Eliza Lynch

Eliza Lynch was the mistress of Francisco Solano Lpez, president of Paraguay.

She was born Eliza Alicia Lynch in Charleville, County Cork, Ireland. She emigrated at the age of ten with her family to Paris to escape the Great Irish Famine. OnJune 1850, she married Xavier Quatrefages, a French officer who was shortly afterwards posted to Algeria. She accompanied him, but at eighteen years of age, due to deteriorating health, she returned to Paris to live with her mother in the Strafford household. Courtesy of a few fortuitous introductions, she later entered the elite circle surrounding Princess Mathilde Bonaparte and quickly set herself up as a courtesan.

Source: Wikipedia