MARIE ANNE PÉRICHON DE VANDEUIL AND SANTIAGO DE LINIERS

Fi-Fiuuuuuuu, what a girl! 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, accelerated the pulse of the gentlemen and made the Creole ladies envious. She was soon accused of being a "man-eater", a smuggler and a spy. And the final straw came when Viceroy Liniers lost his head over her, and one of the most talked-about soap operas of the English Invasions began.

Marie Anne Périchon de Vandeuil, better known as Anita Perichon or "la Perichona", was born in 1775 on the island of Bourbon (today "La Réunion" in the Mascarene Archipelago), a former French possession in the Indian Ocean. She belonged to an elite French colonial family and married Thomas O'Gorman, an Irish officer in French service, at a very young age. In 1797, the family settled in Buenos Aires, where Thomas's uncle, the physician 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 pomp", as they said at the time, and while Ana's father failed in his attempt to become a fazendeiro in Brazil, O'Gorman Spanishised his name as Tomás and acquired fields in the outskirts of Buenos Aires.

Don Tomás' life became more complicated after the English Invasions, as he was imprisoned in Luján after the reconquest for collaborating with the enemy, and when he insisted on offering his services to the invaders in 1807, he had to seek refuge in Rio de Janeiro. His wife, Anita, remained in Buenos Aires, where she became the lover of the "hero of the day" and new strongman in Buenos Aires, Santiago de Liniers, who became viceroy by decision of the "neighbours". Historian Vicente Fidel López points out that her previous lover had been none other than General Beresford, leader of the first English invasion. This gave rise to the suspicions, which were to accompany her for most of her life, about her espionage on behalf of the English.

According to Paul Groussac, while Liniers was advancing at the head of his column, on 12 August 1806, when he reached San Nicolás Street - today's Corrientes Avenue - someone threw an embroidered and perfumed handkerchief at his feet as a tribute to the victor. Liniers picked it up with the tip of his sword, and when he returned the greeting with the handkerchief held high, he caught sight of the beautiful Anita, and from that moment on, a very fiery relationship began. The relationship between "Madama O'Gorman" and Liniers was the scandal of the city in those days. Partly 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" took up residence in Liniers' house and moved around with an escort, and to the horror of the ladies of Buenos Aires she even wore a military uniform and rode around on horseback.

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

According to a Portuguese government spy, the woman "can do anything she likes about her spirit" and was the "adoptable channel for directing the will" of the viceroy. The rumour was that, through her, excellent business was being conducted, thanks to official favour, which was nothing new in the colony, but in these troubled times and with the treasury exhausted, it became more evident.

The situation became more than complicated when Napoleon decided to take over Spain and enthroned his brother Joseph. The fact that both Liniers and "Madama Perichón" were French put them in the crosshairs of the attacks. The wealthy Spanish merchant and head of the Cabildo, Martín de Álzaga, saw an opportunity to get rid of the "Frenchman", and in October 1808 he had an official letter from the Cabildo to the Supreme Central Junta which read: "That woman with whom the viceroy lives maintains a friendship that is a scandal to the people, who does not go out without an escort, who has a guard at home day and night, who employs the service troops in the work of her country estate, where the viceroy spends his days, whose communication neither the insinuations nor the advice of the authorities, nor the whispering 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 no thing, however unjust, that is not attained and achieved through her. She is a very powerful agent with her, and money is a very powerful agent with her. In nothing does she tremble, and thus we see monstrosities in command, disorders upon disorders transcendental to 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 of the rather staid Porteño society of the time was the intention of Liniers' daughter to marry Anita's younger brother, Juan Bautista Perichón. The viceroy, putting aside his amorous passions and trying to defend his "good name and honour", accused his mistress of gathering conspirators in the gatherings at his house, made her embark and expelled her to Rio de Janeiro to join her husband. By then, the Portuguese court had been installed by their British allies in Brazil, fleeing the Napoleonic invasion, and was at the centre of the intrigues of Princess Carlota Joaquina de Borbón, sister of King Ferdinand VII and wife of the Prince Regent of Portugal. It should be remembered that Carlota aspired to rule the American colonies as regent for the duration of the "captivity" of her "royal brother", Napoleon's VIP prisoner in the French palace of Valençay.

At her home in Rio de Janeiro, Anita Perichón de O'Gorman continued her gatherings, where various Rio de Janeiro, British and Portuguese conspirators met. Legend has it that her new protector and lover was none other than Lord Strangford, the British representative to the Portuguese court in Rio; as one would say in more recent times, one of the main "political operators" of the whole process underway in South America and, above all, the staunchest opponent of Princess Carlota's plans to become mistress of the situation. As it was, Dona Carlota decided that she herself was more than enough to "intrigue" on the beaches of Rio de Janeiro, and in 1809 she decided to expel Dona Anita.

Presas, Carlota's secretary, recounts in his "Secret Memoirs" that the princess initially asked him to draw up a list of conspirators, which included Madame Perichon. He took pity on Anita and recounts: "I immediately drew up the details and circumstances that the princess asked for; but I omitted to include Perichon in it, because there is nothing worse for any person than to start writing about her in such matters. As H. A. was reading the list, she noticed that the name of the one she particularly wanted to be sought for was missing. - And why," she said to me, "is the Périchon not here? -Because this woman is not mixed up in such business, and her situation is so unhappy in the day, that it is more worthy that Your Grace should pity her, than that we should add to her affliction. - Hullo," he replied, "you seem to be a protector of good wenches. -Madam, I am a man; but I have never spoken to this one in my life, and if her being a good girl on this occasion does not favour her, neither should it harm her, there being no certain cause to proceed against her, and above all, Your Majesty may do as you please. Presas concludes: "It is not easy to explain the hatred and hatred with which ugly women regard beautiful women, a defect from which not even the princesses themselves are exempt".

Anita was finally deported and put on board an English ship, but the Spanish authorities in Montevideo and Buenos Aires, led by Viceroy Cisneros, refused her permission to disembark. It was not until after the May Revolution that the Junta decreed that "Madame O'Gorman could go ashore on condition that she did not settle in the centre of the city, but on the farm of La Matanza, where she was to keep circumspection and seclusion".

There, the frenetic entertainer of the Buenos Aires and São Paulo gatherings spent the last thirty years of her life in virtual seclusion. The news she received was not generally stimulating, since from her stay in La Matanza she had to learn of two executions of people close to her: the former Viceroy Santiago de Liniers, her former lover, and Camila O'Gorman, her granddaughter and heiress of her rebellious spirit. Something all 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; agencianova.com; elsoldesantelmo.com.ar; pressreader.com