Eugenie Wickham (née Paleologue; c. 1849 – 27 August 1934), self-styled as Princess Eugenie Nicephorus Comnenus Palaeologus, was a Maltese pretender to the throne of Greece and the Byzantine Empire, active in the early 20th century. For most of her life, at least from the early 1860s onwards, Paleologue lived in Great Britain, from the late 1860s onwards in London. She was noted for her great generosity, despite not being rich, as well as her repeated attempts at becoming a sovereign in Greece.
At different times, through invented descent from the Palaiologos dynasty of Byzantine emperors, she laid claim to Constantinople, the Kingdom of Greece and the islands of the Aegean Sea. In 1913, Paleologue managed to form an all-female committee of supporters who petitioned for her to be installed as "Empress of Constantinople" in the aftermath of the First Balkan War, which though unsuccessful garnered her some media attention.
Biography
Early life
Marie Ersilie Eugenie Orades Laurentia Vincenza Nicola Antonia Paleologue was born on Malta in about 1849. She was the daughter of the Maltese pretender Theodore Palaeologo (or Theodore Attardo di Cristoforo de Bouillion), who lived in London and also claimed the style "Prince Nicephorus Comnenus Palaeologus", and his wife Laura Attardo Testaferrata (both died 1912). By 1861 Paleologue had left Malta, moving to Britain, as she is then recorded to have lived in St Davids in Pembrokeshire, Wales.
In 1869, Paleologue married Colonel Edmund Hill Wickham (1842–1907), who served in the Royal Artillery, and thereafter settled in England. She was recorded in documentation of the marriage as "Eugeniue Attard". Paleologue and Wickham, and their children, lived together in Fulham, London.
Pretensions
Though the last confidently verified members went extinct in the 16th century, Paleologue claimed direct descent from the Palaiologos dynasty, the last ruling dynasty of the Byzantine Empire. According to Paleologue, she was a descendant of Emperor John VIII Palaiologos (1425–1448), otherwise regarded to have been childless, as well as of Constantine the Great (306–337). Through her claimed descent, Paleologue claimed not only the style of "Princess", which she frequently used, but also claimed to be "empress by heredity".
Paleologue claimed to have been received with royal honours during a visit to Greece in 1898, at the time under the rule of King George I. In 1899, a claim circulated that the Holy Synod, the highest authority of the Russian Orthodox Church, recognised Paleologue as legitimate, according her the style "imperial highness", and promised that a pension would henceforth be paid to her by the Russian government. It was further claimed that her eldest son, Edmund Theodore Eugene, was recognised as the "future protector of the glorious traditions of the Orthodox Byzantine Empire". The announcement of the Holy Synod's recognition was published in The Genealogical Magazine, though the editors noted that they were unaware of where the claim had originated and were "much inclined to doubt" its "technical and official accuracy". The claim was also published in the international press, for instance being published without any doubts concerning its veracity in the French in 1900.
After the death of her husband in 1907, Paleologue moved to West Kensington, also in London. In 1909, Paleologue claimed the official style "Hereditary Princess of Mytilene, Enos, Chios and Lemnos". She claimed in that year to have been approached about the possibility of making her the "Queen of Samos" (the island was at the time an autonomous Ottoman tributary state), or in the event that she did not become queen to make one of her sons king. Paleologue further stated in an interview with the Daily Express that making her the ruler of Samos would only be a step towards her rightful position as a "direct descendant of Constantine the Great". She further claimed that many Greeks saw her as "the one who is referred to in the old prophecy, that someone shall arise to bring power and prosperity to Greece again."