Isabelle Boye-Singer
She was born in Paris to Louis Noël Boyer, an Africa-born French confectioner, and his English-born wife Pamela Lockwood (aka Pamilla). She married Isaac Merritt Singer, the founder of the Singer Sewing Machine Co., in New York City, in 1863 when Isaac was 52 and Isabella was only 22. Singer had a previous common-law wife, Mary Ann Sponsler, who had Isaac arrested for bigamy.
Isabella and Isaac moved to Paris, then to Oldway Mansion in Paignton, on the Devon coast, because New York society frowned on his many "families." They had six children; Sir Adam Mortimer Singer (1863—1929), Winnaretta Eugénie Singer (1865–1943), Washington Merritt Grant Singer (1866–1934), Paris Eugene Singer (1867–1932), Isabelle-Blanche Singer (1869–1896)[1] and Franklin Merritt Morse Singer (1870–1939).
Isaac Singer is reported to have had a total of 22 children with his many paramours. Singer died in 1875 and left an estate of about $14 million, which at the time was a colossal sum of money. His two wills created family tension and lawsuits. Isabella was declared his legal widow.
On 8 January 1879, Isabella married a Dutch musician, Victor Reubsaet [nl], and settled in Paris. Victor was an internationally successful singer and violinist. He was born in 1843 in Sittard, as Nicolas Reubsaet, a son of a simple shoemaker. Pretending to be of noble descent, he falsely claimed the title Vicomte d’Estenburgh. In 1881, he did obtain the title of Duke of Camposelice from Italian King Umberto I, in appreciation for a generous act of philanthropy in favor of the Italian colonies.[2]
The Duchess of Camposelice was still a striking lady when she met the sculptor Bartholdi. It is rumoured she was his model for the Statue of Liberty, however this claim may not be correct.[3]
Victor Reubsaet died in September 1887 and Isabella was married, for the third time, in December 1891, to the art collector Paul Sohège.
Isabella Eugenia Boyer died at 62 years of age in 1904 in Paris.
The Duchess of Camposelice was still a striking lady when she met the sculptor Bartholdi. It is rumoured she was his model for the Statue of Liberty, however this claim may not be correct.[3]
RE: Is a Bella Boyer-Singer
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/aug/14/humanities.highereducation
Pope urged to apologise for Vatican castrations
Rory Carroll in Rome
@rorycarroll72
Tue 14 Aug 2001 05.06 EDT
Revelations that the Vatican encouraged the castration of choir boys in the name of art for hundreds of years have prompted calls for a papal apology.
Human rights groups, historians and Italian commentators said the Pope, a singer himself, should ask forgiveness for his predecessors' role in the mutilation of castrati singers.
New research suggests that the employment of castrati was tolerated by the Vatican as late as 1959, long after other states had banned it as barbaric.
From the 16th century onwards generations of Italian boys were castrated in the hope that their voices, prevented from breaking, would combine a child's high register with the vocal power of a man.
Their ability to sing beyond normal human limits enraptured opera-goers, emperors and popes, who commissioned a choir of castrati to perform in the Sistine chapel. An edict by St Paul prevented women singing in church.
Successful castrati such as Farinelli - the subject of Gérard Corbiau's 1994 film - became Europe-wide superstars, feted by composers such as Handel, but most failed to make the grade and were cast aside, devastated and useless even as circus freaks.
According to Angels Against their Will, a new book by the German historian Hubert Ortkemper, the castrato Alessandro Moreschi performed in the Sistine chapel until 1913. Other historians suspect that Domenico Mancini, another private pontifical singer who performed from 1939 to 1959, was a castrato, too.
Officially the Vatican always condemned the practice, which is thought to have started around 1500, and punished castrators with excommunication. In 1902 it issued a decree banning castrati from the Sistine chapel.
But such was the beauty and power of their singing that successive popes sponsored the phenomenon by employing them on the pretext that they were accidentally castrated, for example by falling from a horse or by an animal bite.
Italy's leading newspaper, Corriere della Sera, said the Pope, whose CD recordings have sold millions, should follow up his admission of church wrongs against Jews, Muslims and scientists by expressing sorrow for the castrati.