Ida FERRIER. Signed autograph letter to a “dear Count,” undated...
Ida FERRIER. Signed autograph letter to a “dear Count,” undated [ca. 1844]. 1 p. in-8 on paper bearing the embossed coat of arms of the Davy de La Pailleterie family.
“There’s no use dealing with people who change their minds thirty times a minute, so let’s not talk about it anymore. Come say goodbye to my Wednesdays tonight; I’m putting them to rest until next winter…”
After a seven-year affair, in 1840 Dumas suddenly decided to marry Ida Ferrier. After spending four years living almost continuously in Italy, the couple returned to Paris. At 45 rue de la Chaussée d’Antin, where he had settled, life was glamorous, and Ida hosted gatherings every Wednesday after the shows.
By the end of the year, the couple had separated, and Ida returned to live in Italy, where she died in 1859.
Extremely rare.
The two daughters: Marie and Micaëlla
Marie, the younger sister of Alexandre Dumas, Jr., was the daughter of the actress Belle Kreilssammer. She was born in 1831 and was immediately recognized by her father. She was raised by Dumas’s wife, Ida Ferrier, in Paris and then in Florence, where Ida had moved after her separation from Dumas. It was not until 1846 that she joined her father, though she found it difficult to cope with his financial and romantic escapades! In 1856 she married Olinde Pétel, from whom she separated in 1861. She ran Dumas’s household on Boulevard Malesherbes, devoting herself to painting and writing.
Micaëlla was the youngest child, the result of Dumas’s affair with another actress, Émilie Cordier. She was born on December 24, 1860, and spent a happy early childhood with her father, notably in Naples, where Émilie had accompanied Dumas. Émilie, to whom Dumas had offered to acknowledge the little girl on the condition that she raise her, refused. She therefore remained with her mother, who remarried and sent her to a convent until she was eighteen. She then moved to Émilie’s new home, where she was unwelcome by her half-brothers and sisters. Rejected by them, as well as by the Dumas family, and without any means of support, she lived first in hardship and then in poverty until her death in 1936.
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Ida FERRIER. Signed autograph letter to a “dear Count,” undated [ca. 1844]. 1 p. in-8 on paper bearing the embossed coat of arms of the Davy de La Pailleterie family.
“There’s no use dealing with people who change their minds thirty times a minute, so let’s not talk about it anymore. Come say goodbye to my Wednesdays tonight; I’m putting them to rest until next winter…”
After a seven-year affair, in 1840 Dumas suddenly decided to marry Ida Ferrier. After spending four years living almost continuously in Italy, the couple returned to Paris. At 45 rue de la Chaussée d’Antin, where he had settled, life was glamorous, and Ida hosted gatherings every Wednesday after the shows.
By the end of the year, the couple had separated, and Ida returned to live in Italy, where she died in 1859.
Extremely rare.
The two daughters: Marie and Micaëlla
Marie, the younger sister of Alexandre Dumas, Jr., was the daughter of the actress Belle Kreilssammer. She was born in 1831 and was immediately recognized by her father. She was raised by Dumas’s wife, Ida Ferrier, in Paris and then in Florence, where Ida had moved after her separation from Dumas. It was not until 1846 that she joined her father, though she found it difficult to cope with his financial and romantic escapades! In 1856 she married Olinde Pétel, from whom she separated in 1861. She ran Dumas’s household on Boulevard Malesherbes, devoting herself to painting and writing.
Micaëlla was the youngest child, the result of Dumas’s affair with another actress, Émilie Cordier. She was born on December 24, 1860, and spent a happy early childhood with her father, notably in Naples, where Émilie had accompanied Dumas. Émilie, to whom Dumas had offered to acknowledge the little girl on the condition that she raise her, refused. She therefore remained with her mother, who remarried and sent her to a convent until she was eighteen. She then moved to Émilie’s new home, where she was unwelcome by her half-brothers and sisters. Rejected by them, as well as by the Dumas family, and without any means of support, she lived first in hardship and then in poverty until her death in 1936.
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Time, Location
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