Louise-Élisabeth de Croÿ de Tourzel

Louise-Elisabeth de Tourzel
Louise-Élisabeth de Croÿ de Tourzel

Louise-Élisabeth de Croÿ de Tourzel (Louise Élisabeth Félicité Françoise Armande Anne Marie Jeanne Joséphine de Croÿ de Tourzel) 11 June 1749 – 15 May 1832), the Marquise de Tourzel (later Duchess) was a French noble and courtier. She was the Governess of the Children of France from 1789 until 1792. Decades after the French Revolution, de Tourzel published widely read memoirs, which presented a unique perspective on the royal family.

Life

Louise Élisabeth was born in Paris, into the illustrious Croÿ family during the reign of Louis XV. The Duchess's father was the Duke Louis Ferdinand Joseph of Havré and his mother the Princess Marie Louise of Montmorency-Luxembourg. She was married in 1766, at the age of seventeen, to the Marquis de Tourzel. They enjoyed a happy marriage for twenty years, in which Louise Élisabeth bore six children. Her husband was killed in a hunting accident in 1786.[1] She was a staunch supporter of the House of Bourbon, and had this motto engraved on a ring she refused to part with: Lord, save the King, the Dauphin, and his sister![2]

French Revolution

In 1789, after the fall of the Bastille, many members of the Queen's intimate circle were forced to flee abroad. The Duchesse de Polignac, the queen's favourite and the governess to the royal children, was forced to emigrate to Switzerland.[3] Marie Antoinette appointed Louise Élisabeth to the newly vacant post, with particular attention to be paid to the Dauphin, Louis-Charles. The Marquise was advised to curb the Dauphin's fear of loud noises, particularly the barking of the many dogs at Versailles.[4]

From this intimate position, the Marquise de Tourzel was able to watch the disintegration of the Ancien Régime. After an angry mob of hungry women incited by revolutionaries stormed the Palace of Versailles on October 5, 1789, the Marquise accompanied the royal family to live in the Tuileries Palace in Paris.[4] Tourzel's loyalty was strong, and she refused to abandon the royal children as political strife in the nation dramatically increased. She even accompanied the King and his family on a dangerous attempt to flee Paris for a royalist stronghold in Montmédy.[5] This attempt failed, and the entire party was dragged back to Paris by republicans.[5]

After the abolition of the monarchy in 1792, Tourzel was separated from the royal family and imprisoned in La Force Prison and the Prison Port-Libre.[6] Also imprisoned at the same time were Tourzel's daughter, Pauline de Tourzel, and Marie Antoinette's most loyal friend, the Princesse de Lamballe.[6] Shortly after their imprisonment, the three women found themselves victims of the September Massacres, when thousands of incarcerated people in Paris were massacred by violent revolutionaries who were trying to rid the prisons of jailed aristocrats. Tourzel and her daughter were smuggled out of the prison by a mysterious gentleman, but Lamballe was not so fortunate.[4] She was savagely murdered, and her severed head was then paraded around the city.[7]

In January 1793, Louis XVI was executed.[8] In October, Queen Marie Antoinette was also sent to the guillotine.[8] Tourzel was devastated by their deaths, and she was equally shocked to hear of the death of Louis-Charles in 1795.[4] Several times over the coming decades, Tourzel was accosted by various men pretending to be "Louis XVII of France".[4]

Post revolution

During the Bourbon Restoration, Tourzel was made a duchess by a grateful King Charles X.[9] She later published her memoirs, which are an invaluable historical account of the final days of the royal household.[1] Her daughter, Pauline, became a lady-in-waiting to Marie Antoinette's only surviving child, Marie-Thérèse-Charlotte, Duchesse d'Angoulême.

In fiction

The Marquise has featured in several novels about the French Royal family, including Trianon and Madame Royale by Elena Maria Vidal, Flaunting, Extravagant Queen by Jean Plaidy and the Marie Antoinette romances by Alexandre Dumas, père. The character of the Marquise de Tourzel appeared in the 1956 French film Marie-Antoinette reine de France.[10]

References

  1. 1 2 Tourzel, Louise Élisabeth; François Joseph de Pérusse Des Cars (1986). Memoirs of the Duchess de Tourzel: Governess to the Children of France During the Years 1789, 1790, 1791, 1792, 1793 and 1795. Remington & Co.
  2. ↑ Imbert de Saint-Amand, Arthur; Léon Imbert de Saint-Amand; Elizabeth Gilbert Martin (1915). The Youth of the Duchess of Angoulême. University of Michigan: C. Scribner's sons. p. 118.
  3. ↑ McCarthy, Justin Huntly (1897). The French Revolution. Harvard University: Harper.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 Cadbury, Deborah (2003). The Lost King of France: How DNA Solved the Mystery of the Murdered Son of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette. Macmillan. ISBN 0-312-32029-9.
  5. 1 2 Price, Munro (2003). The Road from Versailles: Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, and the Fall of the French Monarchy. Macmillan. ISBN 0-312-26879-3.
  6. 1 2 Lever, Evelyne; Catherine Temerson (2001). Marie Antoinette: The Last Queen of France. Macmillan. pp. 282–283. ISBN 0-312-28333-4.
  7. ↑ Fraser, Antonia (2001). Marie Antoinette: The Journey. Anchor Books. p. 389. ISBN 0-385-48949-8.
  8. 1 2 Hazen, Charles Downer (1917). Modern European History. Harvard University: H. Holt and company. pp. 123, 135.
  9. ↑ Webster, Nesta Helen (1937). Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette During the Revolution. University of Michigan: G. P. Putnam's sons.
  10. ↑ "Marie-Antoinette reine de France". IMDb.com. IMDb.com, Inc. Retrieved 2008-10-20.
Court offices
Preceded by
The Duchess of Polignac		 Governess of the
Children of France
1789–1792 		Monarchy abolished
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