Why did Brigitte Bardot leave her husband of 33 years out of her will? After her death last year, her widower is living in a council flat. Here, he says the late star’s legacy is being tarnished by a ‘pack of werewolves’

When Brigitte Bardot’s widower went to feed the late actress-turned-animal-rights-activist’s cats on Monday morning last week, as he has done every day since her death last year, he was overcome with a profound sadness.

It would have been his wife’s 92nd birthday. The date had been hanging over him for weeks, intensifying his still raw grief, as he agonised over how to commemorate the ‘unique woman’ he had vowed to ‘love forever’.

Bernard d’Ormale had been married to the 1960s superstar for 33 years – the longest of any of her four husbands.

Birthdays, anniversaries, Christmases and New Years were always cherished by the couple, celebrated in a low-key fashion at Bardot’s waterside home on the outskirts of Saint-Tropez.

Surrounded by dozens of animals, the pair, who mostly shunned the limelight, quietly enjoyed each other’s company at La Madrague, a former fisherman’s cottage, and would often enjoy a slice or two of Bardot’s famous apple tart.

It was here, at this home filled with so many memories, that Bardot took her last breath, as she had always wished, being ‘lulled away by the sound of the waves’, holding on to Mr d’Ormale, whom she called her ‘piou, piou’.

All of the actress’s assets were split equally between her son from a previous marriage, Nicolas-Jacques Charrier, and the Fondation Brigitte Bardot – her animal welfare charity

The last nine months have naturally been a painful and lonely time for Mr d’Ormale, now 85. Yet his grief was compounded when he was told to pack his bags and leave La Madrague, now worth up to an estimated £22million, after being left out of his wife’s will.

All of the actress’s assets were split equally between her son from a previous marriage, Nicolas-Jacques Charrier, and the Fondation Brigitte Bardot – her beloved charity set up to protect animal welfare. It was an arrangement her husband claims he suggested, not wanting to be labelled a gold digger.

Yet Mr d’Ormale, perhaps naively, never imagined that it would see him removed from his home of more than three decades. Now living in a 29-square-metre council flat built for senior citizens, he is only allowed to visit his former home in the daytime to check on the animals.

In another blow, last month he was removed as president of his wife’s charity, a position he was handed in the wake of her death to ‘continue her fight’.

The final, and most upsetting, straw for the widower, however, was the charity’s decision to auction off 300 personal items that belonged to Bardot – from photographs and paintings to her nightgowns and underwear. Speaking exclusively to the Daily Mail in Saint-Tropez a week after the sale raised almost one million euros (£808,000), Mr d’Ormale accused the charity of acting ‘like a pack of werewolves’, failing to protect her legacy.

‘Brigitte has been scattered all over the place, like grains of sugar,’ he said. ‘These items were bought by fans, people who loved Brigitte very much, but it’s not their fault. It’s the foundation’s.

Bardot’s relationship with Mr d’Ormale was the longest of any of her marriages, but he is now living in a council flat

He feels ousted after caring for her for many years and plans to take legal action 

‘This is no way to preserve Brigitte’s memory by scattering her belongings all over the place, especially when the foundation does not need the money.’

Hands shaking, he shows me a photograph of his wife at five years old, clutching a teddy bear that was supposed to be returned to him as a memento. He is still waiting. Meanwhile, a photograph of Bardot at La Madrague cuddling her dogs and a caricature of her by artist Jean-Jacques Sempé are among other items that Mr d’Ormale claims were supposed to go into storage.

He claims he did not give the foundation his blessing for the sale, as they suggest.

‘I am still a member of the board, but I am dealing with a bunch of thugs who have no respect for her wishes,’ he added. ‘They could at least respect the fact that we are grieving. But not at all. They have to make money by selling her belongings. Do you realise they’re erasing her? It’s unbelievable.’

The overwhelming sadness and frailty of Mr d’Ormale when he first entered his lawyer’s office for our interview was quickly replaced with anger.

After spending the final years of Bardot’s life caring for her as she had terminal cancer, eventually losing the use of both legs, he feels ousted and is now planning to take legal action against the charity.

The star poured all her energy into fighting for animals

‘Most of the people on the board have done nothing but cause me trouble,’ he adds. ‘So there are going to be lawsuits, and we’re going to fight. We’re not going to let ourselves be pushed around by these people.’

It is not a surprising situation. In the wake of someone’s death, let alone that of a multi-millionaire, the months following are often fraught with discussions over inheritance. But it is one that Bardot, who retired from the silver screen in 1973, would have been appalled by.

Having grown tired of being a global sex symbol, she had just turned 39 when she stepped back from fame to become an animal rights campaigner.

By this time she had been married three times, none of the matches lasting more than five years. Instead of spending time in Paris, she moved permanently to La Madrague, the property two miles from Saint-Tropez that she bought aged 24 after the success of her film, The Female.

Rarely seen outside the Bay of Canoubiers, the star poured all her energy into fighting for animals – a passion that remained over the next five decades.

She campaigned against hunting, slaughterhouse farming techniques and the production of horsemeat – setting up her foundation in 1986. ‘I am not a recluse. I live like an unsociable person; it’s different,’ she told the Toronto Star in 1998 when quizzed on her absence from public life, adding: ‘People get on my nerves.’

By 1992, however, she had met someone she could not only tolerate but with whom she would spend the remaining years of her life. Unlike her previous husbands – Roger Vadim and Jacques Charrier (father of her son, Nicolas-Jacques, now 66), both from the film world, and Gunter Sachs, a millionaire German socialite – Mr d’Ormale was a former businessman turned political adviser to the late Jean-Marie Le Pen, the founder of the far-Right National Front in France.

The couple had been introduced at a dinner party in Saint-Tropez, bonding over Bardot’s political views, and within the year were married at a ceremony on her son’s private estate in Norway.

But because they never had a civil ceremony in France, their marriage was never formalised in the country, automatically writing Mr d’Ormale out of any inheritance to which a spouse might usually be entitled.

It is an oversight Mr d’Ormale regrets – not, he insists, because he wants his wife’s money but because he wants to be in control of protecting her legacy and stopping her so-called ‘erasure’.

‘I told Brigitte to appoint a lawyer as executor of her will, as I didn’t want anything, but I should have kept that role myself. A few years ago, I told Brigitte, “Don’t put my name anywhere.” That way, nobody could accuse me of taking advantage of poor Brigitte or misappropriating anything.

‘In the end, we simply didn’t protect her well enough because we simply hadn’t thought about it. We should have surrounded her with better protection. Then we wouldn’t be having all these problems with these people, who are like a pack of werewolves.’

Perhaps if the couple had done this, Mr d’Ormale would not be living in his council flat, driving each morning across the bay to his former home.

While his flat is a far cry from those provided in the UK – located in the centre of the fashionable town, surrounded by trees and a pretty square filled with cafes – to Mr d’Ormale it is a ‘storage closet’. ‘What can I tell you? It’s been absolutely horrible,’ he adds, speaking of the move. ‘It’s not pleasant at all. On top of that, I still go to La Madrague to feed the cats. No one else is feeding them.’

The foundation has insisted that they were legally bound to remove Mr d’Ormale from the property six months after Bardot’s death, claiming that ‘there was never any intention to oust him from La Madrague’.

A spokesman told the Daily Mail: ‘Everyone experiences grief in their own way, but this does not reflect reality at all; he was well-supported at the time of Brigitte’s passing and in the months that followed. He simply refuses to accept having to leave La Madrague, even though it is not his home – Brigitte Bardot donated it to her foundation in 1992 – and his departure is a matter of legal obligation.

‘La Madrague belonged to Brigitte Bardot. She donated it to the foundation, not to her partner. It is worth noting that he presents himself as her husband, even though he was merely her live-in partner.

‘He was given a six-month period to vacate the premises – a timeframe stipulated by Brigitte — and the foundation helped him find an apartment in Saint-Tropez. Remaining on the premises is not an option; it exposes the foundation to legal risk.’

The foundation added that Mr d’Ormale had been granted the use of the actress’s Paris apartment for the rest of his life but refused, resulting in it being put up for sale.

But for him that apartment was not his home.

‘La Madrague represents 30 years of my life and leaving it is sad and difficult,’ he said in June upon leaving the property. ‘Especially since it is a house that is both simple and beautiful.’

Either way, Mr d’Ormale insists he will find a way to return to the house. He added: ‘I am going to fight to get La Madrague back. It is not lost yet.’

His lawyer, Aurelie-Caroline Vieugue, who specialises in inheritance law, added: ‘We shouldn’t forget that he’s 85 years old, an elderly person. He was treated deplorably by the foundation, worse than a criminal.

‘You wonder why there’s so much aggression towards a man who shared 33 years of his life with Madame Bardot. It really was a 33-year love story.’

For all his anger towards the foundation, who claim it is ‘false and insulting’ to suggest they are ‘erasing’ the actress’s legacy, there is no ill-feeling towards Bardot’s son, Nicolas-Jacques, an engineer who still lives in Norway.

The star had a turbulent relationship with her only child, who she compared to a ‘tumour growing inside of me’ while pregnant. They were later estranged for years after Nicolas-Jacques sued his mother for writing in one memoir that she would have ‘preferred to have given birth to a little dog’.

But over the years, Mr d’Ormale, according to friends, helped the pair mend their relationship, so much that Nicolas-Jacques and his family – he’s married to former Norwegian model Anna, with whom he has two daughters – would holiday in La Madrague from time to time.

‘Bernard had effectively helped open Brigitte’s heart to her son after years of neglect,’ one said. ‘The reconciliation between all of them was very moving.’

So it is unsurprising that, despite Nicolas-Jacques approving the auction so that his mother’s belongings did not sit in storage, Mr d’Ormale places no blame on Bardot’s son. ‘He’s a very nice young man. He’s an honest young man, whom Brigitte always supported, whatever people may say,’ he says.

‘Should we ask him to get involved? No, we mustn’t drag him into all of this. We have to respect his private life and not put him in a situation that might be difficult for him.’

It is easy to forget that at the centre of this explosive row is a man who lost his wife less than a year ago. After detailing the mental and physical toll of the past year, Mr d’Ormale accompanied me to Plage de La Ponche, a beach put on the map by Bardot’s most well-known film, And God Created Woman.

It is places like this in Saint-Tropez, alongside their home, where he is reminded of his wife the most. ‘My fondest memory? There are thousands of them. Every single one is a fond memory,’ he says. ‘She was an exceptionally intelligent woman and I miss her terribly.’

It is impossible to know what Bardot would make of this situation – her husband away from the place he called home for so long.

Yet maybe it had been part of her long-term plan to ensure her fight to protect animals continued long after her death.

As she once said: ‘I gave my beauty and my youth to men. I am going to give my wisdom and experience to animals.’