Claire Clairmont

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Claire Clairmont

Clara Mary Jane Clairmont (April 27, 1798 – March 19, 1879), or Claire Clairmont as she was commonly known, was a stepsister of writer Mary Shelley. She was one of two children of Mary Jane Vial Clairmont and Charles Gaulis Clairmont. It is suspected that Claire’s parents were never married and that her mother had adopted the name Clairmont to disguise the fact that her children were illegitimate.

In December of 1801, Mary Jane Clairmont married William Godwin. Godwin had a daughter, Mary, who just was eight months older than Claire. The two girls would grow to be close and remain in contact with one another throughout the duration of their lives. Claire, like Mary Shelley, was educated at home and influenced by Godwin's radical anarchist philosophical beliefs. Her mother, Mary Jane Vial Clairmont, was well-educated and co-wrote children's primers on Biblical and classical history along with Godwin. But Claire was also a rebellious teenager with a desire to make her own mark on the world.

When her stepsister Mary Shelley ran away with Percy Bysshe Shelley, who professed a belief in free love and left his own wife and two small children to be with Mary, Claire later joined their household and their wanderings across Europe.

Claire is most noted for seducing Lord Byron before he left England in 1816 to live abroad. She wrote to him asking for "career advice" in March 1816, when she was almost eighteen, and later followed up her letters with visits. She then "bombarded him with passionate daily communiques" telling him he need only accept (that which it has long been the passionate wish of my heart to give you.(Benita Eisler, Byron: Child of Passion, Fool of Fame 1999 p. 504.) She arranged for them to meet at a country inn. Byron, in a depressed state after the break-up of his marriage to Annabella Milbanke and scandal over his relationship with his half-sister Augusta Leigh, made it very clear to Claire before he left that she would not be a part of his life. Claire, on the other hand, was determined she would change his mind. She convinced Mary and her husband-to-be, Percy Bysshe Shelley, that they should follow Byron to Switzerland, where they met him and John William Polidori (Byron's personal physician) at the Villa Diodati by Lake Geneva. It is unknown whether or not Claire knew she was pregnant with Byron's child at the commencement of the trip, but it soon became apparent to both her traveling companions and to Byron not long after their arrival at his door. He maintained his refusal of Claire's companionship and only allowed her to be in his presence in the company of the Shelleys, though they resumed their sexual relationship for a time in Switzerland.

Claire was the only lover, other than Caroline Lamb, whom Byron referred to as a "little fiend." (Eisler 1999 p. 515). Confessing the affair in a letter to his half-sister Augusta, Byron wrote "What could I do? -- a foolish girl -- in spite of all I could say or do -- would come after me -- or rather went before me -- for I found her here ... I could not exactly play the Stoic with a woman -- who had scrambled eight hundred miles to unphilosophize me." (Eisler, 1999 p. 519.)

The group left Byron in Switzerland at the end of the summer and returned to England. Claire took up residence in Bath and in January of 1817 she gave birth to a daughter, Alba, whose name was eventually changed to Allegra. The following year, Claire and the Shelleys left England and journeyed once more to Byron, who now resided in Italy. Claire felt that the future Byron could provide for their daughter would be greater than any she herself would be able to grant the child and, therefore, wished to deliver Allegra into his care.

Upon arriving in Italy, Claire was again refused by Byron. He arranged to have Allegra delivered to his house in Venice and agreed to raise the child on the condition that Claire keep her distance from him. Claire reluctantly gave Allegra over to Byron.

It is possible that Claire was also the mother of a daughter fathered by Percy Bysshe Shelley. Elena Adelaide Shelley was born in the Shelley residence on December 27, 1818 in Naples, Italy, and was registered as the daughter of Shelley and a woman named Marina Padurin. There are different theories about the identity of the child's mother. Some scholars have speculated she was Elise Foggi, a nursemaid for the Shelley family, while others believe Elena's mother was Claire. The infant Elena was placed with foster parents and later died on June 10, 1820. (Benita Eisler, Byron: Child of Passion, Fool of Fame 1999: 668)

Clara Allegra Byron

Claire was granted only a few brief visits with her surviving daughter after surrendering her to Byron. When Byron arranged to place her in a Capuchin convent in Bagnacavallo, Italy, Claire was outraged. In 1821, she wrote Byron a letter accusing him of breaking his promise that their daughter would never be apart from one of her parents. She felt that the physical conditions in convents were unhealthy and the education provided was poor and was responsible for "the state of ignorance & profligacy of Italian women, all pupils of Convents. They are bad wives & most unnatural mothers, licentious & ignorant they are the dishonour & unhappiness of society ... This step will procure to you an innumerable addition of enemies & of blame." (Eisler 1999: pgs. 690-691). By March 1822 it had been two years since she had seen her daughter. She plotted to kidnap Allegra from the convent and asked Shelley to forge a letter of permission from Byron. Shelley refused her request. Byron's seemingly callous treatment of the child was further vilified when Allegra died there at age five from a fever some scholars identify as typhus and others speculate was a malarial-type fever. Claire held Byron entirely responsible for the loss of their daughter and hated him for the rest of her life. Percy Bysshe Shelley's death followed only two months later. Devastated, Mary returned to England. She paid for Claire to travel to her brother's home in Vienna where she stayed for a year before relocating to Russia to work as a governess. She returned to England in 1828, but remained there only a short while before departing for Dresden, where she was again employed as a governess.

Claire settled in Paris in the 1840s and traveled often to England. She moved to Florence in 1870 and died there on March 19, 1879, at the age of eighty-one. In her later years she supplemented her income by tutoring students. In her later years she is described as having become very strange. She converted to Roman Catholicism, though she had previously detested the Roman Catholic Church. She even expressed doubts that her daughter had actually died.

Claire also clung to memorabilia of Percy Bysshe Shelley. The Aspern Papers by Henry James is based on the author's attempts to gain ownership of these items. Claire, however, would not part with her keepsakes.