From Prostitute to Princess to Murderer | Marguerite Alibert

Marguerite Alibert's is one of brave survival followed by a lucrative life of sex work. Alibert was a formidable woman who rose from a world of poverty to mingle with the French elite, achieving her goal of turning her affairs into large sums of money in the process. Today, we look at the strange life of Marguerite Alibert. Marguerite saw love not from a romantic point of view, but as a way to survive and thrive. She even is one of Prince Edward VIII's mistresses and married into Egyptian royalty. However, that monumental event is where her story takes a murderous turn.

In the end, Marguerite fell into infamy as the

princess

who got her way. Before we continue, be sure to subscribe to Weird History, and your mom told us you should leave a comment. So go ahead. OK lets start. The daughter of a taxi driver and a maid, Marguerite Alibert was born into the French middle class, that is, in not entirely extreme poverty, in the winter of 1890. Her mother and her father were, not to be too precise, total failures. As parents. When her younger brother, age four, was hit by a truck, and instead of chasing the driver or at least taking Junior to the cemetery, the parents sent their mischievous daughter, who had lost her brother, to the Sisters of María to receive psychological treatment. torture.

The nuns taught young Marguerite that if it were not for her sins, her four-year-old brother would still be alive despite the truck. With more help from the Sisters of Mary, Marguerite spent the rest of her guilt-ridden childhood cleaning someone else's house, only to lose both her childhood and her home due to an unplanned pregnancy at age 16. Surely this was just a bump in the road at the beginning of a healthy life full of possibilities. Hey, just kidding. She was kicked out of the house to starve in the streets. While Marguerite's "don't ask" baby went on to live on a farm, as they did in those days, Marguerite herself became a sex worker and was discovered by Madame Denart, guardian of courtesans.

Madame trained Marguerite to use her natural charm and beauty to make money instead of babies, which suited Marguerite just fine. Madame Denart boasted that Marguerite was... The mistress of almost all of my best clients, gentlemen of wealth and position in France, England, the United States and other countries. It was I who made her into a kind of lady. She was shameless that way. Margaret had already learned from Mary's sisters that she could only count on herself if she wanted to survive and prosper in some way. There she too had learned to sing. Mezzo-soprano, a useful skill in the garter belt of any quality courtesan.

It seems that she had found a satisfying career in which to take advantage of everything she had received from her parents. Marguerite had several aliases, including Maggie Meller, taken from her first almost-husband, a wealthy 40-year-old stable owner, Andre Meller, himself a married man. As we will soon see, she was crazy about horses, money and the name Meller. Andre had it all in the bag... or not. Although Maggie was never married to Meller, laws of man and God and all, the 17-year-old liked the name and the money enough to keep them. We must admit that Maggie Meller has a ring, and it would soon become apparent to her that this ring was the only kind of ring she would receive from this guy.

Ironically, Andre, still married six years later, hung up his sugar daddy shingle because Maggie couldn't or wouldn't be faithful to him. Freed from the clutches of extreme poverty and in possession of some 200,000 British pounds, courtesy of Mr. Meller, Maggie retrieved her "don't ask" baby Raymonde from the farm and would later send her to school in London. She was the only really decent thing she was known to do. Prince Edward VIII, who had recently borrowed a

prostitute

from a friend to solve his virginity problem, was just one of Maggie's many wealthy men, but he was also the Prince of Wales, heir to the British throne, so here our story takes place. a fun twist.

Maggie was in her twenties and an experienced Parisian courtesan at the time. By comparison, Prince Eddie was a baby: 23 years old, royal, freshly deflowered, and on leave during his first World War. He was the good Queen Mother's worst nightmare. Edward fell madly in love with Marguerite for about a year before he got bored, long enough to write what he would later call... Oh, those damn letters. --in a lament to advisor Joey Legh. Those damned letters contain all the stupid things a young man could say to his beloved. All the delicate fantasies that arise directly from the heart without going through the brain.

Things like... I found the sex fork, ha ha ha. Or... Dad is actually a bit of a jerk. Or... This war is stupid and no one will let me drive the damn ship. But while the average parent might be embarrassed if faced with their firstborn's nonsense in the spring of their first love, this shit could have ruined the royal family. Spoiler alert: that's going to be important here in a minute. It may be surprising that Maggie actually settled down. Well, she got married anyway. In 1919, after a year of sending a regular stinker to Prince Edward VIII reminding him that she still had all those damn letters, Maggie Meller married Charles Laurent.

He was handsome and boring, and saved Prince Edward a lot of trouble. People, that's why boredom exists. They divorced six months later, giving Maggie a good settlement she could call her own. An apartment, 10 horse stables, cars, plenty of servants and, of course, a new name that she will use if she feels like it. Maggie's new... --bae was actually a bey, or lord, not a prince. But that didn't stop people in certain circles from calling her Princess Fahmy when she married the hilariously rich Ali Kamel Fahmy Bey and she settled with him in Cairo. The Egyptian, not a prince, received his title as bey of Egypt, and Egypt is an Islamic-oriented nation.

The strictly upright life of a bey's wife wasn't exactly appealing to hedonistic and likely dominatrix Maggie Meller, but she agreed on two conditions. The first was that she was allowed to wear Western clothing. That's fair...she's a great negotiator. The second, that she be allowed to divorce him. Oh. Prince Fahmy didn't like that much, but he was willing to pretend if it meant that Maggie would convert. Just before the wedding, the clever bey took the divorce clause off the table and replaced it with an edict allowing him to get more wives. Maybe they were true soulmates after all.

We have no idea why the bey thought this devilishly sexy twice-divorced Parisian

prostitute

he met while escorting a different rich man around an exotic country a year ago would ever become a suitable Islamic wife. But apparently it was, bless him. Gotta give it to the bey for trying. Bey Fahmy and his

princess

fought more or less constantly, sometimes even continuing their fights in broad daylight in front of other people. He complained that her independence, her insatiable sexuality, and her overall personality were absolutely humiliating. In fact, this was exactly what the bey had signed up for, but it seems she never realized it.

As we will soon see... - he didn't have much time. Bey Fahmy had something of a reputation in Egypt as a closeted homosexual. Whether to perpetuate that rumor or to use it to her advantage, Maggie claimed to have been torn apart during unnatural sexual intercourse. Considering her line of work, this timid, falsely claimed innocence is pretty disgusting, no matter what he intended to do for her. Those who knew her fairly well suspected that she was working to secure another major divorce settlement because this claim was one of many in a growing list of abuses she was accumulating so soon after marriage.

But wait, what's with that last minute no divorce and more wives clause? Well, we'll never know what that battle might have been like, probably not very well, because, dun, dun, dun, maybe it's too perfect that the couple returned from a screening of The Merry Widow to have a violent fight in their bedroom. hotel that would make Maggie Meller happy, but that's exactly what happened on the night of July 9, 1923. After a lot of yelling and such upon his return from the theater, the bey left. He returned a few hours later and would never leave on his own again.

Around 2:00 in the morning, three shots were heard. Princess Fahmy was arrested and, an hour later, the bey was dead; His wife shot him in the back of the head with a .38 pistol that she had been keeping under her pillow. He was pretty well presented when it came to homicides. There was no mystery. The murder weapon, the perpetrator and the victim were accounted for. There were no additional threads to untangle, the witnesses present before and after the shooting rounded out the case very well, or so everyone thought. Ah, the power of blackmail. Oh, those damn letters and what a fool I was to not follow your advice over a year ago.

I'm afraid she's the £100,000 or nothing type, although I'm disappointed and didn't think she'd turn nasty. The problem was my letters and she hasn't burned any. Prince Edward VIII, who all things considered, came out on top of this compared to Joey Legh. We believe there are about 20 extremely indiscreet letters. He said things about the conduct of the war that could have been misinterpreted. He has made rude comments about his father and they also have common sexual content. They are not the kind of letters he would have liked the world to know about. Put it all together and he'll have the keys to a real get-out-of-jail-free card.

Maggie's mother's nuns raised no fools. Her usual stinking threatening letter to Prince Edward VIII about his letters was a refrain the former showgirl turned prostitute was happy to sing again, only this time there was much more than £100,000 at stake. Strings were pulled to protect the reputation of the prince and his family. Maggie's life as a lady of the night was never admitted into evidence and therefore she could not be examined, thus taking care of those pesky letters and ensuring that no one thought less of Maggie for her work or of Eddie for having had 23 years. combined with some classic Roaring '20s racism ensured that the defense could paint the picture it needed to.

The late bey as the subhuman who beat, bought and exchanged wives. Marguerite as the hapless white woman caught in her savage brown clutches. Guess how that turned out? Yes, every decade has its test of the century. This was one of them. People lined up around the building to watch the action, or sent their servants to buy and/or reserve seats for them. However, apart from the cruel slander of the victim, there was not much real action. In September 1923, Bey Fahmy was condemned in public opinion for being an evil, depraved, racially inferior and perverted little monster. Marguerite Alibert was acquitted of all charges.

Maggie returned to her native Paris to live a long, comfortable and luxurious life. She continued her exciting lifestyle but eventually retreated from the spotlight, supported by at least five different ex-husbands until her death at age 80 in 1971. Prince Edward's mistake is a warning to us all in the Internet age. As for Maggie, we learned that a little extortion, a little imagination, and a lot of blackmail can make a widow very happy. What do you think of Marguerite, an expert player or as evil as she seems? Let us know what you think and be sure to check out some of these other triple-A rated videos from our Bizarre Story.