trip to Spa, and had flowers placed in his room. She followed him around until his death in 1822. Another version of her behavior toward him was, that her consort had given her the task to make contact with Richelieu for political reasons, but that his attitude had made her too embarrassed to do so.
During the summer of 1822, her son Oscar made a trip in Europe to inspect prospective brides, and it was decided they should meet. As France was deemed unsuitable, they met in Aachen and a second time in Switzerland. In 1823, Desideria returned to Sweden together with her son's bride, Josephine of Leuchtenberg. It was intended to be a visit, but she was to remain in Sweden for the rest of her life. She and Josephine arrived in Stockholm 13 June 1823. Three days later, the royal court and the government were presented to her, and on 19 June, she participated in the official welcoming of Josephine and witnessed the wedding. A well-known story is that after her return to Sweden there was a warm and dry period, so the peasants turning up to see her were coaxed into greeting her with "Vi vill ha regn!" ("We want rain!"), which in the Scanian dialect sounds very similar to the French "Vive la Reine!" ("Long live the Queen!").
Queen Mother
In 1844, Charles XIV John died and Desideria became the queen mother. Her son, the new King Oscar I, allowed her to keep living in the queen's quarters in the Royal Palace as well as her entire court staff out of consideration, so that she would not have to change her habits. When her daughter-in-law Queen Josephine tried to convince her to reduce her court of her own free will, saying that she no longer needed such a big court as a queen mother, she answered "It is true that I no longer need them all, but all of them still need me." She was a considerate and well-liked employer among her staff.
Desideria did engage in charity but it was discreet, and it has been said: "Her charity was considerable but took place in silence". One example was that she supported poor upper-class women by giving them sewing work. She also acted as official protector of charitable institutions, such as the Women's Society Girl School. The same year she became a widow, she was described by the French diplomat Bacourt: "Royalty has not altered her — unfortunately, for the reputation of the Crown. She has always been and will always remain an ordinary merchant woman, surprised over her position, and surprising to find upon a throne." He also added that she was a goodhearted woman.
After her return to Sweden in 1823, Desideria had kept her house at Rue d'Anjou in Paris awaiting her return. It was managed by her sister Catherine Honorine Villeneuve and her old French staff, while her business in France was managed by her nephew, Imperial Count Clary. In May 1853, after Napoleon III had made himself French emperor, she made preparations to return to Paris. Everything was ready, and she was escorted to her ship in Karlskrona by her grandson Prince Oscar, Duke of Östergötland. Her fear of sea travels, however, made it impossible for her to leave.
During her last years, she was worried about her house in Paris because of the plans of the city architect Haussmann, but Napoleon III made an exception for her and allowed for her house to stand, which it did until one year after her death. Desideria had a fairly harmonious relationship with her daughter-in-law, and felt sympathy for her grandson's bride, Princess Louise of the Netherlands.
During her later years as queen, and particularly as a queen mother, she became known for her eccentricity. She is known to have kept reversed hours and, consequently, for often being late and keeping guests waiting, something which agitated her spouse. Normally, she retired at four in the morning, and awoke at two o'clock in the afternoon. Before she went to bed, she took a "walk by carriage". During these trips, she often paid unannounced visits, which were normally inconvenient because of the time. When the weather was bad, her carriage drove round the courtyard of the royal palace instead. It was normal for her to arrive for a visit to an opera when the show had ended. She went to bed in the morning, got up in the evening, ate breakfast at night and wandered around the corridors of the sleeping palace with a light. An anecdote illustrates this: in 1843, a palace guard saw the Queen fully dressed on a palace balcony in the middle of the night. When he came home to his wife, he told her that she was lazy in comparison to the Queen, who had gotten up hours before sunrise. He thought the Queen Mother was up earlier than anyone else in town, but in fact, she had not yet gone to bed.
Honours
Bavaria : Dame of the Order of Saint Elizabeth.
In fiction
Désirée Clary has been the subject of several novels and films.
Désirée (1951), by Annemarie Selinko, a novel in the form of a mock autobiography. It was originally published in German, by Kiepenheuer & Witsch, and became a worldwide best-seller. It has been translated into many languages, including Chinese, Dutch, English, Estonian, French, Italian, Greek, Hungarian, Spanish, Persian, Slovenian and Turkish.
Le Destin fabuleux de Désirée Clary (also Mlle. Désirée) (1942), a French film by Sacha Guitry.
Désirée (1954), an American film based on Selinko's book, with Jean Simmons as Désirée and Marlon Brando as Napoleon.
Napoleon and Love (1974), British TV series, Désirée is played by Karen Dotrice.
The Bernadotte Album (1918), a "screen treatment" by John B. Langan on the lives of Clary and Joséphine (née Marie Tascher), which purported to be "Founded on the memoirs of Marie Tascher and Désirée Clary."
The Queen's Fortune: A Novel of Desiree, Napoleon, and the Dynasty that Outlived the Empire (2020), by Allison Pataki, a first-person narrative covering Clary's life.