MARIE ANNE PÉRICHON DE VANDEUIL AND SANTIAGO DE LINIERS

Fi-Fiuuuuu, what a mine! The porteños of colonial Buenos Aires would have exclaimed – if they could – when they saw the dazzling and volcanic Perichon arrive. The beauty of this woman, her charming conversation with an exotic accent and marked sensuality, quickened the pulse of the gentlemen and ignited the envy of the Creole ladies. Very soon she was accused of being a "man-eater", a smuggler and a spy. And the last straw was when Viceroy Liniers lost his head over her, and one of the most talked about soap operas of the time of the English Invasions began.

Marie Anne Périchon de Vandeuil, better known as Anita Perichón or “la Perichona”, was born in 1775 on Bourbon Island (today “La Réunion” in the Mascarene Archipelago), a former French possession located in the Indian Ocean. She belonged to a family of the French colonial elite and at a very young age she married an Irish officer in the service of France, Thomas O'Gorman. In 1797, the family settled in Buenos Aires, where Thomas' uncle, the doctor Miguel O'Gorman, creator of the Protomedicato, the institution in charge of regulating health practices in the colony, was already established. They arrived with “great pageantry”, as it was said at the time, and while Ana's father failed in his attempt to become a farmer in Brazil, O'Gorman castilianized his name as Tomás and acquired fields in the outskirts of Buenos Aires.

The life of Don Tomás became complicated after the English invasions, since for collaborating with the enemy he was imprisoned in Luján after the reconquest and, by insisting on offering his services to the invader in 1807, he had to seek refuge in Rio de Janeiro . His wife, Anita, stayed in Buenos Aires, where she became the lover of the “hero of the day” and the new strong man in Buenos Aires, Santiago de Liniers, who became viceroy by decision of the “neighbors”. Historian Vicente Fidel López points out that her previous lover had been none other than General Beresford, head of the first English invasion. There the suspicions were born, which will accompany her for a large part of her life, about her espionage in favor of the English.

According to what Paul Groussac tells us, while Liniers was advancing at the head of his column, on August 12, 1806, when he reached Calle de San Nicolás -now Corrientes Avenue- someone threw an embroidered and perfumed handkerchief at his feet as a tribute to the victor. . Liniers picked it up with the point of his sword, and when he answered the greeting with his handkerchief raised, he was able to see the beautiful Anita and from that moment a very fiery relationship began. The relations between "Madama O'Gorman" and Liniers were the scandal of the city in those days. In part, because at 31 she was no longer considered a young lady in those days and a "lady" was supposed to be much more discreet. The informal “virreina” settled in the Liniers house and moved with an escort, and to the horror of the Buenos Aires ladies, she even wore a military uniform and rode horseback.

The nickname of Perichona, obviously referring to her last name, was associated at that time with María Michaela Villegas y Hurtado, a notable actress from Lima who, in addition to her great talent, became famous for her love affairs with the Viceroy of Peru, Don Manuel de Amat y Juniet. , Knight of the Order of Saint John. The adjective was somewhat insulting because it derived from "bitch" and "chola". For his part, Liniers preferred to call it “La Petaquita”.

According to a Portuguese government spy, the woman "can do whatever she wants over his spirit" and was the "adoptable channel to direct the will" of the viceroy. The open rumor was that, through him, excellent business was carried out, thanks to official favour; something that was nothing new in the colony, but that in those troubled times and with the exhausted treasury became more evident.

The situation became more than complicated when Napoleon decided to seize Spain and enthrone his brother José. The French condition of both Liniers and "Madama Perichón" put them in the crosshairs of the attacks. The rich Spanish merchant and head of the Cabildo, Martín de Álzaga, saw the opportunity arrive to get rid of the "Frenchman", and in October 1808 he had an official letter drawn up by the Cabildo to the Central Supreme Board in which it was read: "That woman with Whoever lives in the viceroy maintains a friendship that is a scandal among the people, who does not go out without an escort, who has guard at home day and night, who employs the service troops in the work of his country estate, where he spends his days. Viceroy, whose communication neither the insinuations nor the advice of the authorities, nor the whispers nor the shouts of the people have been able to cut off, that woman, in short, despised and criminal for all her circumstances, is the arbiter of the government and even of our fate . There is nothing, however unfair it may be, that is not reached and achieved through him. The commitment and money are very powerful agents with her. Not fearful at all, and thus monstrosities in command are seen, disorders upon transcendental disorders among the people themselves, in whom the magistrates cannot administer justice because their conduct is excused”.

The straw that broke the rather small camel's back in the timid Buenos Aires society of the time was the intention of Liniers' daughter to marry Anita's younger brother, Juan Bautista Perichón. The viceroy, putting aside his love passions and trying to defend his "good name and honor" accused his lover of bringing together conspirators in gatherings at his house, made her embark and expelled her to Rio de Janeiro, to meet with her husband. By then, the Portuguese court had been installed by its British allies in Brazil, fleeing from the Napoleonic invasion, and was the center of the intrigues carried out by Princess Carlota Joaquina de Borbón, sister of King Ferdinand VII and wife of the Prince Regent of Portugal. . Let us remember that Carlota aspired to govern the American colonies as regent while the "captivity" of her "royal brother" lasted, a VIP prisoner of Napoleon in the French palace of Valençay.

In her house in Rio de Janeiro, Anita Perichón de O'Gorman continued with her gatherings, where different conspirators from the River Plate, British and Portuguese met. Legend has it that her new protector and lover was none other than Lord Strangford, the British representative before the Portuguese court in Rio; as would be said in more recent times, one of the main "political operators" of the entire process underway in South America and, above all, the staunchest opponent of Princess Carlota's plans to see herself master of the situation. Thus, Doña Carlota decided that for "intriguing" on the Rio beaches with herself it was more than enough, and in 1809 she decided to expel Doña Anita.

Presas, Carlota's secretary, recounts in his "Secret Memories" that at first the princess asked him to make a list of conspirators in which Madame Perichón could not be missing. He took pity on Anita and recounted: “I formed at the moment with the details and circumstances that the princess requested; but I omitted to put Périchon in it, because there is nothing worse for any person who begins to write about her in similar matters. At the time of reading SA the list, she noticed that the name of the one she wanted to be searched for was missing. "And why," he said to me, "isn't Périchon here?" –Because this woman does not get mixed up in such business, and her situation is so unfortunate today, that it is more worthy that VA R take pity on her, than that we increase her affliction. - Hello! –he replied-, it seems that you are a protector of the good girls. –Lady, I am a man; but I have spoken to her in life, and if being a good girl on this occasion does not favor her, it should not harm her either, since there is no certain cause to proceed against her, and above all VA will be able to do what she likes”. Presas concludes: "It is not easy to explain the hatred and disgust with which ugly women look at beautiful ones, a defect from which not even the princesses themselves are exempt."

Finally, Anita was deported and embarked on an English ship, but the Spanish authorities in Montevideo and Buenos Aires, led by Viceroy Cisneros, denied her permission to disembark. Just after the May Revolution, the Junta decreed that "Madame O'Gorman could go ashore on the condition that she not establish herself in the center of the city, but on the farm of La Matanza, where she should keep circumspection and seclusion. ”.

There, the frenetic entertainer of Buenos Aires and São Paulo gatherings spent the last thirty years of her life practically confined. The news he received was not generally encouraging, since since his stay in La Matanza he must have learned of two executions of people close to him: the former Viceroy Santiago de Liniers, his former lover, and Camila O'Gorman, his granddaughter and heiress. of his rebellious spirit. Something too dangerous in a society where freedom has always been a quality that arouses suspicion and sanctions.

Compilation of texts and images: elhistoriador.com.ar; agencynova.com; elsoldesantelmo.com.ar; pressreader.com