the Second French Empire, he played a highly important rôle, acting as a kind of minister of cultural affairs. It was at his request that the painter William Wyld (of English birth but resident in Paris) was allowed to exhibit in the French section of the 1855 Exposition Universelle (the second after that in London in 1851). He was responsible for four museums (Louvre, Luxembourg, Versailles, then the Saint-Germain-en-Laye), for the objets d'art in the imperial palaces, for imperial commissions of paintings, sculptures and engravings and for the organisation of the Paris Salon. With difficulty, he also reformed the École des Beaux-Arts. He also became a senator and conseiller général for the Aisne. He was the subject of several attacks by artists and critics due to his taste veering more to old art and academicism than contemporary art - he refused to acquire works by some already-acclaimed artists such as Camille Corot who he did not appreciate. In Paris he lived in a hôtel particulier in the Monceau quarter at 13 rue Murillo (8th arrondissement), where he lived and had his gallery and studio "that does not draw the eye". He had had it built by the imperial architect Lefuel on a parcel of land acquired from the Pereire brothers in May 1869 and completed a year later - three months before the fall of the imperial regime. That fall forced him to submit his resignation to Gambetta. Sick and fearing his arrest, he got on a train to Boulogne-sur-Mer alone in an attempt to flee to the United Kingdom. However, he was found unconscious in the train compartment and transported to Valéry-en-Caux (Somme), where he asked for safe conduct from princess Marie Cantacuzène (1821–1891), who he had met in 1862 at the house of princess Mathilde. Nieuwerkerke and his daughter Olga (1843–1929) then moved to London, where in October he tried to sell some of the smallest of his objets d'art to the South Kensington Museum. These came from Nieuwerkerke's extraordinary collection (for which no list or inventory survives) of more than 800 historic art objects, in metal and gold, sculptures, ceramics, painted enamel, glass and furniture. It also included Medieval and Renaissance arms and armour, including 100 swords, 60 daggers, 50 helmets, 15 sets of armour or demi-armour, and the only known complete example of Gothic armour for man and horse (now in the Wallace Collection). In April