Victor Emmanuel II
Victor Emmanuel II (Italian: Vittorio Emanuele II; full name: Vittorio Emanuele Maria Alberto Eugenio Ferdinando Tommaso di Savoia; 14 March 1820 – 9 January 1878) was King of Sardinia (also known as Piedmont-Sardinia) from 23 March 1849 until 17 March 1861,[a] when he assumed the title of King of Italy and became the first king of an independent, united Italy since the 6th century, a title he held until his death in 1878. Borrowing from the old Latin title Pater Patriae of the Roman emperors, the Italians gave him the epithet of Father of the Fatherland (Italian: Padre della Patria).
Victor Emmanuel II
17 March 1861 – 9 January 1878
Napoleon (1814)
23 March 1849 – 17 March 1861
14 March 1820
Palazzo Carignano, Turin, Kingdom of Sardinia
9 January 1878 (aged 57)
Quirinal Palace, Rome, Kingdom of Italy
Born in Turin as the eldest son of Charles Albert, Prince of Carignano, and Maria Theresa of Austria, he fought in the First Italian War of Independence (1848–1849) before being made King of Sardinia following his father's abdication. He appointed Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour, as his Prime Minister, and he consolidated his position by suppressing the republican left. In 1855, he sent an expeditionary corps to side with French and British forces during the Crimean War; the deployment of Italian troops to the Crimea, and the gallantry shown by them in the Battle of the Chernaya (16 August 1855) and in the siege of Sevastopol led the Kingdom of Sardinia to be among the participants at the peace conference at the end of the war, where it could address the issue of the Italian unification to other European powers.[1] This allowed Victor Emmanuel to ally himself with Napoleon III, Emperor of France. France had supported Sardinia in the Second Italian War of Independence, resulting in liberating Lombardy from Austrian rule.
Victor Emmanuel supported the Expedition of the Thousand (1860–1861) led by Giuseppe Garibaldi, which resulted in the rapid fall of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies in southern Italy. However, Victor Emmanuel halted Garibaldi when he appeared ready to attack Rome, still under the Papal States, as it was under French protection. In 1860, Tuscany, Modena, Parma and Romagna decided to side with Sardinia, and Victor Emmanuel then marched victoriously in the Marche and Umbria after the victorious Battle of Castelfidardo over the Papal forces. This led to his excommunication from the Catholic Church until 1878, just before his death in the same year. He subsequently met Garibaldi at Teano, receiving from him the control of southern Italy and becoming the first King of Italy on 17 March 1861.
In 1866, the Third Italian War of Independence allowed Italy to annex Veneto. In 1870, Victor Emmanuel also took advantage of the Prussian victory over France in the Franco-Prussian War to conquer the Papal States after the French withdrew. He entered Rome on 20 September 1870 and set up the new capital there on 2 July 1871. He died in Rome in 1878, and was buried in the Pantheon.
The Italian national Victor Emmanuel II Monument in Rome, containing the Altare della Patria, was built in his honour.
In 1842 he married his paternal first cousin (aunt's daughter) Adelaide of Austria (1822–1855). With her, he had eight children:[5]
In 1869 he married morganatically his principal mistress Rosa Vercellana (3 June 1833 – 26 December 1885). Popularly known in Piedmontese as "Bela Rosin", she was born a commoner but made Countess of Mirafiori and Fontanafredda in 1858. Their offspring were:
In addition to his morganatic second wife, Victor Emmanuel II had several other mistresses:
1) Laura Bon at Stupinigi, who bore him two children:
2) Baroness Vittoria Duplesis who bore him another daughter:
3) Unknown mistress at Mondovì,
mother of:
4) Virginia Rho at Turin, mother of two children:
5) Rosalinda Incoronata De Domenicis (1846–1916), mother of one daughter:
6) Angela Rosa De Filippo, mother of:
Styles of
King Victor Emmanuel II
Your Majesty
