Legendary fashion designer Coco Chanel ruled Paris haute couture for almost six decades, but felt bitter about her childhood after being abandoned by her father in 1895 at age 12 at a convent orphanage in central France when her mother succumbed to tuberculosis. Named Gabrielle Chasnel by the sadistic nuns - later changed to Chanel - the young girl was unwilling to accept an impoverished future with no benefactor and ...