Edgar DEGAS mourns the loss of his sister Marguerite.

Edgar Degas (1834.1917)

Autograph letter signed to Sophie Niaudet-Berthelot.

Four pages in-8° on mourning paper. Slnd. [Fall 1895]

“I am a hard bachelor, and the loss of children particularly disturbs me. »

Moving letter from Degas lamenting the death of Hélène Berthelot – daughter of Sophie and Marcellin Berthelot – who died at the age of 32. The painter is all the more affected as he has just lost his sister Marguerite who died in Buenos Aires a few weeks earlier.

“ I was waiting, dear madam and friend, for a summons to the funeral of your poor daughter to see you and tell you how much the people there [her brother-in-law – widower – and her nieces exiled in Argentina] and I we took part.

I learned from the Halévys that you preferred secrecy. Nothing that affects our old friends Berthelot can be of little importance to us. And above all the death of a young woman, whom my sister and my nieces knew so well. I am a hard bachelor, and the loss of children particularly disturbs me. It must be awful.

Since Marguerite's death, people write to me more often from there , and now I receive news, newspapers and letters, on Fèvre's project in the competition for the Congress hall. The poor man fires his last cartridges with the same energy and touching confidence. It would be high time that he seriously hurt the attention of these Argentines .

You know their address there, Casilla 1582. A word from you would really touch them. But you are good and faithful enough to have done it before. I shake your hand very affectionately as well as poor Berthelot. Friendships. Degas. »

_________________________________

Sophie Niaudet-Berthelot (1837.1907), niece of Louis Breguet, married Marcellin Berthelot in 1861. Six children were born from this union. Their first daughter, Hélène (1863.1895) was the only one of the siblings not to survive her parents.

Sophie Niaudet-Berthelot was the first woman buried in the Pantheon, where she rests alongside her husband.

_________________________________

Marguerite Degas (1842-1895) was one of her brother Edgar's favorite models. In 1865 she married the architect Henri Fèvre (1828-1900) whom she followed to Buenos Aires in 1889. In a delicate financial situation following bad business, Fèvre hoped for a new start in Argentina.

Marguerite died in Buenos Aires on October 2, 1895, without Degas ever seeing her again.