Comte Charles-Victor Salviac de Viel-Castel (1804 -1877), military quartermaster
1st image: Soirée; 2nd: caricature by Eugène Giraud drawn 1851 at Nieuwerkerke's salon.
Starting March 28, 1851, Victor de Viel-Castel enlivened many of de Nieuwerkerke's16 vendredi-soirées with his elegant manners, participating in the après-soirée with his elder brother Horace43, ever-present caricaturist Eugène Giraud11 and a select group of other elite guests. Less prominent than Horace, and lacking any political or artistic qualities, de Nieuwerkerke devalued gregarious Victor to a barely visible place deep in the background of Une Soirée au Louvre, behind Horace.
The family wealth from his mother’s side, Lasteyrie du Saillant, enabled bohemièn Victor de Viel-Castel to live an aristocratic life. The attractive and elegant Victor spent his days riding his fancy cabriolet carriage with magnificent chestnut horse at the Bois de Boulogne, and enjoying the mountain air at Berchtesgaden (Bavaria, Germany). There, in 1839, he was challenged to a duel by a Hungarian after a game of cards. From fifteen paces, the Hungarian fired his pistol twice with and was disqualified. Victor had not fired yet and decided not to take advantage of the situation, upon which the duel was stopped by the witnesses and both men reconciliated.
When in Paris, Victor attended the Parisian opera houses, theatres, and any other pleasurable things in life together with the high nobility and other rich-and-famous such as art collector Lord Hertford. His title as military administrator was entirely ceremonial.
Victor was a friend of writer Prosper Mérimée54 and of de Nieuwerkerke’s love, Princess Mathilde Bonaparte, who introduced him to the emperor in 1852.
The Parisian and London gossip journals mention gourmet Victor winning 3,000 francs in a bet with an Englishman in 1839, requiring him to eat dinner of minimum 500 francs (present value €1000) at the Café de Paris (1822 – 1857).
It took the restaurant eight days to prepare Victor’s dinner.
Victor managed to consume the meal within the allocated two hours, collected his wager, and proceeded to a dinner-reception by English ambassador Lord Granville.
At the age of sixty-six he married even richer to Belgian Clémence van de Woestyne, cousin of marquess de Lawoestine42, which the gossip journals considered the first serious act in his life.