Brigitte Bardot inheritance row deepens after private letter to partner leaked

A row over the inheritance of late screen legend Brigitte Bardot has intensified after a private letter was made public which appears to show her cutting off relations with her last partner.

Dated November 2022 – three years before she died at her home in Saint Tropez – the hand-written note accuses Bernard de Chiara, her companion of more than 30 years, of "patiently destroying me day after day".

The leaked letter is a useful weapon for the other side in the Bardot legacy battle - the animal rights foundation that bears her name - which is accused by de Chiara of rushing to dispose of her estate without regard for friends and intimates.

A week ago de Chiara, who is 85, was forced to leave the seaside house known as La Madrague which he shared with Bardot from the early 1990s.

After being looked after financially by her for so many years, he is reported to possess neither a bank account nor a social security card.

He was also furious after the Brigitte Bardot Foundation organised a sale in September of household objects mainly taken from the late actress's Paris flat. The sale raised nearly €1m (£835,000), shared between the Foundation and Bardot's only son Nicolas Charrier.

"I found it extraordinary that just a few months after Brigitte's death, they already wanted to make a souvenir out of her. I did not appreciate that one bit," de Chiara said.

In the letter, which begins "Bernard, it's a failure!", Bardot said she had given "everything" in the hope of finding a "companion would could offer back my love, share my joys and immense sorrows... who is happy at the life I am giving him."

But she concluded: "Today I have reached the end-point of my distress... I am so in need of a shoulder, a support, a tenderness, a presence – which you are incapable of giving."

Widely known under the adopted name d'Ormale (a pun on the French dort mal – sleeps badly), de Chiara was a businessman and one-time associate of far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen.

Friends say that he and Bardot had an up-and-down relationship. They were never married under French law, but he was living with her to the end and cared for her as she was dying.

When her will was read after her death last December, it divided the estate between the Foundation and her son, who lives discreetly in Oslo. There was no mention of de Chiara, and Bardot also stipulated that La Madrague should be unoccupied within six months of her death.

As lawyers now draw up a definitive list of the late actresses' assets, the Foundation accused de Chiara of removing items from La Madrague, including her Mini Moke jeep. "I am not accusing him of theft, but it's gone and that's a problem," said Foundation President Max Guazzani on Tuesday.

According to the Foundation, de Chiara has no legal claim except for a share of the Paris flat, which is now up for sale. In the meantime he is living in an apartment rented from the town hall of Saint Tropez.

Guazzini said that "on a human level one can understand [de Chiara's reluctance to leave La Madrague]. But it's the law and it's also what Brigitte Bardot wanted.

"It's not our fault that she did not leave him the right to live there. What else are we supposed to do?"

The high cost of maintaining La Madrague – and Bardot's second home La Garrigue in the hills behind the Mediterranean coast – means the Foundation needs to find ways to make the properties pay. Both houses were in a poor state when she died, and now need round-the-clock security.

An idea for a museum has been abandoned because La Madrague is inaccessible by car. Instead the house could be opened up for guided tours, as well as for fashion displays and film shoots.

After Bardot left the world of cinema in 1973 she devoted her life to animal welfare and her foundation says it now cares for 13,000 animals.

Bardot was married three times before she met de Chiara: to filmmaker Roger Vadim, actor Jacques Charrier and industrial heir Gunter Sachs.

French media say she married de Chiara at a ceremony in Norway but this was never registered in French law.