2255 - Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria,

Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria, 1819–1901), Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Signed dedication in French to Empress Eugénie (born Eugénie de Montijo, 1826–1920), dated “31. January 1873." In: C(harles) Grey. The Early Years of His Royal Highness the Prince Consort, compiled under the direction of Her Majesty the Queen. Fifth edition. London, Smith, Elder and Co., 1868. Gr.-8° (22 x 14 cm.). xxxi, 469, (1) p. with an engraved portrait frontispiece (“Prince Albert at the age of four”). Contemporary leather binding with gold-stamped title on the spine, a crowned vignette, and five monograms (“AV”) on the covers; fillets on the covers and inner edges; and gold edges. An important autograph by the most powerful woman of the 19th century, addressed to the wife of Napoleon III of France, Empress Eugénie. “Pour ma chère Soeur L’Impératrice Eugénie de la part de sa dévouée Soeur Victoria 31 January 1873.” - After Napoleon III was taken prisoner at the Battle of Sedan during the Franco-Prussian War, Eugénie fled Paris on September 5, 1870, under dramatic circumstances, with the help of the dentist Thomas W. Evans. She first traveled by carriage to Deauville, then by boat to England. On October 30, she visited Napoleon III at Wilhelmshöhe Palace in Kassel, where he was being held under arrest as a prisoner of war. From March 1871, she lived with her husband in exile in England. Napoleon III died on January 9, 1873, and Eugénie subsequently lived alternately in Farnborough, Hampshire, and at the villa “Cyrnos” (the Greek name for Corsica) at Cap Martin near Monaco. - In addition: a handwritten, signed letter from Empress Eugénie (Chislehurst, December 2, 1872. 18 x 11.2 cm. 3 pages. Double sheet) addressed to “ma chère Marquise,” in which she sends her a photograph she had requested. This is likely the third wife of Charles, Marquis de La Valette, who served under Napoleon III first as Minister of the Interior, then as Minister for Foreign Affairs, and finally as French Ambassador to London. This third wife, whom Charles had not married until 1871, was Georgiana Gabrielle de Flahaut de la Billarderie (1822–1907). She envied her for being able to spend the entire winter in Italy.