Marguerite Alibert

Marguerite Marie Alibert , also Maggie Meller , Marguerite Laurent and Princess Fahmy , (born December 9, 1890 in Paris , † January 2, 1971 there ) was a French prostitute and socialite. In 1923 she shot her Egyptian husband Ali Kamel Fahmy Bey in the Savoy Hotel in London . She was acquitted in a lawsuit. It was allegedly prevented that their love affair with the future British King Edward VIII was made public.

biography

Youth and life as mistresses

Marguerite Alibert was born in Paris as the daughter of the housekeeper Marie Aurand and the cab driver Firmin Alibert. She had a younger brother who died at the age of four when he was run over by a car. Marguerite, who should have looked after him, was blamed for this misfortune by her parents, which is why she was sent to a convent school. After she left school, she appeared to be employed as a maid . She became pregnant at 16 and had to take care of her child, a girl named Raymonde, in the country.

Under the guidance of a brothel operator with a distinguished clientele, Marguerite Alberit developed into a noble prostitute of "special class" by receiving language (she previously spoke French with an accent) and behavior lessons. In 1907 she met the wealthy André Meller from Bordeaux , who was more than 20 years her senior , and became his mistress . Although Alibert was married, from then on he called himself Madame Meller and was known by this name in Paris. The couple separated in 1913 after Meller's justified jealousy led to heated arguments in which Alibert released his horses out of anger and the police had to be called. She received a severance payment of 200,000 francs from Meller .

Prince Edward in France (1915)

In April 1917, Marguerite Alibert, who was now known in Paris as a luxury mistress and had an influential circle of acquaintances, was “introduced” to the then Prince of Wales , later British King Edward VIII, in the Paris Hôtel de Crillon for this sexual experience collect. He was stationed as an officer in the Grenadier Guards on the Western Front during World War I , but most of all he enjoyed the Parisian nightlife. Edward fell in love with Marguerite Alibert and wrote her numerous love letters, including sexual content and gossip about his family. Towards the end of the war, the prince's relationship cooled off, since he had now met another woman from the British upper class, Freda Dudley Ward . When Alibert realized he was avoiding a meeting with her, she sent him a letter of abuse, pointing out the letters she had in her possession. "Oh! Those bloody letters [...] ”, he wrote to one of his advisors who had previously warned him about Alibert.

In May 1919, Alibert married Charles Laurent, son of a wealthy Paris entrepreneur, in Venice . Laurent's family had tried in vain to prevent this connection. Alibert is said to have confided in a confidante before the wedding that she was only entering into this marriage because of her daughter, whom she wanted to bring in, and that she would pull Laurent out after six months. Laurent, a rather serious man, financed her a luxurious lifestyle and an expensive apartment. When Laurent was offered a post in the diplomatic service in Japan , he had to leave France alone because Alibert decided to stay in Paris. The marriage was annulled on March 30, 1920. Alibert again received a high severance payment, which allowed them to keep the apartment, employ several servants and maintain their own riding stable. Her daughter Raymonde from then on bore Laurent's name and was sent to an English boarding school.

Marriage and death of Ali Fahmy

At the beginning of the 1920s, Marguerite Alibert, who now called herself Madame Laurent , met the ten years younger and very wealthy Egyptian nobleman Ali Kamel Fahmy on a trip with Raymonde in Egypt. In 1922 the two met again in Paris; Alibert was the mistress of the wealthy Chilean Juan de Astorca at the time. The couple went on a pleasure trip through entertainment establishments and casinos in Paris, Deauville, and Biarritz , and Fahmy bought Marguerite Alibert precious jewels. They married in December 1922; the prenuptial agreement stated that Alibert would lose her living if she filed for divorce. Just a week later he wrote a letter complaining about his wife's "bad habits". A few days later there was a first threatening marital dispute between the two with mutual death threats. The couple traveled to Luxor twice to visit the excavations of Howard Carter . A formal Islamic marriage followed a little later, after which Alibert was also called Princess Munira Fahmy . During a boat trip to Trieste , the two quarreled so violently that the captain had to intervene: "The Fahmys argied and bargied, clawed and scratched, bit and kicked their way from [...] Egypt to [...] Paris." "The Fahmys argued and quarreled, clawed and scratched, bit and kicked their way from [...] Egypt to [...] Paris.")

From Trieste, the couple traveled to Paris, where Madame Fahmy flirted with male acquaintances in front of her husband, whereupon there was renewed mutual abuse during an exclusive ball in front of the eyes of the higher society. From Paris, the Fahmys traveled to London, where they arrived on July 1, 1923. They lived in the Savoy with an entourage consisting of a secretary, a valet, a maid and Ali's personal Sudanese personal servant .

On July 9th, after a visit to the theater, Marguerite and Ali Fahmy had another loud argument with assaults on both sides. Marguerite planned to travel to Paris alone for an operation, which her husband had forbidden her. Hours earlier he had sent several telegrams to Paris, for example to the luxury stores Van Cleef & Arpels and Louis Vuitton , that nothing should be sold to his wife on his account. At 2:30 in the morning, after another heated argument, Alibert fired three shots from behind at her 23-year-old husband when he was standing in the door to bring the couple's lap dog into the room. Fahmy was transported to Charing Cross Hospital , where he died within an hour. His wife was taken into custody. During this detention she was under special observation by the Special Branch , a police unit whose special task was to protect the royal family.

Murder trial

On September 10, 1923, the murder trial against Marguerite Alibert was opened with great public participation; In front of the Old Bailey courthouse there was a long line of people waiting, mostly women. The process was covered in newspapers across Europe and a correspondent for the Egyptian newspaper al-Ahram was there. The accused, mostly called Maggie Meller in the newspapers , presented herself as a victim of the “brutality and meanness” of her “oriental husband” who had imprisoned and abused her. Fahmy has been described as a "monster of Eastern depravity and decadence" who indulged in perverse sexual practices, while Marguerite Alibert was described as a "helpless European woman". Your defense attorney Edward Marshall Hall , one of the most renowned British criminal defense attorneys of his time, therefore called the act "self-defense". The judge did not allow Alibert's past to be brought up before the act, allegedly to ensure that the Prince of Wales's name remained anonymous . The newspapers reported that when the prosecution asked whether Alibert's father was not a cab driver, the judge shouted: "It is none of our business whether the defendant's father was a coachman or a millionaire!" Acquitted September 1923 . The jury , which had not learned anything about her previous life, needed an hour for its verdict.

The trial sparked a wave of xenophobic outrage in the British press, and the acquittal sparked protests in Egypt and other Arab countries. The Wafd Party 's Women's Committee wrote a letter to the British press and High Commissioner Percy Lyham Loraine in Cairo. In the process, oriental people in general and Egyptians in particular were slandered, which serves to justify the colonialist policy of the British. Loraine noted: "It will be remembered that this sensational case caused a great deal of ill-feeling in Egypt."

After the trial

After the trial ended, Alibert sued her husband's family for their inheritance and monthly maintenance. A court in Egypt did not recognize the British ruling against her and dismissed her lawsuit against the family. Until the end of her life, she lived in an apartment opposite the Hotel Ritz in Paris. After her death, one of her close confidants is said to have destroyed the remaining letters from Prince Edward.

reception

In the book The Prince, the Princess and the Perfect Murder, author Andrew Rose, a retired judge, speculates that Marguerite Alibert's acquittal was the result of a deal. In return, she is said to have promised to return the compromising love letters from the Prince of Wales and not to mention his name in court.

In 2013 the British TV broadcaster Channel 4 broadcast the documentary Edward VIII's Murderous Mistress: Was there a cover-up of Edward VIII's fling with a murderess? out.

literature

• Andrew Rose: The Woman before Wallis: Prince Edward, the Parisian Courtesan, and the Perfect Murder . Picador, 2013, ISBN 978-1-250-04069-5 .
• Andrew Rose: The Prince, the Princess and the Perfect Murder: An Untold History . Coronet, 2013, ISBN 978-1-4447-7645-4 .

Web links

• Edward VIII's Murderous Mistress - Marguerite Marie Alibert on YouTube , April 12, 2019

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Rose, The Prince, the Princess , pp. 33/34.
2. ↑ Rose, The Prince, the Princess , p. 37.
3. ↑ ^{a b c} Lucy Bland: Modern women on trial. ISBN 0719082641 p. 142 ( limited preview in Google Book search)
4. ↑ ^{a b} Sex, murder and conspiracy sheds new light on Edward VIII-Book. In: reuters.com. April 4, 2013, accessed February 8, 2020 . 
5. ^ Rose, The Prince, the Princes , p. 42.
6. ^ Adrian Phillips: The King Who Had To Go. ISBN 1785903470 ( limited preview in Google Book Search).
7. ^ Rose, The Prince, the Princes , p. 66.
8. ^ Rose, The Prince, the Princess , p. 78.
9. ↑ Innsbrucker Nachrichten v. September 20, 1923, p. 5.
10. ^ Rose, The Prince, the Princess , p. 99.
11. ^ Rose, The Prince, the Princess , pp. 93f.
12. ^ Rose, The Prince, the Princess , p. 106.
13. ^ Rose, The Prince, the Princess , p. 128.
14. ↑ Tom Sykes: The King & the Courtesan: Inside Edward VIII's Steamy French Affair. The Daily Beast, May 15, 2013, accessed February 8, 2020 . 
15. ^ ^{A b c} Ian Graham: Scarlet Women: The Scandalous Lives of Courtesans, Concubines, and Royal Mistresses . St. Martin's Press, ISBN 978-1-4668-6817-5 , pp. 183-185 ( google.com ).
16. ↑ Innsbrucker Nachrichten v. September 20, 1923, p. 6.
17. ↑ Marguerite Fahmy - Murderpedia, the encyclopedia of murderers. In: murderpedia.org. September 14, 1923, Retrieved February 8, 2020 (Spanish). 
18. ^ Rose, The Prince, the Princess , pp. ???.
19. ↑ Cheryl Stonehouse: A new book brings to light the scandalous story of Edward VIII's first great love. In: express.co.uk. April 5, 2013, accessed February 8, 2020 . 
20. ↑ Edward VIII's Murderous Mistress: Was there a cover-up of Edward VIII's fling with a murderess? . In: The Telegraph , April 21, 2013.