Rosario Montt

Rosario Montt Goyenechea (1820s^[1] – 1894) was the First Lady of Chile from 1851 to 1861, during the presidency of her husband, Manuel Montt.

Rosario Montt Goyenechea
Portrait of Rosario Montt Goyenechea
Born	1820s Chile
Died	December 2, 1894 San Bernardo, Chile
Other names	Rosario Montt de Montt (after marriage)
Known for	First Lady of Chile
Spouse	Manuel Montt
Children	16, including Pedro Montt
Relatives	José Anacleto Montt Goyenechea (brother); Sara del Campo (daughter-in-law); Ambrosio Montt Luco (son-in-law); Teresa Wilms Montt (great-granddaughter)

Early life

María del Rosario Montt Goyenechea was born in Chile, the daughter of Filiberto Montt Prado (1758–1838) and María de la Luz Goyenechea de la Sierra, and part of the prominent Montt family, originally from Catalonia. Her older brother was politician José Anacleto Montt Goyenechea (1802-1867).^[2]

Marriage and legacy

Montt was in her teens when she married her older cousin, government official Manuel Montt Torres (1809–1880) in 1839, in Casablanca, Chile. They had sixteen children together. She was the First Lady of Chile from 1851 to 1861, during the presidency of her husband. Because he was the target of attempted assassinations, she was the only person allowed to shave her husband's face or cut his hair.^[3] She was widowed when Manuel Montt died in 1880,^[4] and she died in 1894, about seventy years old, in San Bernardo.

Montt's home in Santiago was declared a national historic site in 1981.^[5] From 1891 to 1896, her nephew Jorge Montt was president of Chile. From 1906 to 1910, her son Pedro Montt was president of Chile.^[2][6] Poet Teresa Wilms Montt was her great-granddaughter.^[7]

References

1. Various sources give dates from 1822 to 1827 for Montt's birth year.
2. Garrido-Vergara, Luis (2020-06-16). Species of Capital in the Political Elite: Who Rules in Chile?. Springer Nature. pp. 167–170. ISBN 978-3-030-41172-5.
3. Merino, Roberto (2018). Todo Santiago: Crónicas de la ciudad. Hueders. ISBN 978-956-8935-28-3.
4. Novoa, Jovino (1893). Juicios de la prensa sobre Don Manuel Montt publicados con motivo de su fallecimiento y documentos referentes á su vida pública. Santiago de Chile, Imprenta Gutenberg – via Internet Archive.
5. "Casa Manuel Montt". Archivo Fotografico Dirección de Arquitectura (in Spanish). Retrieved July 4, 2021.
6. Lagarrigue, Fernando Pinto (1991). Balmaceda y los gobiernos seudo-parlamentarios (in Spanish). Andres Bello. p. 141.
7. Gonzalez, Ruth (2011-04-01). Teresa Wils Montt: Un canto de libertad (in Spanish). Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial Chile. ISBN 978-956-325-051-0.