Pamela, Lady Edward FitzGerald

From Dittopedia

St Nicholas Churchyard ** (T)

One of the more interesting monuments in the graveyard is that of the tragic Lady Pamela FitzGerald (La Belle Pamela), the ostensible daughter of the Duke of Orleans and Madame de Genlis, and widow of Lord Edward FitzGerald, the Irish patriot and martyr. Her father was guillotined by the French; her husband shot by the English; and her half-brother became King of France, later to be exiled to Claremont. She died in Paris in 1831 and was originally buried in Montmartre cemetrery, where her tomb was rudely shattered by a German shell during the siege of 1870, and the coffin exposed. Her relatives, who lived in Thames Ditton, then had her remains re-interred in their final resting place here.

Pamela, Lady Edward FitzGerald by Elisabeth Louise Vigée Le Brun (1755-1842) (5-Nov)

Pamela, Lady Edward FitzGerald (1773-1831) was the wife of the revolutionary aristocrat, Lord Edward FitzGerald.

Pamela's final resting place, St Nicholas (6-Nov)

While in Paris, FitzGerald became enamoured of a young girl whom he chanced to see at the theatre, and who is said to have had a striking likeness to Mrs Sheridan. Procuring an introduction he discovered her to be a protégé of Madame de Sillery, Comtesse de Genlis.

The parentage of the girl, whose name was Pamela, is uncertain; but although there is some evidence to support the story of Madame de Genlis that she was born in Newfoundland of parents called Sims, the common belief that she was the daughter of Madame de Genlis herself by Louis Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, was probably well founded. On 27th December 1792 FitzGerald and Pamela were married at Tournay, one of the witnesses being Louis Philippe, afterwards King of the French; and in January 1793 the couple reached Dublin. The couple eventually had a son and two daughters.

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After Sir Edward's death

After her husband's death in Newgate Gaol, Dublin, Pamela, Lady Edward FitzGerald, was no longer welcome at Boyle Farm, the house of his brother Lord Henry FitzGerald in Thames Ditton. Pamela suffered a broken re-marriage on the continent, and found no happiness in Paris, where she died in 1831.

With the Irish estate confiscated, Pamela brought the children to her parents-in-law's house, Boyle Farm. Lively but rather spendthrift, she left her son with Edward's mother, her younger daughter Lucy with her aunt Sophia, and took her elder daughter Pamela back to the continent where she married again.^[1]

Lucy was clever and taught in the church school. She married but died of scarlatina after childbirth in 1826. She shares a tomb with her aunt -- the box grave near Clematis Cottage, which is thought to be part of the school where she taught. ^[1]

But her daughters found much happiness in the village, living with an aunt. After she died, her mortal remains were buried at St Nicholas Churchyard. In attendance at this third burial were:

Her grandson Sir Edward Fitzgerald Campbell,
Her grand-daughter, Lady Selby Smyth,
Lt General Sire Edward Selby Smyth
and three great-grandchildren.

Inset into the headstone at St Nicholas was a fragment of marble from the Montmartre tombstone, which was shattered by a German shell during the siege of 1870.

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