Famous Impostors

Bram Stoker spent his last years collecting history's great frauds: pretenders to thrones, alchemists and witch-finders, the Tichborne Claimant — and the strange Cotswold legend that Queen Elizabeth was really a boy.

The False Dauphins

5 cases in this part of Famous Impostors.

The False Dauphins

ON 21 January, 1793, Louis XVI of France was beheaded in the Place de la Revolution, formerly Place de Louis Quinze. From the moment his…

The False Dauphins: Dauphin

The imposture regarding the Dauphin was like a torch-race-so soon as the lighted torch fell from the hand of one runner it was lifted by…

The False Dauphins: Amazon

In 1804 (still according to his story), he embarked for America and got away to the banks of the Amazon, where amid the burning deserts (as…

The False Dauphins: Leaving

Leaving the hospitable home of Don Juan, he returned to Paris in 1815. Here Condé introduced him to the Duchesse d'Angoulême (his sister!)…

The False Dauphins: Louis

His profile was something like that of the typical Bourbon. In 1841, the Prince de Joinville, seeing him on his travels in the United…

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