In the summer of 1904, after a secret vacation with Debussy in Jersey, Debussy wrote to his wife Rosalie ('Lilly') Texier announcing the end of their marriage.
Distraught, Texier attempted suicide with a revolver in the Place de la Concorde.
The ensuing scandal alienated Bardac and Debussy from friends and family, and in the spring of 1905 they fled to England, where they finalized their divorces, Emma from Sigismond on 4 May, Debussy from Rosalie on 2 August.
They returned to Paris in time for the birth, on 30 October, of their daughter Claude-Emma, nicknamed 'Chouchou' , and dedicatee of his Children's Corner Suite composed in 1909.
The couple bought a large house in a courtyard development off the Avenue du Bois de Boulogne (now Avenue Foch) where Debussy would reside for the rest of his life.
Bardac eventually married Debussy in 1908, their troubled union enduring until Debussy's death 10 years later.
Claude-Emma died while recovering from diphtheria in 1919 when the doctor gave her the wrong treatment, the year after her father's death.
Emma Bardac died in 1934 and, like Claude-Emma, was laid to rest in Debussy's grave in the Cimetière de Passy in Paris.