She left America to be able to live
In France she could work and live where she chose; at home she could not.
Jean-Yves Didier — CC BY-SA 3.0 · Johan Allard — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Johan Allard — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Johan Allard — CC BY-SA 4.0
A fifteenth-century château in the Dordogne valley, known because it was the home of Josephine Baker — the American singer and dancer who became a French icon, a member of the Resistance, and then the mother of twelve adopted children from around the world. Her story is the museum. She was born in St Louis, Missouri in 1906 into severe poverty, and left America in the 1920s for Paris, where she became one of the most famous performers in Europe. The reason for leaving was plain: in France she could work, love and live where she chose, and in her own country a Black woman could not. During the Second World War she worked for the French Resistance, carrying information hidden in her sheet music and her underwear, using the fact that her fame eased her movement. She was awarded the Croix de Guerre and the Legion of Honour. She then bought this château and raised in it what she called her Rainbow Tribe: twelve adopted children of different races and religions, to demonstrate in practice that coexistence was possible. The project eventually bankrupted her and she lost the house in 1968. In 2021 her remains were symbolically moved to the Panthéon in Paris — the first Black woman given that honour. Practical points: entry is ticketed and covers the château, the gardens and a birds of prey display. Allow two to three hours. It is about two hundred kilometres from Bordeaux — a full day by car.
In France she could work and live where she chose; at home she could not.
She carried information in her sheet music; stardom eased her movement.
Twelve adopted children of different races and faiths — a project that bankrupted her.
Les Milandes, the Dordogne valley
Because raising twelve children, maintaining a château and opening it to visitors cost more than she earned, and she was ageing with fewer engagements. The debts mounted and the house was auctioned in 1968; she was physically evicted and photographed sitting on its steps. Princess Grace of Monaco then took her in and provided a home, and she returned to the stage in the 1970s with real success, dying days after her show opened in 1975.
The region is among the most beautiful in France: Castelnaud and Beynac castles facing each other across the river, the village of La Roque-Gageac built into the cliff, and Sarlat with its medieval old town. The Lascaux caves and their prehistoric paintings are half an hour away. Two days in the area beat one.
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