WI: Marie-Caroline, Duchesse de Berry doesn't remarry?

So I've been trying to find a good POD for a Bourbon Restoration TL in 1848 and wanted to get opinions on this one. In 1832 the mother of the Comte de Chambord, Marie-Caroline of the Two Sicilies, Duchesse de Berry, led a revolt in the Vendée region to restore her son to the French throne. The revolt failed and the Duchesse was imprisoned for 7 months, during which she gave birth to a daughter and was forced to reveal her secret marriage to a Neapolitan noble. After she was released the Duchesse was cut out her her children's lives and education, not reconciling with her former in-laws until the late 1840s.

My POD would be for the Duchesse to never have remarried or for her marriage to never have been discovered (AKA isn't pregnant when she's captured). Its a rather odd POD I know, but there's a method to my madness. The Duchesse wanted to actively attempt to restore her son to the throne, as made obvious in her failed revolt. She also wanted her son educated to rule over modern France, not Ancien Régime France. She wanted François-René de Chateaubriand, a fairly liberal Legitimist, appointed as her sons tutor and Governor and for it to be made clear that the Comte de Chambord is the Legitimist pretender to the throne.

Sadly for her, by the time she made these demands the Duchesse had been completely discredited. So what if she hadn't remarried and remained a member of the Royal Family? Even though her Vendée revolt would have failed it still would have been a powerful image for Legitimists within France, especially if she instead escaped instead of being captured. As the Mother of the King of France, de jure Regent and head of an action party I'd think she'd be in a position to have her demands for her son's education recognized, if not by her father-in-law Charles X then by other monarchs like Fernando VII of Spain (still alive at this point) and Emperor Franz of Austria. So what do people think?
 
I think with the duchesse de Berri not becoming the princess of Campofranco she might be allowed more influence over her son, but the real bone of contention will come in when and if she tries to become regent. I think the duchesse d'Angouleme is going to block that move. From what I can gather there doesn't seem to have been much love lost between them - even before the July Revolution.

Although, his mother being present might make for different personalities of Louise and Henri. OTL they were both severely psychologically affected by their mother's "abandonment", with Henri never taking a mistress due to his parents' shenanigans (Amy Brown and Conte Ettore), in one point. Also, if Caroline's choosing the bride for Henri instead of MT, we may get someone else (like her half-sister - OTL Carlist Queen Maria Carolina of the Two Sicilies) as potential queen of France. Another thing ascribed to his mother's abandonment is the fact that he was delivered body and soul into the duchesse d'Angouleme's care and thus into the hands of the Jesuits, which resulted in a severe reining in of what seems to have been his natural personality (probably much like his father and mother) with the intent on making him a dour, serious-minded prince on the Louis Quatorze model.

*NOTE: The duchesse d'Angouleme was not a bad person, as you said in another post, simply formed by circumstances, and suited to a different age, but I think her child-rearing skills were not adequate to the challenges of raising the heir to the throne in 1830. I personally think the duchesse de Berri was far more realistic than her pie-in-the-sky sister-in-law.
 
I think with the duchesse de Berri not becoming the princess of Campofranco she might be allowed more influence over her son, but the real bone of contention will come in when and if she tries to become regent. I think the duchesse d'Angouleme is going to block that move. From what I can gather there doesn't seem to have been much love lost between them - even before the July Revolution.

Although, his mother being present might make for different personalities of Louise and Henri. OTL they were both severely psychologically affected by their mother's "abandonment", with Henri never taking a mistress due to his parents' shenanigans (Amy Brown and Conte Ettore), in one point. Also, if Caroline's choosing the bride for Henri instead of MT, we may get someone else (like her half-sister - OTL Carlist Queen Maria Carolina of the Two Sicilies) as potential queen of France. Another thing ascribed to his mother's abandonment is the fact that he was delivered body and soul into the duchesse d'Angouleme's care and thus into the hands of the Jesuits, which resulted in a severe reining in of what seems to have been his natural personality (probably much like his father and mother) with the intent on making him a dour, serious-minded prince on the Louis Quatorze model.

*NOTE: The duchesse d'Angouleme was not a bad person, as you said in another post, simply formed by circumstances, and suited to a different age, but I think her child-rearing skills were not adequate to the challenges of raising the heir to the throne in 1830. I personally think the duchesse de Berri was far more realistic than her pie-in-the-sky sister-in-law.

I agree completely. Blocking a party mom who thoughtlessly remarried (or made it up to a pregnancy) at a very difficult time is one thing, but blocking the widowed mother of the King of France, who is also the only Bourbon attempting to pull off a restoration? Much more difficult.

But as to the Regency, that was always really murky to me. On one hand the Duchesse managed to get Charles X to say she would be Regent "once they return to France" but on the other hand when she acted as Regent and tried to get aid from the other nations of Europe for a Restoration and later landed in France to raise a revolt, Charles issued decrees saying that the Duhesse was not the Regent and had no authority to do anything. The entire thing was very odd.

However, I will say that while the Duchesse disagreed with her son's education (saying it prepared him for the past and not the future) but she did actually help in picking out Marie-Therese of Modena. By that time Madame Royale and her sister-in-law had reconciled (helped by the fact that Charles X and Louis XIX were dead). But from what I can find in the bio I got on Chambord (its from 1967 so not the best) his mother favored a Russian match heavily with either Nicholas I's daughter Olga or his niece (either Maria or Elizabeth), but was vetoed by Madame Royale as being a schismatic union. So with Duchesse in a place to challenge Madame we might get a Russian-Bourbon marriage.

Also the Jesuit influence only lasted for a short time. When the news got around enough Royalists freaked out and demanded they be removed that Charles X had no choice but to back down. So with the Duchesse we'd probably be able to see a constitutionalist educated Henri, able to rule 19th-century France and married to a Russian Grand Duchess. Very cool.

Finally, your absolutely correct about Madame Royale. To me she was a saint for all she went though but she was vastly unprepared to oversee the education of a modern 19th-century monarch. The Duchesse may have started out as a party mom but after 1830 she seemed to have matured and understood the political situation better than her in-laws.

On a related note, I'm trying to find portraits of the Comte de Chambord but I can only find one or two. Any suggestions?
 
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