Editing Susan May Williams

{{Short description|American heiress}}
{{Infobox royalty
| name = Susan May Williams
| image = Susan May (Williams) Bonaparte.jpg
| caption = portrait by [[George D'Almaine]]
| birth_date = {{birth date|1812|4|2}}
| birth_place = 
| death_date = {{death date and age|1881|9|15|1812|4|2}}
| death_place = 
| house = 
| spouse = {{marriage|[[Jérôme Napoléon Bonaparte]]|1829|1870|end=d.}}
| issue = [[Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte II]]<br>[[Charles Joseph Bonaparte]]
| father = Benjamin Williams
| mother = Sarah Copeland
}}
'''Susan May Williams Bonaparte''' (April 2, 1812 &ndash; September 15, 1881) was an American heiress and the wife of [[Jérôme Napoléon Bonaparte]], a French-American nephew of [[Napoléon Bonaparte|Napoléon I, Emperor of France]] and a Baltimore lawyer and landowner.  

==Biography==
Susan was the daughter of Benjamin Williams, a native of [[Roxbury, Massachusetts]], who became a prominent [[Baltimore, Maryland|Baltimore]] merchant; and his wife, Sarah Copeland, widow of Nathaniel Morton. In 1827, Williams helped found the [[Baltimore and Ohio Railroad]], the first railroad company in the United States, in response to the opening of the [[Erie Canal]] and its competition with the port of Baltimore.

In November 1829, Susan married Jérôme Napoleon Bonaparte-Patterson, the son of [[Elizabeth Patterson Bonaparte|Elizabeth Patterson]], an American socialite, and [[Jérôme Bonaparte]]; their marriage had been annulled after three years on the orders of Napoléon himself so that his brother could make a more advantageous marriage.<ref name="Stephens2010">{{cite book|author=Gail Stephens|title=Shadow of Shiloh: Major General Lew Wallace in the Civil War|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5PphAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA178|year=2010|publisher=Indiana Historical Society|isbn=978-0-87195-287-5|pages=178–}}</ref> Jérôme Napoleon-Patterson, who had graduated from Harvard but found he preferred raising horses to working in law, soon became interested in Susan and the $200,000 fortune she had inherited. According to his uncle Henry Patterson, the match was purely mercenary on Bonaparte's part. The groom's maternal grandfather, [[William Patterson (Maryland businessman)|William Patterson]], one of the wealthiest men in [[Maryland]], made the financial arrangements for the marriage and gave the couple [[Montrose Mansion and Chapel|Montrose Mansion]] as a wedding gift.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://msa.maryland.gov/megafile/msa/stagsere/se1/se5/004000/004100/004190/pdf/msa_se5_4190.pdf|title=Maryland State Archives, Montrose Mansion and Chapel|access-date=February 25, 2013}}</ref> Their wedding was conducted in secret behind the back of his mother, who was away in Europe at the time and hoping for an aristocratic match for her son; Susan and Elizabeth Patterson Bonaparte never successfully reconciled after this rift. 

Their sons were the soldier [[Jerome Napoleon Bonaparte II]] (1830-1893) and the lawyer and government official [[Charles Joseph Bonaparte]] (1851-1921).<ref name="Sobel1990">{{cite book|author=Robert Sobel|title=Biographical Directory of the United States Executive Branch, 1774-1989|url=https://archive.org/details/biographicaldire00sobe|url-access=registration|year=1990|publisher=Greenwood Publishing Group|isbn=978-0-313-26593-8|pages=[https://archive.org/details/biographicaldire00sobe/page/33 33]–}}</ref>

General [[Lew Wallace]] described Susan as:<ref name="Stephens2010"/><blockquote>...staunchly Union, a tall, handsome, black-eyed, Franco-American woman, decidedly masculine in mind, but true to her woman's place</blockquote>

==References==
{{reflist}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Williams, Susan May}}
[[Category:1812 births]]
[[Category:1881 deaths]]
[[Category:19th-century American people]]
[[Category:House of Bonaparte|Susan May Williams]]
[[Category:People from Baltimore]]
[[Category:Princesses of France (Bonaparte)|Susan May Williams]]
[[Category:Patterson family (Maryland)]]
[[Category:Burials at Loudon Park Cemetery]]