From Courtesan to Egyptian Princess to Outlaw: The Strong Woman Marguerite Alibert

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

The story of Marguerite Alibert is a tale of survival echoed by work in less-than-exclusive locations and establishments of the time. Alibert was a strong and strong-willed woman who escaped from the world of poverty and mixed with the French elite, in the process replenishing her fortune with fabulous sums.

She is also known as Maggie Möller, as she took her last name from a man she claimed to be her first husband at the age of 17. And it was one of the four main surnames that she skillfully juggled with throughout her life.

For her, love is not romance and walking under the moon, but a way to survive and achieve the desired prosperity. She was even the mistress of the famous Prince Edward VIII, and soon married an Egyptian prince. However, to this day, her story is better known as the legend of a princess who escaped punishment for murder.

1. The tragic childhood of a girl from a poor family

Marguerite was born in 1890 to a working-class French family. Her father worked as a taxi driver, and her mother was a servant. When her younger brother was four years old, he was hit and killed by a truck. Alas, the girl's parents blamed her for the death of her brother, because, according to her mother, it was she who was supposed to look after him and be responsible for his safety. Because of this incident, the girl was sent to the Sisters Mary boarding school. When the baby was 15, the nuns sent her to a house where she probably worked as a servant. At the age of 16, the girl was thrown out of the estate for having an affair with an unknown man, from whom she became pregnant. The daughter she eventually gave birth to was sent to a farm somewhere in central France.

2. Working as a priestess of love for a piece of bread

After the girl was on the street, and her daughter was sent away, she decided to contact the local owner of the brothel in order to somehow make ends meet. This is because Maggie saw more elite girls, upper class sex workers called courtesans, enter into an elite society and make good money. The owner of the brothel, Madame Denart, willingly took the young Marguerite into her care. Denart will later say about Marguerite:.

3. Marguerite's first and unsuccessful love

In 1907, the girl meets a young man named Andre Meller. She was only 17, and he was about 40. He was very rich, and kept a luxurious stable, in which Maggie loved to spend time. Andre also bought her an apartment where they could spend time together, thereby hiding their relationship from the eyes of others. At the same time, she takes his last name for herself, claiming that they were actually married. However, if the facts are to be believed, Andre was still living with his first wife at the time. This relationship, alas, was not destined to last long: the couple broke up in 1913.

4. Sexuality education for the Prince of Wales

In 1917, Maggie meets Edward VIII, a man with whom she will have a great romance. During the First World War, the Prince of Wales served in the British troops in France, where he had already lost his virginity to a courtesan, which he "borrowed" from his friend. His companions decided that the young, 23-year-old guy needed to have more sexual experience, and therefore sent him to receive a "sex education" with an experienced priestess of love - Marguerite. For some time they had a passionate romance, which, however, did not last more than a year, after which the prince simply lost all interest in the girl.

5. An extravagant lifestyle sponsored by wealthy gentlemen

Since Marguerite made a living courting and seducing wealthy aristocrats and famous personalities, it certainly paid off well. She received many gifts from her admirers, as well as simply valuable trinkets, given the apartment from Andre Meller. However, this was not enough for the girl and she always wanted more. Thus, she found her first legal husband - Charles Laurent in 1919. But the marriage was clearly not successful, since the spouses had different views on life, and therefore, when they did not agree on their convictions, they decided to dissolve their union after only six months. At the same time, Marguerite got what she wanted: a major divorce proceedings that allowed her to pay for her apartment, stable, servants, and also a presentable car.

6. Marriage with an Egyptian prince: stability and pitfalls

The first meeting between Marguerite Laurent and Ali Kamel Fahmi Bey took place in 1921. At that time, the girl accompanied a very rich businessman, but Ali was not at all embarrassed by this. It is also worth noting that in fact this young man was not a prince in the full sense of the word: he was fabulously rich, and therefore received the title of "bey", which was equal to the title of lord or prince. Soon Ali meets with Marguerite and her companion, and, finding himself completely fascinated by a charming woman, invites her to marry him and go to live with him in Cairo. Maggie did not hesitate very long, and therefore soon agreed and accepted this offer. Since Ali Kamel was an extremely cautious person, he offered Marguerite to draw up a marriage contract. It contained only two provisions: the first allowed the girl to wear Western clothes, and the second contained a clause on the possibility of divorce at her request. In exchange for this, she agreed to accept his faith - Islam, thanks to which she could claim the inheritance. However, just before the wedding, the divorce clause was removed from the contract, and a new one was added, allowing Ali to have several more wives.

7. The Wife of an Islamic Rich Man: Expectation, Reality, and the Death Ending

It is not surprising that such a marriage was unhappy. A woman like Marguerite, who was sexy, perceptive and independent, could never become the submissive, obedient and most real Islamic wife that Bey Fahmi wanted her to be. The couple fought and swore like a cat and a dog, sometimes even doing it in public. Rumor has it that with her behavior Maggie humiliated Bey Fahmi. Over time, Marguerite became more and more dissatisfied with the way her husband treated her. And this was especially true of sexual issues. In Egypt, rumors circulated about Bey's alleged homosexuality, and Marguerite herself claimed that at some point she even suffered physically from an unnatural sexual act. Those who knew her well believed that Maggie could begin another major divorce proceedings, as the girl herself began to collect a list of all the malicious acts that Fahmi committed to her. At some point, the couple's quarrels reached their climax. On July 9, 1923, the couple went to the screening of "The Merry Widow" in London. After they returned to the hotel, they made another scandal, which ended in a real fight, as a result of which Bey left the room for several hours. At about two o'clock in the morning, three shots were fired: Marguerite shot her husband with a Browning 32 pistol, which she always kept under her pillow. She was arrested shortly thereafter, and Fahmi died of his injuries an hour later. The presence of witnesses to this incident made this case elementary for investigators.

8. Blackmailing the English prince and the trial of the calculating widow

Several years before Marguerite killed her husband, she tried to blackmail Prince Edward, claiming to have kept all the scandalous letters he once wrote to her. Before the trial, she decided to revert to this blackmail. Andrew Rose, who wrote a book about her, stated the following:.

When Marguerite was tried for the murder of her husband, no one, in general, understood what was going on behind the scenes of this action. If the girl published the letters that Prince Edward wrote to her, it would destroy the reputation of the English royal family, and therefore its members were ready to literally do anything to hide this from the public. Therefore, in court, a deal was made with officials, which required a complete non-disclosure of Marguerite's past, including ties with Prince Edward. Instead of accusing the girl of murder, the court arranged everything as if her husband was such a vile and cruel tyrant, moreover, racist that the jury released Marguerite without any doubts. During the trial in September 1923, a whole crowd of people gathered around the building to watch the fate of Alibert. People even sent servants there to take their places, and some even paid to attend the courtroom. It is thanks to her past work as a courtesan, as well as because of her connections with the English crown, her trial became a kind of event.

9. Happy and comfortable rest of life in France

After her husband was killed, and her trial died down, Alibert went back to Paris to live there until the end of her days. It is known for sure that for some time she played small, episodic roles in films, and also sometimes continued to charm non-poor men until society ceased to be interested in her. Marguerite Alibert died at the age of 80, continuing to carry the title of her husband until the end. It is also worth noting that she managed to turn her lifestyle into a real business. After her death, her grandson discovered that Marguerite's luxurious and wealthy life was financed by five different men.

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