Comte and Comtesse d'Eu

A carte-de-visite portrait of Gaston d'Orléans (1842-1922), the first son of the duc de Nemours. His full name was Louis Philippe Marie Ferdinand Gaston d'Orléans. He became a military commander and fought in the Spanish-Moroccan War and the War of the Triple Alliance. Gaston was married to Princess Isabel, heiress to the Brazilian imperial throne.

On 15 October 1864 he was married in Rio de Janeiro to Isabel, Princess Imperial of Brazil, the older daughter of the Emperor Pedro II.

She acted as regent of Brazil three times while her father was absent from the country. In 1888 she signed the Golden Law establishing the total abolition of slavery in the Empire. For her pious character and her role in the abolition of slavery in Brazil, Pope Leo XIII bestowed the Golden Rose upon her.

In 1889, the Brazilian military overthrew her father, Pedro II, along with the monarchy, and the imperial family was sent into exile, ending her chance at a permanent succession upon the end of his reign. Nonetheless, after the end of the monarchy, she became the head of the exiled Brazilian Imperial House and de jure Empress of Brazil.

Isabel died on 14 November 1921 while living in Château d'Eu in France. At the time she and her family were preparing to return from exile to Brazil. The comte d’Eu died at sea less than a year later on 28 August 1922.

Photographed by Pacheco of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil.