Scandalous Love Affairs
Jane Digby and the Greek War of Independence Chieftain, Hadjipetros
May 16, 2009
In her Biography of Jane Digby, A Scandalous Life, Mary Lovell describes Hadjipetros as powerfully built, tall, handsome, full of humour, self-confidence and the joy of living: dressed in a traditional pleated kilt or fustanella, scarlet silk jacket and gold embroidered gaiters, a red cap with a blue tassel on his head and brimming with pistols and yataghans, Hadjipetros breathed fire and adventure. Despite the age difference – he was past 60 – Jane Digby fell in love.
The Chieftain Hadjipetros
Christodoulos Hadjipetros, Jane Digby’s latest lover in Greece in the 1850s, came from a powerful Vlach family of Veternik (now Neraidohori, Trikala), at the central part of the Pindus Mountain range in central Greece (part of the Ottoman Empire until 1881). The Hadjipetros family were major sheep breeders and wool traders and the village’s local notables.
When the family fell from favour with the notorious Ottoman notable, Ali Pasha, Christodoulos Hadjipetros, one of the younger members, left Veternik in 1812 and eventually went to Vienna. He reportedly became member of the secret society Filiki Etairia, was one of the members of the committee who met Napoleon Bonaparte and in 1817 served as secretary to Ali Pasha.
Hadjipetros is reported as a famous chieftain who took part in the Greek War of Independence of 1821 and fought several battles. When Jane Digby met him, Greece had won its independence from the Ottoman Empire, Otto, the son of her former lover King Ludwig I of Bavaria, was King of Greece and Hadjipetros was called upon to control the brigands that terrorized the countryside.
Jane Digby in Athens
In the 1840s, after a string of love affairs and marriages, one of which to Greek Count Theotokis, English aristocrat, Jane Digby, settled in Athens. Within a few years, her marriage to Count Theotokis broke down as she discovered he was unfaithful to her and in 1846 her son Leonidas died in a tragic accident.
Jane Digby took to travelling and in 1851 returned to Athens and to a life of entertaining “in the French manner” holding salons and regular dances. It was around this time that she met chieftain Hadjipetros.
Scandalous Love Affair in Greece
Rumour had it that Queen Amalia herself had her eye on the Greek War of Independence chieftain whom King Otto had promoted into a General of the province of Lamia. Amalia reportedly disliked and distrusted Jane, all the more so when Jane rode alongside Hadjipetros.
Lovell describes Jane Digby’s love affair with the chieftain as a tempestuous love story with Jane living in caves, cooking on open fires and riding alongside the chieftain in the mountains. Reportedly jealous of Jane Digby's affair, Queen Amalia relieved Hadjipetros of his command and recalled him to Athens. He was quick to write a note to the Queen dismissing his affair with Jane.
Despite the betrayal, Jane Digby set out to build a luxury house in Athens to accommodate her new love and his followers and compiled great lists of equipment for the new stables with a mind to purchase fine Arab horses from Syria. The scandalous affair had however the effect of Jane being ostracised from Queen Amalia’s court.
Jane Digby was reportedly happy on her birthday on 3 April 1853. But three days later she left Athens for Beirut, never to return. Her maid of many years had confessed that she was the lover of Hadjipetros and that the chieftain loved her and not Jane. It seemed that Hadjipetros was interested more in Jane Digby’s wealth. But Jane was destined to finally find the love of her life in Syria.
Sources:
Mary S. Lovell, A Scandalous Life. The Biography of Jane Digby el Mezrab, Fourth Estate: London 1995.
History of the Municipality of Aithikon, Trikala, Thessaly in www.dimosaithikon.gr
Heroes of the Greek Revolution in www.asxetos.gr and www.vlahoi.net
Edmond About, La Grèce Contemporaine, Dodo Press 1999 (first edition. 1855)
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