Bénigne Dauvergne de Saint-Mars

Bénigne Dauvergne de Saint-Mars (* 1626 ; † September 18, 1708 in the Bastille, Paris ) was a French soldier and prison director who supervised important state prisoners of Louis XIV .

Saint Mars

Saint-Mars was orphaned early and was adopted by an uncle (de Blainviliers). In 1650 he got a job in the 1st Company of the King's Musketeers. In 1660 he became a corporal and in 1664 a sergeant. In December 1664, on the recommendation of his captain (capitaine) d´Artagnan , with whom he had arrested the powerful minister Nicolas Fouquet , he became the prison guard of the fortress Pignerol ( Pinerolo ) at the foot of the Alps in Piedmont . He took up his post in January 1665. Other important prisoners were added later, such as the Duke of Lauzun and the mysterious man with the iron mask (from 1669). To guard it, he received his orders directly from War Minister Louvois . The prisoners who were still alive followed him to the other prisons of which he was in command: the Alpine fortress of Exiles (May 1681 to January 13, 1687), the island of Sainte-Marguerite in the Gulf of Cannes (April 30, 1687 to April 8, 1698) ) and finally, as the coronation, the Bastille in Paris from September 18, 1698 until his death.

For his service as a guard of important state prisoners he was rewarded princely by Louis XIV. In 1672 he was ennobled as Palteau de Dimont et d´Erimont. He had land worth ten million francs. In addition, 20 million cash were found in his chests when he died. According to Pagnol (1965) he had an annual salary of 240,000 francs and ancillary income of the same amount. In addition, there were special bonuses from the king in considerable amounts on several occasions. From 1680 he bought the Dixmont Castle in the Yonne department and the associated rights of rule (censives). He also owned the castle at Palteau Armeau in the same department, where he taught his transfer to the Bastille most lived and the "prisoner in the Iron Mask". Saint Mars also took good care of his subordinate musketeers (in Pignerol he commanded a corps of 66 men) and was popular with them.

Saint Mars was married to a daughter of the War Council Damorezan, whose sister was the maitresse of War Minister Louvois. He had two sons, the last, Jacques-Bénigne, fell in 1704 and so his nephew Corbé de Formanoir, who had previously served as his musketeer, came into the inheritance.

literature

• Jean-Luc Dauphin: Bénigne Dauvergne, dit Saint-Mars, ou le vrai père du Masque de fer , Etudes villeneuviennes, no.33, 2005.
• Pagnol: The Iron Mask , dtv 1968.