The Tragedy of Mademoiselle Albertina

One hundred and twenty three years ago today, on 21 July 1896, a brave young woman lost in her life in an aerial stunt that should never have been allowed to happen.

I first became aware of the story of Louisa Maud Evans – her nom de theatre was Mademoiselle Albertina – when I lived in Cardiff and was a frequent visitor to nearby Cathays Cemetery. The inscription on her headstone intrigued me:

In memory of Louisa Maud Evans, aged 14 ½ years.

Who met with her death on July 21st 1896.

On that day she ascended in a balloon

from Cardiff, and descended by parachute

into the Bristol Channel. Her body was

found washed ashore near Nash (Mon) on

the 24th of July and was buried

here on the 29th.

To commemorate the sad ending of

a brave young life.

This memorial was erected by public subscription.

“Requiescat in Pace”   [presumably rest in peace]

‘Brave woman, yet in years a child

Dark death closed here they heavenward flight

God grant thee, pure and undefiled

To reach at last the light of light.’

I read an account of her death in the booklet Cathays Cemetery Cardiff on its 150th Anniversary, produced by the Friends of Cathays Cemetery in 2009, but it wasn’t until I read the contemporary newspaper reports that the real horror of Louie’s death was brought home to me.

Sketch of Louie Evans (left), South Wales Echo, 27 July 1896, and sketch of Louie with her foster parents (right),
Cardiff Times, 1 August 1896

This was a very public spectacle, an ascent by balloon followed by a descent by parachute, one of the many entertainments that accompanied the six-month run of the 1896 Cardiff Industrial and Maritime Exhibition. Long story short, Louisa (Louie) Maud Evans had been engaged by her foster parents the Crinks to work as a domestic servant for the manager of a circus and, perhaps craving a taste of the excitement she saw in that environment, became involved with Auguste Gaudron, a Frenchman who entertained the crowds with balloon stunts, often performed by young women.

Evening Express, 24 July 1896 and 22 July 1896

On 21 July, despite never having performed this stunt previously, Louie was dressed in a sailor suit, with a cork life vest for safety, and hoisted several thousand feet into the air, while hanging by ropes from a smoke-filled balloon. At a pre-arranged place, she was meant to detach herself from the balloon, parachute safely to earth, be collected by a horse and carriage, and driven back to much applause from the huge crowd at the exhibition. But it all went horribly wrong.

South Wales Echo, 22 July 1896

This ‘graphic interview with a boat-man’ was reported the next day in the Evening Express:

James Ware, boatman at the Pier-head, states: A little after eight o'clock on Monday I was standing on the East Moors, just above the signal box. I followed the course of the parachutist right from above the Exhibition to the moment she entered the water. I had with me an excellent pair of marine glasses and was able to distinctly follow every movement of the parachutist. A little while after it struck the water, the parachute remained extended above, and appeared to be keeping the young aeronaut up, but after two or at the most three minutes, it slowly toppled over in a northerly direction, and disappeared altogether. I saw no vessel near enough to pick her up, and I am sorry to have to say that in my opinion no boat did rescue the unfortunate lady ...

Gaudron denied that such an accident was possible: ‘it is an emphatical impossibility for the parachute to topple sideways’ and ‘it is utterly and completely impossible for anyone to sink when equipped with a lifebelt such as Mdlle. Albertina wore’. When asked how he had become acquainted with Louie, he replied: “I advertised for a young lady for balloon work, and she applied. I think she had been doing some public performances before somewhere. She first went up in a captive balloon with me at Dublin, and eventually started parachuting in Cornwall, at Redruth. Last night's ascent made the sixth. She has never fallen in the sea before, but was a good swimmer.” Sadly, none of Gaudron’s statements was true.

For several days, men in boats searched the waters off Cardiff for any sign of the poor young woman, and the newspapers were full of stories about the accident, Louie’s disappearance, and speculation as to whether or not she would be found alive. Sadly, she was not. On 25 July, the Evening Express was one of the first newspapers to report that Louie’s body had been found.

South Wales Echo, 27 July 1896

The body of Mdlle. Albertina was recovered about twelve o'clock last night at Nash, near Newport. It had been reported at an earlier hour at Goldcliffe that the body had been seen on the seashore at Nash, and a number of men set off with a view to the recovery of it ... They found that the body was that of the lost parachutist by her dress. The police were afterwards communicated with, and in the early hours of this (Saturday) morning the body was removed to the belfry of Nash Church. It bore no marks of violence, and there were no traces of the lost parachute to be seen, but the hooks for attaching the parachutist to the parachute were still fastened to the dress at the shoulders.

There was also a rather gruesome description of the body, which a reporter had travelled to Nash Church to view, and of the ‘excitement’ the news had caused in Cardiff. The inquest, held two days later, returned the following verdict (Evening Express, 27 July 1896):

The jury consulted in private, and returned the following verdict: "That deceased was accidentally drowned in the Bristol Channel on Tuesday last, whilst descending from a balloon," and the foreman, addressing the coroner, stated that the jury were unanimously of opinion that M. Gaudron displayed great carelessness and want of judgment in allowing so young and inexperienced a person to make a descent during such weather as prevailed on Tuesday last, and that they wished to censure him and caution him against allowing such a thing to occur again.

Evening Express, 25 July 1896

The newspaper also reported about Louie’s funeral:

Strong feeling has been manifested that the body of the unfortunate parachutist should be buried at Cardiff, and many offers of subscriptions towards the funeral expenses have been forthcoming. We understand, however, that Mr. Webster, on behalf of the Concessions Company, Cardiff Exhibition, by whom M Gaudron was employed, has undertaken to defray the expenses of the burial of the unfortunate girl. This clears the way for the devotion of the money subscribed by the public to the erection of a memorial tablet over the grave on which shall be inscribed an account of the poor girl's tragic death.

And so it was that on 3 December 1896 the South Wales Daily News reported:

IN MEMORY OF MDLLE. ALBERTINA.
THE ILL-FATED PARACHUTIST.
HEADSTONE IN CARDIFF CEMETERY
During the six months run of the Cardiff exhibition of 1896 there was one untoward incident which marred an otherwise clean sheet. This was the lamentable occurrence by which the so-called Mdlle. Albertina met an awful death in making a parachute descent. The fact that this was her first attempt—although quite unknown at the time to the organisers of the affair—taken in conjunction with her tender age—she was but 14—served to excite an intensity of public interest in Cardiff and the neighbourhood that has rarely, If ever, been paralleled. Nor was the excitement confined to this neighbourhood. The circumstances attracted the attention of Baroness Burdett-Coutts, who, wrote a long letter to the Times condemning such performances. The non recovery of the body of the poor girl for two or three days also contributed to the anxious excitement of the many thousands who had witnessed the aerial descent and of others and it was only after the corpse bad been washed up by the tide on the Nash side of the Usk mouth and the Coroner's 'quest had been duly held that public excitement became in some degree allayed. The peculiarly distressing circumstances, however, of the death of Louisa Maud Evans, whose nom de theatre, Mdlle. Albertina, was assumed by her once and once only, had stirred the warm sympathies of not a few Cardiff people, who determined that the girl's final resting-place in their midst should be marked with some suitable memorial. Thus, then, it happens that a handsome stone has been recently set up at the Cardiff Cemetery which shall serve to recall, for generations to come it may be, one of the most heartrending occurrences associated with the town of Cardiff. The preparation of the headstone was entrusted to Mr Button, sculptor, Neville-street, and his work has been excellently done.