Nancy Fish

Nancy Fish Barnum Callias D'Orengiani, Baroness (née Fish; 22 April 1850 – 23 June 1927) was an English socialite, daughter of a successful cotton miller and the second wife of P. T. Barnum, 40 years her senior. After the death of Barnum's first wife in 1873, they married the following year in both London and New York City. After his death in 1891, he left her a large annuity.

Four years later, after an accidental meeting in Egypt, Fish married Demetrius Callias Bey, an Ottoman diplomat, nobleman and businessman of Greek descent. Their marriage in New York City was sensationalised in the American press and ended at Callias's 1896 death.

Two years later, Fish entered a mutually beneficial business-like marriage with the Baron Lucien D'Alexandry D'Orengiani, a French nobleman. She lived out the rest of her life in Europe as a baroness and died in 1927. She was cremated and buried next to her second husband. A posthumous biography was published by The New Yorker magazine.

Early life Nancy Fish was born in Blackburn, Lancashire on 22 April 1850 to Martha (née Shaw) and John Fish, a Manchester cotton mill owner. John Fish credited his own business success to reading the autobiography of the successful businessman P. T. Barnum. In 1858, her father met Barnum at a lecture at the Free Trade Hall in Manchester and thanked him for the inspiration he had provided. The two subsequently became close friends; John Fish named a pair of his engines "Barnum" and "Charity" (after Barnum's wife) and threw a party for General Tom Thumb when he was exhibiting in England; Barnum dedicated a chapter of his autobiography to John Fish. Due to her father's business success, by 1871 Nancy Fish and her family had moved to a large house in the relatively upmarket North Meols, near Southport, Lancashire. They honeymooned at the Windsor Hotel in New York City. The large size of the legacy displeased Barnum's children.

Marriage to Callias

In 1894, Fish visited Egypt where she was presented with a mummy that was being donated to the Scientific Society in Bridgeport. After their wedding ceremony they sailed to Paris and travelled Europe before arriving at Callias's estates on the island of Melita.

Later life

After the death of her second husband, Fish moved to Paris where she lived in an apartment near the Arc de Triomphe. She was cremated and then buried next to her second husband in the English Square of Grand Jas cemetery in Cannes, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, France.

A posthumous biography was published in The New Yorker magazine in April 1936. She was portrayed by Kirsten Bishop in the 1986 television film Barnum, a musical biography of P.T. Barnum.