Bathilde d'Orléans
Louise Marie Thérèse Bathilde, d'Orléans (born July 9, 1750 in Saint-Cloud , † January 10, 1822 in Paris ) was a member of the French royal family from the House of Bourbon-Orléans . Through their marriage, she became Duchess of Bourbon , Princess of Condé.
Life
Bathilde was the daughter of Duke Ludwig Philipp I of Orléans and his first wife Princess Louise Henriette de Bourbon . Together with her only brother Louis-Philippe-Joseph , called Philippe Égalité, she grew up in Saint-Cloud and Versailles . After her mother's death, Bathilde was sent to a convent at the request of her father's jealous lover, Charlotte-Jeanne Béraud de la Haye de Riou, Marquise de Montesson .
In 1770, Princess Bathilde became with her cousin (second degree) Louis VI. Henri Joseph de Bourbon, prince de Condé , only son of Louis V. Joseph, duc de Bourbon, prince de Condé and his first wife Princess Charlotte de Rohan, married. The marriage resulted in only one son: Louis Antoine Henri de Bourbon, duc d'Enghien (1772–1804).
In 1778 her husband's adultery was made public, but Princess Bathilde had to bear the consequences, as she was no longer received at the royal court at Versailles. She retired to Chantilly Castle , where she dealt with the secret sciences, astrology and dream interpretations. From a liaison with a naval officer, she gave birth to a daughter who was raised as his own child by her secretary.
During the Revolution, like her brother, Princess Bathilde was enthusiastic about democracy. She called herself Citizeness Vérité (Bathilde Vérité) and gave up her property before it could be confiscated. As of May 1793, all members of the Bourbon house were placed under house arrest, and her brother died under the guillotine in November of the same year . Fortunately, she was freed from captivity during the reign of terror and then lived in the Élysée Palace in Paris. In 1797 all Bourbons were banished from France ; Bathilde went to Spain with her illegitimate daughter . In Barcelona she ran a pharmacy and a hospital for the poor.
Kidnapping and murder of her son
After an uncovered conspiracy in August 1803 around Georges Cadoudal , Jean-Charles Pichegru and Jean-Victor Moreau , who were planning an assassination attempt on Napoleon in Malmaison , Bonaparte, with the help of his police minister Joseph Fouché , looked for a Bourbon man to make an example of. Her son proudly described himself as an enemy of Bonaparte and revolutionary France, but denied any accusation of participating in a conspiracy against the life of the First Consul and requested an interview with him, which was refused because Napoleon ordered the immediate execution of the death sentence and, moreover, had moved away from Paris. On March 21, 1804 at four in the morning the death sentence was pronounced and half an hour later a firing squad carried out in the moat of Vincennes Castle .
When Princess Bathilde moved to Paris in 1814, she was greeted with applause as the mother of the " Martyr of Vincennes". Her son's body was exhumed and buried in the church in Vincennes.
Web links
- La duchesse de Bourbon (French)
- Les Aventures des Bourbon-Condé (French)
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Bathilde d'Orléans |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Louise Marie Thérèse Bathilde d'Orléans |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | french princess |
| DATE OF BIRTH | July 9, 1750 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Saint-Cloud |
| DATE OF DEATH | January 10, 1822 |
| Place of death | Paris |