Lillie / Emilie le Breton

http://genealogics.org/getperson.php?personID=I00039725&tree=LEO

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lillie_Langtry

http://www.americanwest.com/pages/fwpnfron.htm

Jersey Lily, a beauty who dallied with many famous men

• Her father was the Dean of Jersey, Rev. William Corbet Le Breton who himself was associated with scandalous affairs. Lily's family must have had scandal in its genes since another ancestor was Richard le Breton, who was reported to have assassinated Saint Thomas a Becket. Not only was she a great beauty, like her mother apparently, she was the only daughter, with six brothers, five of whom were older than her. This made her an iconoclast for her era, with her feminine wiles and appeal and her "masculine" drive and education that she shared with her six brothers. She spurned the French governess for her brothers' tutor, and thus was well educated for her gender.
• She was known as "Jersey Lily" and considered to be a great beauty. She married her brother-in-law, Edward Langtry, at age 20 but marriage failed to tame her. At age 27 Lily became the mistress of the Prince of Wales, Albert Edward, although both were married. Following that affair, she had an affair with the Earl of Shrewsbury and subsequently with Prince Louis of Battenberg, at the same time that she was sleeping with Arthur Clarence Jones. She had a daughter in 1881, claiming that the Prince was the father.

The Actress

• She enjoyed a successful career as an actress in England and the United States, beginning in 1881 and extending into the next century with vaudeville appearances up to 1912.

At the Racetrack

• Her next lover (1882 to 1891) was Frederic Gebhard, an American millionaire who introduced her to horse racing. They bought thoroughbred horses that they raced in both the U.S. and in England. Langtry's horse Merman, ridden by American Tod Sloan, won the Ascot Gold Cup.

The American, Winery Owner, and Lady de Bathe

• Lilly became an American citizen, moving to California and purchasing a winery. She divorced Edward Langtry in 1897 and re-married the younger Hugo Gerald de Bathe who became a Baron and was also an owner and sponsor of thoroughbred horse racing. Although they separated, they lived near one another in their later years, in Monaco.

Lasting Fame as an Iconoclast

• Lilly would have right at home in today's celebrity culture and reality shows. Her fame lives on in semi-fictional books, musicals, and movies. Numerous places associated with her or claimed to be associated with her bear the name "Langtry". The history of celebrity advertising counts her as one of the ground breakers.