Hedvig Antoinette Isabella Eleonore Jensen (December 4, 1867 July 19, 1889), better known by her stage name Elvira Madigan, was a circus performer who performed as a
slack rope dancer, artistic rider, juggler and dancer. She is best known today for her romantic relationship with the Swedish nobleman and cavalry officer
Sixten Sparre
Bengt Edvard ''Sixten'' "Sigge" Sparre af Rossvik (September 27, 1854 – July 19, 1889) was a Swedish nobleman, lieutenant, cavalry officer, journalist, poet, mostly known for the murder of circus performer Elvira Madigan in a murder-suicide act. ...
. Their joint death caused great sensation and the event was described in song by, among others, the author in a song beginning "Sad things happen", which gained great popularity.
Early life
![Poster_for_Ciniselli%27s_circus,_Saint-Petersburg_23](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/52/Poster_for_Ciniselli%27s_circus%2C_Saint-Petersburg_23._april_1879.jpg)
Hedvig Antoinette Isabella Eleonore Jensen was born on December 4, 1867 in
Flensburg
Flensburg (; Danish, Low Saxon: ''Flensborg''; North Frisian: ''Flansborj''; South Jutlandic: ''Flensborre'') is an independent town (''kreisfreie Stadt'') in the north of the German state of Schleswig-Holstein. Flensburg is the centre of the ...
,
Schleswig-Holstein
Schleswig-Holstein (; da, Slesvig-Holsten; nds, Sleswig-Holsteen; frr, Slaswik-Holstiinj) is the northernmost of the 16 states of Germany, comprising most of the historical duchy of Holstein and the southern part of the former Duchy of Sch ...
in the then
Kingdom of Prussia
The Kingdom of Prussia (german: Königreich Preußen, ) was a German kingdom that constituted the state of Prussia between 1701 and 1918.Marriott, J. A. R., and Charles Grant Robertson. ''The Evolution of Prussia, the Making of an Empire''. Re ...
. It is often stated that Elvira Madigan was Danish, but uncertainty prevails over which should be considered her home country as well as her citizenship.
Her mother, Eleonora Cecilie Christine Marie Olsen, was a circus artist born in Finland and was of Norwegian ancestry. She was later known as
Laura Madigan (1849–1918) but during Elvira's childhood she mostly used the stage name Miss Ulbinska. Elvira's father, circus artist Frederik Peter Jensen, was born in 1845 in
Copenhagen
Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...
, Denmark. His later destiny is unknown.
At the time of Elvira Madigan's birth in 1867 her parents were not married to each other, and they toured with the French circus director Didier Gautier's "Cirque du Nord" in Germany and Denmark. During the years 1869–1872 Elvira's mother toured with
Circus Renz
Circus Renz was a German circus company. It was established in 1842 in Berlin by Ernst Jakob Renz (1815–1892) as ''Circus Olympic'' and existed until 1897. The company had several stationary buildings in Berlin, Hamburg, Bremen, Breslau and Vi ...
in Germany and Austria, where she in 1871 gave birth to Elvira's half-brother Richard Heinrich Olsen in Berlin. He later toured with the stage name Oscar Madigan. The father of this child is unknown.
In 1875, Elvira's mother worked at
Circus Myers in Austria, where she got to know the American circus artist
John Madigan, whom she subsequently lived with. The following year Elvira Madigan, then still Hedvig Jensen, made her debut in the circus, a pas-de-deux with John Madigan during a performance with the circus Loisset in
Tivoli in
Copenhagen
Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...
. After the death of Loisset in Norrköping the following year, his circus was dissolved, and the Madigan family moved to
Circus Ciniselli in Russia. There Elvira Madigan trained to be a slack line dancer.
Career
In the summer of 1879, the Madigan family tried to run their own small circus company in
Finland
Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...
and at the same time Hedvig began using the name Elvira Madigan. The following year, when the family appeared in Circus Cremes in
Vienna
en, Viennese
, iso_code = AT-9
, registration_plate = W
, postal_code_type = Postal code
, postal_code =
, timezone = CET
, utc_offset = +1
, timezone_DST ...
,
Gisela Brož became a foster child in the family, she was two years older than Elvira. Gisela was trained as a tightrope dancer, and together with Elvira on slack line they practiced a unique number, where they appeared simultaneously on separate lines, one above the other. Elvira used to juggle at the same time as she was on the line. The number became a sensation, and in the following years the girls appeared as "daughters of the air" in circuses and in variety rooms across much of Europe, including in Berlin, Paris, London, Brussels and Moscow. After an appearance at Tivoli in Copenhagen in 1886 before the Danish royal family, the girls were each awarded a gold cross by King
Christian IX of Denmark
Christian IX (8 April 181829 January 1906) was King of Denmark from 1863 until his death in 1906. From 1863 to 1864, he was concurrently Duke of Schleswig, Holstein and Lauenburg.
A younger son of Frederick William, Duke of Schleswig-Holstein- ...
. The following year, John Madigan again started his own circus company, this time in Denmark. Gisela left the family in the autumn of the same year, after which Elvira had to appear alone when the tour continued to Sweden.
Relationship with Sixten Sparre
In January 1888 circus Madigan appeared in
Kristianstad
Kristianstad (, ; older spelling from Danish language, Danish ''Christianstad'') is a Urban areas in Sweden, city and the seat of Kristianstad Municipality, Scania County, Sweden with 40,145 inhabitants in 2016. During the last 15 years, it has ...
, where she was seen by the
dragoon
Dragoons were originally a class of mounted infantry, who used horses for mobility, but dismounted to fight on foot. From the early 17th century onward, dragoons were increasingly also employed as conventional cavalry and trained for combat w ...
lieutenant
Sixten Sparre
Bengt Edvard ''Sixten'' "Sigge" Sparre af Rossvik (September 27, 1854 – July 19, 1889) was a Swedish nobleman, lieutenant, cavalry officer, journalist, poet, mostly known for the murder of circus performer Elvira Madigan in a murder-suicide act. ...
.
Letter exchange
Sixten Sparre, who was married and had two children, fell madly in love with Madigan, who was considered an extraordinary beauty, with an excellent figure and almost meter-long, blond hair. Sparre sought her out, and the two started a correspondence. Madigan gradually tired of his writing, and several times tried to end their correspondence. Sparre, however, tried to persuade her to leave both her family and the circus to marry him. According to a letter that Elvira's mother later wrote to the Danish newspaper ''
Politiken
''Politiken'' is a leading Danish daily broadsheet newspaper, published by JP/Politikens Hus in Copenhagen, Denmark. It was founded in 1884 and played a role in the formation of the Danish Social Liberal Party. Since 1970 it has been independe ...
'', Sparre threatened to shoot himself if Madigan did not do as he wanted. He also lied to her about his marital and financial status; he had squandered his entire fortune and was heavily in debt. After suffering a nervous breakdown, Madigan finally gave in; on May 28, 1889, she secretly left her family at the circus's stop in
Sundsvall
Sundsvall () is a city and the seat of Sundsvall Municipality in Västernorrland County, Sweden. It has a population of 58,807 as of 2020; more than 95,000 live in the municipal area. It is Sweden's 21st largest city by population.
History
Th ...
. Her family was unaware of her correspondence with Sparre.
Relationship development
Sparre, who was granted two months leave from May 27, met Madigan in Bollnäs. The two went on to Stockholm, where Madigan's mother made a failed attempt to catch the couple by taking a steamboat from Sundsvall. After a few weeks in an unknown place, they arrived at
Svendborg
Svendborg () is a town on the island of Funen in south-central Denmark, and the seat of Svendborg Municipality. With a population of 27,300 (1 January 2022), Svendborg is Funen's second largest city.[Funen
Funen ( da, Fyn, ), with an area of , is the third-largest island of Denmark, after Zealand and Vendsyssel-Thy. It is the 165th-largest island in the world. It is located in the central part of the country and has a population of 469,947 as of ...]
on June 18. They lived almost a month at the city hotel, but when the hotel director presented a bill, the couple fled. The already heavily indebted Sparre was completely broke at this point and had been living on credit for several weeks. The two lived a few days in a guest house in
Troense on
Tåsinge
Tåsinge () is a Danish island immediately south of Funen, opposite and facing Svendborg, divided from Funen by Svendborgsund.See detailed Denmark roadmap in References section. The island covers an area of circa . It is part of the South Funen A ...
,
Denmark
)
, song = ( en, "King Christian stood by the lofty mast")
, song_type = National and royal anthem
, image_map = EU-Denmark.svg
, map_caption =
, subdivision_type = Sovereign state
, subdivision_name = Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark
...
. On July 18, they went to the nearby forest area Nørreskov, where Sparre murdered Elvira with his service revolver and then killed himself on the morning of July 19, 1889. Their bodies were found three days later. In Madigan's dress pocket was found a paper with a poem that she had written herself just before her death. The poem was written in a mixture of Swedish, Danish, Norwegian and German.
Funeral
![Elvira Madigan og Sixten Sparres gravar](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/45/Elvira_Madigan_og_Sixten_Sparres_gravar.JPG)
The couple were buried at Landet's cemetery in the middle of Tåsinge on July 27 in the presence of a large number of locals and summer guests. The hotel bills, funeral costs and tombstones were paid for by Sparre's brother, Edvard. Madigan's grandmother came to oversee the funeral, but she did not arrive in time. The original tombstones are of two different materials. Madigan's is of white marble and Sparre's of dark grey granite. The difference was to mark that the two were not a "genuine" couple.
The original burial ground is located a few meters south of the great oak in the middle of the cemetery, but during a reorganization of the cemetery walkways in 1943, the gravestones were moved a few meters to the southeast and turned to the west. The original gravestones were replaced by new ones on the 75th anniversary in 1964. On Madigan's new gravestone her stage name was also mentioned. In 1999, the original tombstones were restored and re-used, but now turned east and moved a few meters eastward. In 2013, the memorial site was redesigned again and the tombstones were placed close to each other in the middle of a circular pavement located near the 1999 memorial site.
Legacy
The interpretation of the murder drama that was told was a love story and became to many a symbol of romantic love. It was about a circus princess who was courted by a nobleman, in a combination of morality and entertainment. The event, in its turn, brought a tremendous look, and promptly gave rise to poetry and poems.
Johan Lindström Saxon Johan
* Johan (given name)
* ''Johan'' (film), a 1921 Swedish film directed by Mauritz Stiller
* Johan (band), a Dutch pop-group
** ''Johan'' (album), a 1996 album by the group
* Johan Peninsula, Ellesmere Island, Nunavut, Canada
* Jo-Han, a manu ...
's
broadside ballad
A broadside (also known as a broadsheet) is a single sheet of inexpensive paper printed on one side, often with a ballad, rhyme, news and sometimes with woodcut illustrations. They were one of the most common forms of printed material between the ...
was heard throughout the
Nordic countries
The Nordic countries (also known as the Nordics or ''Norden''; literal translation, lit. 'the North') are a geographical and cultural region in Northern Europe and the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic. It includes the sovereign states of Denmar ...
from the autumn of 1889 and for many decades to come. Everyone knew the story, and everyone could sing the song. But it was not just
Barrel organ
A barrel organ (also called roller organ or crank organ) is a French mechanical musical instrument consisting of bellows and one or more ranks of pipes housed in a case, usually of wood, and often highly decorated. The basic principle is the sa ...
ists that conveyed the story, also the newspapers were full of up-to-date descriptions, even with terrible details.
The couple's relationship also gave rise to an intense press debate. The conservative press condemned the couple's actions and Sparre's adultery, while the liberal press was more understanding. The event was interpreted as saying that the couple had to take this step because of the class society of the time and the prevailing sexual morality. Among other things, the Danish author
Holger Drachmann
Holger Henrik Herholdt Drachmann (9 October 1846 – 14 January 1908) was a Danish poet, dramatist and painter. He was a member of the Skagen artistic colony and became a figure of the Scandinavian Modern Breakthrough Movement.
Early yea ...
wrote the tribute poem
"Til de to" (To the two) under these premises. The event was seen as a repetition of the
Mayerling incident, but the extent to which the two were influenced by this event is unclear. Already in the first press releases on the drama, this connection to the event in Austria was made six months earlier, and other newspapers continued to spin on this thread, perhaps mostly because this version was what the readers wanted: the all-consuming love, stronger than death, in addition, between a man of noble birth and a woman of very humble lineage (circus performers stood very low on the social scale). This romanticized view of the drama has survived to the present day through movies, novels, musicals and much more.
However, recent years of research give a different picture. It has emerged that Sparre the last few years of his life lived very extravagantly. He had wasted his fortune and systematically withdrew debts in a way that gave rise to questions about his mental health. According to Grönqvist, he may have suffered from
bipolar disorder
Bipolar disorder, previously known as manic depression, is a mental disorder characterized by periods of depression and periods of abnormally elevated mood that last from days to weeks each. If the elevated mood is severe or associated with ...
, and his systematic waste, his renunciation of the family and the values his social class traditionally represented (Sparre posed far left politically in the last few years), and finally the love affair with Madigan should then be seen as the rash of his illness. Lindhe maintained that Sparre was spoiled, wasteful and narcissistic; he also condemned Sparre's wife Luitgard.
Contemporaries remembered Madigan as having been shy and withdrawn. She had been interested in poetry and literature, and was a good amateur pianist.
Elvira Madigan in culture
In 1943,
Åke Ohberg
Åke Ohberg (20 July 1905 – 18 July 1975) was a cinema of Sweden, Swedish actor and film director. He appeared in about 30 roles in films between 1932 and 1961.
Ohberg was born to Johan and Hulda Ohberg in Västerås, Sweden.
Marriage and Fa ...
directed the first Swedish film version of ''
Elvira Madigan
Hedvig Antoinette Isabella Eleonore Jensen (December 4, 1867 July 19, 1889), better known by her stage name Elvira Madigan, was a circus performer who performed as a slack rope dancer, artistic rider, juggler and dancer. She is best known today ...
'' with
Eva Henning
Eva Henning (born Eva Wetlesen; 10 May 1920 – 18 April 2016) was a Swedish stage and movie actress.
Career
Born in Newark, New York, US, Henning was trained at the Royal Dramatic Theatre's acting school (1938–40) in Sweden and made her fi ...
and himself in the lead roles. After pressure from relatives of Sixten Sparre, his name was changed to Christian.
In 1967,
Bo Widerberg
Bo Gunnar Widerberg (; 8 June 1930 – 1 May 1997) was a Sweden, Swedish film director, screenwriter, writer, film editing, editor and actor.
Biography Early life
Widerberg was born in Malmö, Malmöhus County, Sweden.
Career
Widerberg was th ...
made his film adaptation, ''
Elvira Madigan
Hedvig Antoinette Isabella Eleonore Jensen (December 4, 1867 July 19, 1889), better known by her stage name Elvira Madigan, was a circus performer who performed as a slack rope dancer, artistic rider, juggler and dancer. She is best known today ...
'', with
Pia Degermark
Pia Charlotte Degermark (born 24 August 1949) is a Swedish actress. She is best known for her role as Elvira Madigan in the 1967 drama film ''Elvira Madigan'', for which she won a Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actress.
Career
Born Pia Char ...
and
Thommy Berggren
Thommy Berggren, né Tommy William Berggren (born 12 August 1937) is a Swedish actor. He is known for having starred in several films directed by Bo Widerberg, and was often considered one of the foremost Swedish film and theatre actors from t ...
in the lead roles. The film music used throughout was the second movement from
Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 21 in C major (K. 467), which has subsequently sometimes been referred to as the "Elvira Madigan" concerto. The same year, Poul Erik Møller Pedersen also directed a Danish film, with Anne Mette Michaelsen in the title role as Elvira Madigan and
Søren Svejstrup
Søren Svejstrup (born 5 December 1937) is a Danish diving (sport), diver. He competed in the Diving at the 1964 Summer Olympics – Men's 10 metre platform, men's 10 metre platform event at the 1964 Summer Olympics. He played Sixten Sparre in ...
as Sixten Sparre.
In 1990, the "Circus Elvira Madigan" by Jan Wirén and Lars-Åke von Vultée premiered in connection with that year's edition of the Kristianstad Days. Directed by
Hasse Alfredson
Hans Folke "Hasse" Alfredson (28 June 1931 – 10 September 2017) was a Swedish actor, film director, writer, and comedian. He was born in Malmö, Sweden. He is known for his collaboration with Tage Danielsson as the duo Hasse & Tage and their p ...
and among others
Johan Ulveson
Karl Johan Magnus Ulveson (born 30 May 1954) is a Swedish actor and comedian. Most famous for appearing in ''Lorry'', ''c/o Segemyhr'' and '' Parlamentet''.
Ulveson grew up in Stockholm, graduated in Malmö and started his career at Norrbotten ...
was in the cast.
The road on which the country church is located was named Elvira Madigans Vej in 1970;
a
ship
A ship is a large watercraft that travels the world's oceans and other sufficiently deep waterways, carrying cargo or passengers, or in support of specialized missions, such as defense, research, and fishing. Ships are generally distinguished ...
was also bestowed with her name.
Sparre has a street named after him in the regiment area of Ystad, ''Sixten Sparres Gata''.
See also
*
Gisela Brož
References
External links
*
*http://elviramadigan.se (in Swedish)
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Madigan, Elvira
1867 births
1889 deaths
Danish female equestrians
People from Flensburg
People from the Province of Schleswig-Holstein
People murdered in Denmark
Suicides by firearm in Denmark
Tightrope walkers
Women stunt performers
Murder–suicides in Europe
Danish circus performers
19th-century circus performers
1880s suicides