The Dame Mabel Brookes Collection with Dr Emma Gleadhill

The Briars homestead and wildlife sanctuary on the Mornington Peninsula has an unusual connection to Napoleon. Following his defeat at Waterloo in 1815, Napoleon spent the first two months of his captivity in the home of East India Company official William Balcombe and his family, known as The Briars, on St Helena. In 1824, the family moved to Australia following Balcombe’s appointment as treasurer of NSW. The son, Alexander, settled on the Mornington Peninsula naming this estate The Briars. The daughter, Betsy, drew upon her friendship with Napoleon as a young girl to write Recollections of the Emperor Napoleon.

In the 1950s, Alexander’s granddaughter, Dame Mabel Brookes, purchased objects associated with her ancestors’ time with Napoleon to restage her family’s past, casting herself in the role of Betsy. Through Brookes’ story, a different Napoleon emerges; one suitable to associate with a conservative career-driven woman operating in 1950s Australia.