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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?
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