This biography is republished from The Dictionary of Irish Biography and was written by . Shared by permission in line with Creative Commons ‘Attribution’ (CC BY) licencing.
Born: 1776 (circa), France
Died: 8 November 1831
Country most active: International
Also known as: Anne Caroline Stéphanie Sims or Seymour
Pamela FitzGerald (c.1776–1831), had been reared from about age four as Anne Caroline Stéphanie Sims (or Seymour; sources differ) in the household of her natural father, the radical duc d’Orléans, at Bellechasse; she received the pet name ‘Pamela’ after Samuel Richardson’s fictional heroine. Like her future husband, she received a Rousseauvean education, under the tutelage of her natural mother, Mme de Genlis, author, educationist, and governess to the duke’s children. Between Lord Edward’s arrest and death she made strenuous but futile efforts to visit him in prison. Thereafter she moved to Hamburg, where she assisted United Irish exiles, and married secondly (1800) Joseph Pitcairn, the US consul; they had two children, but separated by 1806. Pamela lived the rest of her life in various European locations, suffering considerable financial hardship; after 1812 she lived mainly in France, most permanently in Montauban. Hoping vainly for a reversal of her fortunes, she moved to Paris in 1830 after the Orléanist ‘July revolution’ placed her natural half-brother Louis-Philippe on the French throne, but died penniless in the city 8 November 1831 at the Hotel de Danube, 7 rue Richepance. A double portrait with her daughter Pamela (1800), in the NGI, conveys a sense of her renowned and envied beauty.