Antoinette Van Leer Polk | |
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Antoinette Van Leer Polk in 1912
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Born |
Antoinette Wayne Van Leer Polk October 27, 1847 Nashville, Tennessee, USA |
Died | February 3, 1919 Bouguenais, Loire-Atlantique, France |
Residence |
Avenue Hoche, 8th arrondissement of Paris Château de la Basse-Mothe |
Occupation | Equestrian, planter, socialite |
Title | Baroness |
Spouse(s) | Athanase-Charles-Marie Charette de la Contrie |
Children | Antoine de Charette |
Parent(s) | Andrew Jackson Polk Rebecca Van Leer |
Relatives |
William Polk (paternal grandfather) James K. Polk (paternal great-uncle) Leonidas Polk (paternal uncle) Vanleer Polk (brother) |
Antoinette Polk, Baroness de Charette (October 27, 1847 - February 3, 1919) was an American Southern belle in the Antebellum South and (by marriage) French aristocrat in the Gilded Age. Born into the planter elite, the great-niece of the 11th President of the United States James K. Polk, and an heiress to plantations in Tennessee, she was a "Southern heroine" who saved Confederate States Army personnel during the American Civil War of 1861-1865. After the war, she moved to Europe, where she took to foxhunting in the Roman Campagna of Italy and the English countryside, and later became a Baroness and socialite in Paris and Britanny.
Antoinette Wayne Van Leer Polk was born on October 27, 1847 in Nashville, Tennessee. Her father, Colonel Andrew Jackson Polk, was a planter who served in the Confederate States Army. Her mother, Rebecca Van Leer, was an heiress to an iron fortune from Cumberland Furnace. Polk grew up at Ashwood Hall, a mansion in Ashwood near Columbia in Maury County, Tennessee with her parents and brother, Vanleer Polk.
Her paternal great-uncle, James K. Polk served as the 11th President of the United States from 1845 to 1849. Bishop Leonidas Polk, who served as a General in the Confederate States Army, was her uncle. She was also a descendant of William Penn, the founder of the state of Pennsylvania, and General Anthony Wayne, a Commander-in-Chief in the American Revolutionary War.