Many of us Regency authors and readers know that Napoleon’s wife, the Empress Josephine contributed to establishing the slim, high-waisted, chemise dress as the dominant fashion in Regency England, but did you know that Josephine is also known for her passionate love of roses?
She was born Marie Josèphe Rose Tascher de la Pagerie in 1763 on the Caribbean island of Martinique where her wealthy family owned a sugar plantation. The island is a lush, tropical paradise with beautiful flowering plants. Perhaps it was there she first developed a love for beautiful, fragrant plants, for she was to introduce many to France.
After she married Napoleon and became Empress of France, Josephine spent vast sums of money collecting new varieties of plants, including roses, from all over the world for her garden at Chateau Malmaison outside of Paris. Napoleon complained about the expense but he was off fighting the British in various places, so Josephine pursued her love of roses and expanded her garden.
Napoleon turned a blind eye when Josephine broke the law by asking that English seeds and plants be brought to her from captured ships. Her informal plantings had already been christened jardins à l’anglaise (English Gardens) and her greenhouses were modeled on those at Kew Gardens near London.
Her principal source for roses was the Lee & Kennedy Vineyard Nursery in London. But Josephine wanted every rose known in the world. In 1804, by way of Lewis Kennedy, she was in proud possession of the new Chinese roses: Slater's Crimson China, Parson's Pink and Hume's Blush Tea Scented China. These roses were recent imports to England from China, and it was a coup for the Empress (and for France) to have them growing at Malmaison. They became known as “stud roses”, potent parents of the modern ever blooming rose cultivars.
Andre du Pont, Josephine's head horticulturist, began breeding new roses for the Empress. His 1813 catalogue of roses at Malmaison listed nearly 200 different varieties, including many new introductions.
The fact that France was at war with England did not stop her from looking at the enemy’s roses. At the height of the war in the early 1800's, Napoleon sent money to England to pay for his wife's rose plant bills. And the British Admiralty allowed ships to pass through its naval blockade to deliver those roses to Malmaison. War could wait while the rose deliveries continued. She even obtained a passport of a London nurseryman to travel back and forth with her new plants.
During the period 1805-1810, she collected
260 roses for her gardens. But she did more than plant a beautiful rose garden.
She influenced the growing of roses. The
roses at that time bloomed once a season, and their blossoms faded quickly once
a flower was cut. By systematically hybridizing the western rose with varieties
from China, where the rose first developed, Josephine re-structured the way
roses developed their petals. The result was a rose that blossomed several
times a season, and looked splendid in a vase in the parlor for days.
Josephine elevated the stature of the rose by commissioning artist Pierre-Joseph Redoute, a former court painter of Marie Antoinette, to paint a series of rose portraits. Blush Noisette is considered by many to the all time masterpiece of botanical illustration.
After Josephine died in 1814, Redoute published his rose portraits in three volumes simply titled Les Roses (1817-24). There were dedicated to Josephine’s memory. The book has continuously been in publication ever since.
In Racing with the Wind, book 1 in the Agents of the Crown Regency series, you’ll see Josephine’s roses in Paris when Lady Mary Campbell is taken with them.
