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 ey  igures
Some of the key figures in the history of the monastic community of Farnborough Abbey include:
Empress Eugenie
A Spanish grandee, Eugenia de Montijo married Napoleon III in 1853. Unusually for the era, it was a
marriage of love rather than political alliance. Eugénie was a beauty and was thus a great asset for the
fashion and silk industries of France. She led the women of France into the crinoline and, in the 1860s led
them back out of it. She was universally admired for her beauty and deportment. As Professor William Smith
put it ‘she had shoulders, when shoulders mattered’.
After the Fall of the Empire, Eugénie found herself blamed for many of the misfortunes of France, rather as
that other foreigner - Marie-Antoinette - had been. In the first ten years of her exile in England, she
found herself widowed and then childless. Crushed by the loss of husband and son, she moved in September of
1880 to Farnborough in Hampshire and with her little French court-in-exile commenced her plans for
St Michael’s, the Imperial Mausoleum. The chapel was ready to receive the Imperial dead in January 1888.
Eugénie herself lived on until 1920. She now lies buried in the Abbey Crypt.
Emperor Napoleon III
The nephew of Napoleon I, Louis Napoleon lies buried in the abbey crypt. Mocked as being ‘Napoleon the
Little’ by Victor Hugo, Louis Napoleon has, in recent years enjoyed a rehabilitation of his reputation by a
number of scholars.
The Second Empire as it was known, was, in many ways, a glorious moment in the history of France. It saw
the reorganisation of Paris under the architect Hausmann, a flourishing of trade, of the arts and of
science. It was the France of the ‘expositions universelles’, and of the beginning of the entente cordiale
between France and England which undid much of the Francophobia caused by Napoleon I.
Defeat in the 1870 Franco-Prussian War led to exile for the Emperor and a certain forgetfulness of his
achievements and popularity in France. He died in January of 1873 in Chislehurst in Kent and was buried in
the Catholic Church of Saint Mary, until the tomb was transferred to Farnborough in 1888.
The Prince Imperial
The story of Louis, the Prince Imperial, is a tragedy. Bearing the weighty name of his ancestor, it was
expected that he would one day be Napoleon IV. Instead, because of the Franco-Prussia War, he found himself
living not in the great palaces of France but Camden Place in Chislehurst, Kent. Determined to live up to the
family name he received a military training with the British Army at the academy at Woolwich.
Only through the intervention of his mother was he permitted to travel with his fellows to South Africa to
witness the British Campaign against the Zulu. Surrounded by Zulu warriors, his escape was impeded by a
broken saddle strap. He fought bravely – it was widely remarked that his wounds were all to the front of
his body, his face to the foe – but at the age of only twenty-three, he was dead.
His body was returned to England and laid to rest with the highest military honours in St Mary’s Church in
Chislehurst. In January of 1888 it was transferred to the crypt at Farnborough.
Dom Fernand Cabrol
Dom Fernand Michel Cabrol was Prior of the Abbey of Saint Pierre de Solesmes. Like most Benedictine houses
the pax, or peace, which is at the heart of its life was won only through many ‘spinas’ or thorns and
vicissitudes. When Dom Paul Delatte, Abbot of Solesmes was the victim of accusations made against his
person, it was his prior, Dom Cabrol, who kept a firm hand on the helm of the community during the abbot’s
absence in Italy and fiercely defended the reputation of his friend and superior.
Passionate about liturgical studies, Cabrol dreamed of a monastery whose life would be dedicated not only
to the practice of the prayer of the Church, but also to its study. This dream was realised in 1895 when
the first five monks came to England from the Abbey of Solesmes. Cabrol followed soon after and became prior
of the community and then its first abbot in 1903.
Cabrol remains a giant of the embryonic liturgical movement and one of the most respected liturgical
scholars of the early twentieth century. A great number of books and articles issued from his pen, and it
was he who, with Dom Henri Leclercq, produced the mammoth Dictionnaire d’archéologie et de la liturgie
Chretienne. To a formidable mind he added a boyish humour and a real paternal character. One of his
monks would comment that, when the abbot was absent, the life of the house was gone and the community
recreation suffered. He retained the title of Abbot of Farnborough until his death in 1937, though in his
latter years the monastery was ruled by a co-adjutor, Dom Bernard Jacquelot du Boisrouvray.
Dom Prosper Guéranger
Restorer of the monastic life to post-Revolutionary France by his re-founding of the ancient Priory of
Solesmes, Dom Prosper Guéranger was long since dead by the time the monks of Solesmes arrived on
English soil at Farnborough. It is true to say, however that history has left inseparable bonds between
Farnborough and Solesmes. Their history is incomplete without ours, and our history would be incomplete
without theirs and so Farnborough continues to grow in the soil hallowed and tilled by its French
forebears.
The richest part of this garden is to be found in the teaching of Dom Prosper Guéranger. The monastic
doctrina of the Farnborough community depends much on the doctrina of Dom Delatte and Dom Guéranger. In
gratitude to this massive legacy of wisdom, the Farnborough monks have recently, in collaboration with
communities of the Solesmes Congregation, published the first three volumes of an intended series of
books. This series will introduce much of the corpus of Dom Guéranger’s writings in to the English
speaking domain for the first time, as well as keeping alive the flame of the giants of Farnborough, Dom
Cabrol chief amongst them.
Dom Paul Delatte
The abbacy of Dom Delatte was one of simple trust in God’s providence in the midst of great trials.
Chosen to succeed the successor of Dom Guéranger as Abbot of Solesmes, Dom Delatte presided over a
community banished from its own monastery, and obliged to take refuge in the convent and parish church
for the daily round of monastic prayer. The monks were able to take possession of their abbey again in
1895. This marked the start of a great growth.
New foundations sprang up, of which Farnborough was one. ‘My lovely little Farnborough,’ he wrote,
‘seldom have I seen anything begin with such joy!’On his first visit he was a little afraid of the
Empress. ‘She thinks me a grand sort who travels around in a mitre and crozier!’
Little did he then know that most of his remaining days would be spent on English soil. The Laws of
Associations of 1901 were, in effect, an attack on the religious orders in France and Solesmes moved to the
Isle of Wight until 1922. He himself, on account of age an infirmity, resigned as abbot in 1921. Dom
Delatte’s teaching on the Holy Rule is fundamental to the doctrina of the monks of Farnborough today.
For further information or comments please
contact info@farnboroughabbey.org
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