Napoleon III - Personal Life

Personal Life

Louis Napoleon has a historical reputation as a womanizer, yet he referred to his behaviour in the following manner: "It is usually the man who attacks. As for me, I defend myself, and I often capitulate." He had many mistresses. During his reign, it was the task of Count Felix Bacciochi, his social secretary, to arrange for trysts and to procure women for the emperor's favours. His affairs were not trivial sideshows: they distracted him from governing, affected his relationship with the empress, and diminished him in the views of the other European courts. Among his numerous love affairs and mistresses were:

• Mathilde Bonaparte, his cousin and fiancee
• Maria Anna Schiess (1812–1880), of Allensbach (Lake Constance, Germany), mother of his son Bonaventur Karrer (1839–1921)
• Alexandrine Éléonore Vergeot, laundress at the prison at Ham, mother of his sons Alexandre Louis Eugène and Louis Ernest Alexandre
• Elisa Rachel Felix, the "most famous actress in Europe"
• Harriet Howard (1823–1865) wealthy and a major financial backer
• Virginia Oldoini, Countess di Castiglione (22 March 1837 – 28 November 1899) Spy, Artist and famous beauty, sent by Camillo Cavour to influence the Emperor's politics
• Marie-Anne Waleska, a possible mistress, who was the wife of Count Alexandre Joseph Count Colonna-Walewski, his relative and foreign minister
• Justine Marie Le Boeuf, also known as Marguerite Bellanger, actress and acrobatic dancer. Bellanger was falsely rumoured to be the illegitimate daughter of a hangman, and was the most universally loathed of the mistresses, though perhaps his favorite
• Countess Louise de Mercy-Argenteau (1837–1890), likely a platonic relationship, author of The Last Love of an Emperor, her reminiscences of her association with the emperor.

His wife, Eugenie, resisted his advances prior to marriage. She was coached by her mother and her friend, Prosper Mérimée. "What is the road to your heart?" Napoleon demanded to know. "Through the chapel, Sire", she purportedly answered. Yet, after marriage, it took not long for him to stray as Eugenie found sex with him "disgusting". It is doubtful that she allowed further approaches by her husband once she had given him an heir.

By his late forties, Napoleon started to suffer from numerous medical ailments, including kidney disease, bladder stones, chronic bladder and prostate infections, arthritis, gout, obesity, and the effects of chronic smoking. In 1856, Dr. Robert Ferguson, a consultant called from London, diagnosed a "nervous exhaustion" that had a "debilitating impact upon sexual ... performance" and reported this also to the British government.