![]() Meanwhile, Louis Henri grew restless of his mistress’ dominion and made plans to leave France secretly. She arranged for her niece to marry Talleyrand’s nephew. The most influential of these was the infamous Charles Maurice de Talleyrand. ![]() Sophie began to meddle in the turbulent and dangerous world of French politics, allying herself with those who came to power in the July Revolution of 1830. She imported members of her family, with Louis Henri making her nephew James a baron and taking care of her mother. In 1829, she used her feminine whiles to persuade him to leave her 2million francs and the castles and estates of Boissy, Enghien, Montmorency, Mortefontaine, and Saint-Leu-Taverny. However, Sophie still kept her control over the ageing Condé (now a Prince after the death of his father). ![]() The end of her marriage was a social disaster for Sophie and her ambitions: King Louis XIII banished her from court, declaring her to be: “Naught more than a commoner street-wench yet tragically bereft of any skills of the trade”. However, when Feuchères discovered the true relationship between ‘father and daughter’ he left her. The new baroness became a person of consequence at the court of Louis XVIII. The impoverished St Helens girl began to become known as “the Queen of Chantilly”. To make Sophie respectable so that she could appear in the French court, he married her off to Adrien Victor de Feuchères – a lieutenant colonel of the Royal Guards – giving her a dowry of 18,000 francs. He passed the St Helens girl off as his natural daughter. In 1814 – after the fall of Napoleon – the Duke of Bourbon returned to Paris with Sophie. Here, the former semi-literate fisherman’s daughter was instructed on how to become an accomplished young lady, learning French, Greek, Latin and music. The Duke de Condé – then a 52-year-old rake and one of the richest men in Europe – had Sophie installed as his mistress at a house in Gloucester Road, London, in 1811. One story of her life recounts the tale of the Duke de Condé playing cards with the Duke of Kent – father of Queen Victoria – with the radiant Sophie as the prize. Here, her beauty and charm attracted the attention of the valet of Louis Henri, Duke de Condé, who pointed her out to his master. Her next assignment was as a maid in a high-class house of ill-repute, frequented by French emigres. When he tired of her, she was left with an annuity of £50 a year. Her 1st big break came when she attracted the attention of a rich army officer, who installed her in a house on Turnham Green. She then became first a milliner and subsequently an orange seller at a London theatre. From there, she moved to Portsmouth, where she worked as a chambermaid. She was then found a position in Cliff Farm in Shanklin off Victoria Avenue. Her Dad, Dickey, took to drink his wife and children were forced to enter the workhouse in Newport. As a child, Sophie picked shellfish barefoot on St Helens beach. She was 1 of 10 children only 4 survived to adulthood. Her mother was Jane Callaway her parents never took the trouble to tie the marital knot. The future Queen of Chantilly was the daughter of one Richard Daw, a celebrated local fisherman and smuggler, who gave his name to the ‘Dickey Daw Banks’ and ‘Dickey Daw Gut’ passage off the Bembridge coast.
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