HENSLER, Eliza [HENSLER, Elise Fredrika] (b La Chaux de Fonds, Switzerland, 22 May 1836; d St Marta Palace, Lisbon, 21 May 1929)
The American-bred soprano Eliza Hensler had only a short, if pleasing, career as a singer, but she is perhaps (give or take Emilie Ambre) the only Victorian vocalist to have become something near to a regular royal Queen in real life.
Miss Hensler was born in Switzerland in 1836. Given the royally-coloured place she was to find in life, her personal details have been minutely recorded by historians, but unfortunately they have been recorded in divergent versions. I think I have, modestly, to leave it to the genealogists of the Portuguese royal family (into which she married) to work out whether her Christian names were Elise or Elisa, Fredrika, Frederica or Friederike, whether her father’s name was Jean/Johann Conrad Hensler or Friedrich Conrad Hensler (born ?Baden, Germany, ?26 June 1811), and whether her mother was née Josefa Hechelbacher or Elizabeth or Lizette or Louise Lörchner or Lörtscher. You would really think that even a morganatic Queen would have that sort of detail carved in stone, wouldn’t you. But no. Some ‘reference works’ even have her born in Vienna, others describe her as a ballerina and an actress. So much for ‘fact’.
The Henslers reportedly left Switzerland for Massachusetts when Eliza (as she was later known) was two. So I ought to be able to find them in the American censi of 1840 and 1850, but I can’t. (This could have something to do with the fact that Eliza’s younger sister is reported to have been born in Neuchatel on 19 June 1838, and always said she came to America aged six). My first official sightings of the Henslers are, in fact, on 7 June 1855 when Conrad Hensler, 43, and Elise Hensler 19, return to America on a ship from Europe. The following year, Elise took out her own passport (as ‘Elise F’), but the application form tells us only that she was 5ft 5ins with brown hair and hazel eyes and father is again listed as plain Conrad.
Trivial note: sister Mina Louise (note the Louise) christened one of her multitude of children ‘Fredrika’, so I think ‘Elise Fredrika’ is probably right. She also said her parents were both born in Switzerland and, as above, that the family came to America in 1844. I suppose its of minimal importance, but one does like to get these ‘facts’ right. Maybe, in fact, all these things are got right in a biography of Elise, A Contessa d’Edla written by Teresa Rebelo and published by Editorial Atheneia (ISBN 989 622 031X), but maybe not.
Father has been said to have been ‘a respectable mechanic’, ‘a shoemaker’, ‘a well-educated political refugee’ but most commonly, and doubtless correctly, a tailor. A bundle of addresses for his tailoring business have been suggested and one decidedly precise one has him working in 1851 as a cutter for Messrs Clapp and Gavitt at the corner of Beacon and Tremont, Boston, before setting up in partnership as ‘Hensler and Grothusen’. Unfortunately that same precise piece calls him ‘Adolph Hensler’, but the firm of Gustav A Grothusen and Conrad Hensler, tailors, of 32 Carver Street was (in 1852) a Boston fact, as was that of George P Clapp and George B Gavett of precisely the address given, so the Adolph has clearly to be forgiven.
Elise is said to have been discovered (‘attracted in the streets by the rare voice of the young girl …’) by a Springfield singing teacher and former tenor by the name of Guidi (d Albany 1857), and one Thomas Ball, singer turned sculptor, told many years later in the press how he visited Guidi’s studio in Springfield to hear the ‘seventeen or eighteen year old girl’ (she would have been younger) sing. ‘Her parents being in modest circumstances’, he recommended her to get a church choir position and was instrumental in having her engaged at the King’s Chapel, on Tremont and School, where she featured in the quartet with Ball, Julia Weston and Dr Derby. It was the churchgoers, he said, who subscribed to send their soprano to Europe.
Elise can be spotted (8 January 1853) singing in Boston with the Germania Musical Society, who also proposed to mount a Benefit to allow her to go overseas. She was gone in a matter of weeks.
Another version has her studying with a Signor Corelli, singing at Park Street Church, studying at Emerson School, and so forth, but the picture seems to be that the Henslers spent time in Boston and in Springfield (1848-1851), until the early 1850s when Conrad dissolved his tailoring firm and, in 1853, took his daughter off to Europe.
The Henslers went first to Paris, where Elise attended the Conservatoire for a few months, and studied with the elderly G-M Bordogni. It is refreshing to see it reported that she was awarded a ‘deuxième prix’ (most 2èmes have a habit of transforming into 1ers on contact with a newspaper), or, more correctly, a ‘deuxième accessit’ in 1853. From Paris, they continued, in 1854, to Florence and Milan, and Miss Hensler’s name appears in the newsletters sent back to Dwight’s Magazine in Boston by a fellow student, Harrison Millard.
It also appears, in the same year, listed with those of Augusta Albertini and Giuseppe Sinico in the listings for Milan’s Teatro della Canobbiana. This seems to be an error, for the two ladies were indeed at Milan, but both were engaged, alongside Giulia Sanchioli and Catherine Goldberg-Strossi, as prime donne for the season at La Scala.
Neither history nor ‘history’ relates how the nineteen year-old American netted an engagement in such company, but wheels evidently had turned. The name of Prince Poniatowski is mentioned, above all in the extravagant correspondence sent back to America by Boston journalist Frank Boott Goodrich, who also indulged in violent tales of jealous prima donna rivalry (one-sided, of course) on the part of Albertini. Why a proven dramatic soprano of Albertini’s status should have bothered about a pretty, teenaged light soprano is not explained, but Goodrich (‘Dick Tinto’), who spends lines and lines describing the appealing Hensler physique, the success of the girl apparently surnamed ‘l’Americana’ at ‘a private party near Como’, the fact that she was paid a considerable salary rather than paying for the privilege of debuting, as was common, and who hailed her debut as ‘the first notable operatic entertainment offered by an American in Europe’ (rather stigmatising Albertini as ‘an Englishwoman’), was seemingly being a little more than just patriotically supportive. He continued to rail in print at Albertini when the La Scala season was over.
But the fact remains that the La Scala debut of Elise Hensler (December 1854) was a success. Not an earth-shaking success, but the kind of success, as one journalist wrote, that about one debutante in twenty scores in Italy. The vehicle of the occasion was Linda di Chamonix, and the circumstances apparently not propitious: the performance was postponed for theatrical reasons and then Conrad Hensler suffered a stroke. The papers printed ‘a private letter’ in which Miss Hensler expressed herself as having to go on and sing whilst crying for her father. The debutante was considered to have too small a voice for the auditorium, but her pretty, well-trained, accurate voice and charming appearance won through, and ‘la gentilla Hensler’ was a success.
The Scala season continued with Albertini in Trovatore, with Sanchioli in La Vestale and Miss Hensler was scheduled to sing La Sonnambula or Berta in Il Profeta, but I don’t think she did. By May, the Henslers (and Goodrich) were in Paris, and on 7 June 1855 – accompanied by suitable publicity -- they were back in America. Not, it was stressed, for professional reasons (the extended contract, which Goodrich related had been offered to her by La Scala, he said, had been rejected and the present one terminated), but for personal ones.
Nine days later, 16 June 1855, Elise Hensler made her American debut in Linda di Chamonix, playing alongside Brignoli, Bardiali, Rocco and Felicia Vestvali, at New York’s Academy of Music, manager W H Paine, musical director Max Maretzek,
Mr Maretzek, in his autobiographical Sharps and Flats tells of the poorly-dressed, brown-eyes lass who auditioned for the chorus … ah, memoirs! We, of course, know that Elise Hensler’s eyes were hazel. Mr Maretzek was obviously not the moving force behind the sudden acquisition of Miss Hensler for the company, but he ought to have remembered the circumstances better for, in order to allow Elise to debut, Maretzek’s Benefit was postponed for two days. And when it went on (18 June), Miss Hensler sang an act of Linda in it.
Once again, Miss Hensler’s debut was successful. Once again, it caused no great stir, but it was voted agreeable, pleasant and effective and the New York Times, rather less blinded than Mr Goodrich, reported acutely: ‘The quality of Miss Hensler’s voice is sympathetic and sweet. It does not command admiration but beseeches it…’ continuing ‘Her method is the pure Italian, and as far as it goes, admirable…’ and sagely concluding that Miss Hensler would, with experience, be a fine operatic vocalist.
Elise spent the next months in occasional concert, beginning 20 June at Boston and following up in her ‘old home town’ of Springfield, in Nahant and in Newport, with her sister [Mina] Louise in support. She is, reported the music press, ‘the protégée of a refined set of Bostonians’ with ‘a voice of virgin sweetness and delicacy’, and moreover ‘the only American prima donna except Biscaccianti who has been liked in Europe’. Hum. Well, we won't go into that!
When the next season of opera opened at the Academy of Music, Miss Hensler was engaged, alongside Anna Lagrange as prima donna. She gave her Linda di Chamonix (and sang ‘Hail, Columbia’ in the interval), she sang Elvira to the Masaniello of Brignoli (‘a quiet and genuine success’, ‘A gentle freshness and purity added to much executive power’, ‘an able impersonation’), she was Adalgisa to the Norma of Lagrange and Berthe to her Fidès in Le Prophète (‘admirable acquittal of difficult business’), and when Don Giovanni was produced at the end of the season she sang Elvira to the Anna of Lagrange, the Zerlina of Nantier-Didiée, the Don of Morrelli and the Leporello of Rovere. ‘Her singing was very sweet but she did not seem to be wholly conversant with her part’, reported the New York Times. But the verdict on Miss Hensler was decidedly positive -- ‘a fair debutante for whom this engagement is, we are sure, but the preface to a charming career ...’, ‘one of the most promising of her age we have ever seen’ (Putnam’s Magazine) – even although it was generally recognised that her voice as yet lacked strength and ‘its greatest charm at present is its freshness’.
The company then went on the road, where Miss Hensler’s roles included Elvira in I Puritani, and returned for a further season in New York, during which Arditi’s opera La Spia (24 March 1856) was given its premiere. Brignoli played the title role, Lagrange his mother, and Elise was Francesca, the jeune premiere. La Spia did not make a mark.
When the opera ended, and Mr Paine retired to restock his vaults, Elise Hensler returned to Boston. In May 1856 she can be seen singing there in concert with Millard and Adelaide Phillipps. A few days later she set sail for Italy.
She seems, however, to have stopped off in Paris, for it is there that I spot her next, in June 1857, singing at a concert given by the Sicilian violinist Nicosia. A compatriot with a pen described her as ‘an American who dresses like a Parisienne, pronounces like a Sienese, and sings like a Neapolitan’. She gave, he reported, ‘Caro nome’ and ‘Qui la voce’ ‘with exquisite taste and unimpeachable precision, and above all with immense success’.
In August, she is still in Paris, for she can be seen giving her ‘Caro nome’ at a concert given by a wealthy young American by the name of Hill, alongside a newer American soprano, Cora de Wilhorst.
In November 1857 she opened a season at the Teatro San Benedetto in Venice, singing opposite the tenor Carrion in Moise and La Sonnambula, and Gilda to the Rigoletto of Varesi. ‘Beautiful and sympathetic, very interesting in passages where sentiment predominates, full of dignity and grace, Miss Hensler adds to all those qualities a charming voice of the nightingale…’ the French press reported, expressing at the same time a longing to see her in La Traviata (‘she would die beautifully’).
From Venice, she continued to the Carlo Felice in Genoa, where she shared the soprano roles over Carnevale with Antoninetta Montenegro, and, indeed, appeared in La Traviata alongside delle Sedie. While her singing was much appreciated her acting was found ‘cold and unimpassioned’.
In April 1858 she was back in Paris, heading for Vienna (26 performances, Rigoletto, Cherubino, Dorabella in Cosi fan tutte, Adalgisa), later in the year at the Teatro Mauroner in Trieste and Verona for Merelli (La Sonnambula, Moise), but then I lose track of her until autumn 1859, when she apparently arrived in Portugal as the member of what seems to have been a rather insignificant touring opera troupe. I pick her up in March of 1860, when she is engaged at Lisbon’s Teatro San Carlo, alongside prime donne Marcellina Lotti della Santa and Fortunata Tedesco, and singing Isabella in Robert le diable and Oscar in Ballo in maschera. She had apparently made her first appearance there the previous month in Le Prophète, and also played La Traviata. Her reviews were the same as ever: ‘charmante ... elle a une petite voix mais elle s’en sert avec gout et elle chante juste’. Correct, in tune, charming … if not exactly voluminous. But volume alongside Lotti and Tedesco would have been de trop.
Lisbon is where the story of Elise Hensler, Victorian vocalist, comes to an end. It was not just the press and public who found her ‘charmante’: Miss Hensler attracted the attention of ‘Dom Fernando’, Ferdinand [Augustus Francis Anthony] of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha (b 29 October 1816), the consort of the late Queen of Portugal, Maria II (d 15 November 1853), father of her seven children, and regent of the country.
A great deal has been written about their relationship: suffice it that in 1869 Elise Hensler, well and truly retired from the stage and created Countess d’Edla, became the morganatic wife of Ferdinand. He died in 1885, and she lived on – apparently shunning contact – till the age of 93, when she died in her Palace in Lisbon.
Needless to say, the tale of the girl from Boston who ‘was almost Queen of Spain’ has been often put onto paper, with more or less care for facts and more or less enjoyment of fictions.
It is insisted, from time to time, that Elise travelled with her mother. But mother remains a shadowy figure and, like father, what became of her is not recorded. Certainly, on some occasions when it is insisted that ‘mother came too’, she didn’t.
Elsewhere, she is credited with a busy sex life, and the mothering of a number of children. One source mentions two sons by one Miguel Angelo Pereira. And then there is Alice Hensler (Mme Manuel de Acevedo Gomez): allegedly the daughter of Ferdinand and Elise. Or not. But also allegedly born in Paris 25 December 1855 or was it 1856, four or five years before the two are supposed to have become coup-de-foudre acquainted. In 1855, Elise Hensler was, in any case, not in Paris, but singing in concert at the Boston Music Hall (22 December 1855). Maybe 1856? Oh dear, for an almost royal person, Elise Hensler and her family details seem to have been drolly inaccurately recorded.
One person whose personal details are well documented, however, is Elise’s sister, [Mina] Louise, who sang with her in concert in Boston days. Louise married Dr Daniel Denison Slade (27 May 1856), and mothered eleven children, amongst whom the painter Conrad Hensler Slade (1871-1949).
Elise Hensler lived through the whole of the Victorian period and, indeed, married Queen Victoria’s cousin, so although she was a vocalist for but a handful of years, she probably deserves to fill five pages of this article.
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