Louis Jean Marie de Bourbon, duc de Penthièvre

Louis Jean Marie de Bourbon, duc de Penthièvre (November 16, 1725 – March 4, 1793) was the son of Louis-Alexandre de Bourbon, comte de Toulouse. As such, he was the grandson of Louis XIV and the marquise de Montespan. From birth he was known as the duc de Penthièvre. He also possessed the following titles:

* prince de Lamballe,
**title given later as a courtesy title to the duke's only surviving son,
* duc de Rambouillet,
**title inherited in 1737 at the death of his father, who owned the château de Rambouillet, the birthplace of the duc de Penthièvre,
* duc d'Aumale (1775),
* duc de Gisors,
* duc de Châteauvillain,
* duc d'Arc-en-Barrois,
* duc d'Amboise,
* duc de Carignan,
* comte d'Eu
*comte de Guingamp

Biography

Louis Jean Marie de Bourbon was born at the château de Rambouillet, the son of Louis XIV's youngest illegitimate son with Mme de Montespan, the comte de Toulouse, and his wife, Marie Victoire de Noailles, one of the daughters of Anne Jules de Noailles, duc de Noailles.

Upon his father's death, at the age of twelve, he succeeded to his father's military and titles and posts:
*Amiral de France (Admiral of France),
*Grand Maître de France, (Grand Master of France),
*Grand veneur de France, (Grand Huntsman of France),
*Maréchal de France , (Marshal of France),
*Gouverneur de Bretagne, (Governor of Brittany). He served in the military under his maternal uncle, the maréchal de Noailles, and fought brilliantly at Dettingen in 1743 and Fontenoy in 1745.

On 2 July 1743, he was made a maréchal de camp (Field Marshal) and the next year lieutenant général (Lieutenant General). He was also a holder of the:

*Ordre de la Toison d'or or Order of the Golden Fleece (1740),
*Ordre du Saint-Esprit or Order of the Holy Spirit (1742).

Marriage

It was suggested by some that he marry his cousin, Louise Henriette de Bourbon-Conti, the eldest granddaughter of his paternal aunt, Louise-Françoise de Bourbon. This idea was abandoned as Louise-Élisabeth de Bourbon-Condé, Louise Henriette's mother, had her eye on the House of Orléans and its heir Louis Philippe I d'Orléans.

In 1744, the duc de Penthièvre married Marie Thérèse Félicité d'Este, princesse de Modène (1726-1754), the daughter of Francesco III d'Este, the sovereign Duke of Modena and Reggio ("duc de Modène et Reggio" in French). The couple was very happy and had seven children. Unfortunately, only two of them survived infancy, and the duchesse de Penthièvre died in childbirth in 1754.

Children

The seven children of the marriage were:

*Louis Marie de Bourbon (1746-1749);
*Louis-Alexandre de Bourbon, "prince de Lamballe" (1747-1768),
**married the Princess Marie Thérèse Louise of Savoy-Carignan (1749-1792), who, better known as princesse de Lamballe, became a close friend of Marie-Antoinette;
*Jean Marie de Bourbon (1748-1755), "duc de Châteauvillain" ;
*Vincent Marie Louis de Bourbon (1750-1752), "comte de Guingamp" ;
*Marie Louise de Bourbon (1751-1753) ;
*Louise Marie Adélaïde de Bourbon, "Mademoiselle de Penthièvre" (1753-1821):
**married Louis Philippe II d'Orléans; they were the parents of Louis-Philippe I, King of the French;
* Louis Marie Félicité (1754), died at birth.

Later life

The duc de Penthièvre then retired to the country sharing his time between two of his many residences, the château de Rambouillet and the château de Sceaux, and devoting the rest of his life to dispensing charity. During the French Revolution, he gave refuge in Sceaux to the poet Jean Pierre Claris de Florian, who had formerly been one of his pages and his secretary at the château d'Anet.

In 1791, he moved to the château de Bizy [http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ch%C3%A2teau_de_Bizy] , at Vernon in Normandy [ [http://www.vernon-visite.org/rf2/patri6.htm vernon visite château patrimoine 6 ] ] , where his daughter joined him in April of that year after leaving her husband, the duc d'Orléans. Still respected by all as the Revolution was progressing, he was never bothered by the revolutionaries, although his family was not spared: on September 3, 1792, his daughter-in-law, the princesse de Lamballe, was savagely massacred; on January 21, 1793, his cousin Louis XVI was executed. He never saw the arrest of his daughter in April 1793, as he died on March 4, 1793 in his château de Bizy. In the night of 6 to 7 March, his body was brought clandestinely to Dreux where it was buried in the family crypt in the "Collégiale Saint-Étienne".

During his lifetime, the duc de Penthièvre had had one passion: collecting watches.

Gallery

Legacy

House of Bourbon-Penthièvre

Louis Jean Marie de Bourbon was also the head and founder of the house of Bourbon-Penthièvre, an extinct and illegitimate branch of the House of Bourbon, which was originally called the House of Bourbon-Toulouse after the title of his father Louis-Alexandre de Bourbon, comte de Toulouse.

The duc de Penthièvre's wealth

The duc de Penthièvre was one of the wealthiest men of his day and probably the richest in France. He was known to be very charitable. Most of his vast riches derived from the fortune of "La Grande Mademoiselle", the first cousin of King Louis XIV. In 1681, Louis XIV had given his consent that his cousin marry the duc de Lauzun, the only man she ever loved, on the condition she make the duc du Maine, the illegitimate son of the king and Mme de Montespan, her heir. All she could be made to accept, against her will, was to give the young duc the county of Eu and the principality of Dombes. Upon which, untrue to his word, Louis XIV refused to let her marry Lauzun [Philippe Erlanger, "Louis XIV", translated from the French by Stephen Cox, Praeger Publishers, New York, 1970, pp. 192-193.] , ["Mémoires de La Grande Mademoiselle", Troisième partie, chapitre 3, http://penelope.uchicago.edu/mlle/partie3/chap303.html] .

The duc du Maine's fortune was enlarged with many expensive gifts from his adoring father. His two sons inherited his fortune and when they both died childless, the duc de Penthièvre was the sole heir to du Maine's wealth. The châteaux at Sceaux, Anet, Aumale, Dreux and Gisors were part of this huge inheritance.

In addition, being his only child, the duc de Penthièvre was the only heir of the comte de Toulouse from whom he inherited the Hôtel de Toulouse in Paris, and the château de Rambouillet surrounded by the game-rich Rambouillet forest. The "Hôtel de Toulouse" was the family's residence in Paris. The duc de Penthièvre willed it to his daughter, Louise Marie Adélaïde de Bourbon-Penthièvre. It was located opposite the Palais-Royal [The former "Hôtel de Toulouse" is now the seat of the "Banque de France".] .

Over the years, the duc de Penthièvre also acquired other estates:

*château de Chanteloup, a vast château [The château de Chanteloup was demolished in the 19th century.] situated in the Touraine province of France. He received this after the death of the duc de Choiseul, in 1785,
*château d'Amboise, a castle in the Loire Valley,
*château at Châteauneuf-sur-Loire,
*château de La Ferté-Vidame, this château was home to the "sharp-penned" memorialist, the duc de Saint-Simon,

Because his male heir, the prince de Lamballe, predeceased him in 1768, his only surviving child, his daughter, became the sole heir to his fortune. In 1769, she had married the duc de Chartres, future duc d'Orléans, known to history as Philippe Égalité. As a result, what she managed (after the Bourbon Restoration) to recuperate of her fortune confiscated during the French Revolution, passed, upon her death in 1821, into the possession of the House of Orléans.

Chapelle royale de Dreux

The lands of the "Comté de Dreux" (County of Dreux), had been given to the duc de Penthièvre by his cousin Louis XVI. In November 1783, after having sold the château de Rambouillet to Louis XVI, Penthièvre transferred the nine bodies of his family (his parents, his wife and six of his seven children) from the 12th century Saint-Lubin church in the village of Rambouillet to the Collégiale Saint-Étienne de Dreux, where he himself was buried after his death in March 1793. On November 1793, a revolutionary mob desecrated the family crypt and threw the ten bodies in a mass grave in the "Collégiale" cemetery ("cimetière des Chanoines"). In 1816, his daughter, Louise Marie Adélaïde de Bourbon-Penthièvre, duchesse douairière d'Orléans, had a new chapel built on the site of that grave, as the final resting place for the members of the "House of Bourbon-Toulouse-Penthièvre". After the accession to the throne of her son, Louis-Philippe I, King of the French, the chapel was named Chapelle Royale de Dreux [http:::fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chapelle_royale_de_Dreux] , and became the necropolis of the royal Orléans family. It contains the remains of seventy-five members of the Bourbon-Penthièvre and Orléans families.

Rue Penthièvre in Paris

A street in Paris near the Avenue des Champs Élysées is named for the duc de Penthièvre [Félix de Rochegude, "Promenades dans toutes les rues de Paris par arrondissements", Hachette, Paris, 1910, p. 30.] . At the site of n° 11 rue de Penthièvre, an hôtel particulier of the First French Empire period with a large garden, is believed to have once been the residence of the duc de Penthièvre's grandson, the future King Louis-Philippe of the French, in his youth. In the late 19th century, n° 11 housed the American Embassy. This address became famous in the early 20th century as the couture salon of the British designer, "Lucile".

Ancestry

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boxstyle_2=background-color: #FFA1A1;
boxstyle_3=background-color: #FFC0C0;
boxstyle_4=background-color: #FFE1E1;
1= 1. Louis Jean Marie de Bourbon, duc de Penthièvre
2= 2. Louis-Alexandre de Bourbon, comte de Toulouse
3= 3. Marie Victoire de Noailles
4= 4. Louis XIV of France
5= 5. Françoise-Athénaïs, marquise de Montespan
6= 6. Anne-Jules, 2nd duc de Noailles
7= 7. Marie-Françoise de Bournonville
8= 8. Louis XIII of France
9= 9. Anne of Austria
10= 10. Gabriel de Rochechouart, duc de Mortemart
11= 11. Diane de Grandseigne
12= 12. Anne, 1st duc de Noailles
13= 13. Louise Boyer
14= 14. -
15= 15. -

References

*1911

Titles

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