A King's Ransom: The Life of Charles Thèveneau de Morande, Blackmailer, Scandalmonger & Master-Spy

A KING’S RANSOM
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A King’s Ransom
The Life of Charles Théveneau de Morande,
Blackmailer, Scandalmonger & Master-Spy
Simon Burrows
Continuum UK, The Tower Building, 11 York Road, London SE1 7NX
Continuum US, 80 Maiden Lane, Suite 704, New York, NY 10038
www.continuumbooks.com
Copyright © Simon Burrows 2010
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted

in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
recording or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission
from the publishers.
First published 2010
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978-0826-41989-7
Typeset by Pindar NZ, Auckland, New Zealand

Printed and bound by MPG Books Ltd, Cornwall, Great Britain
Contents
Illustrations vii
Prefatory note xi
Prologue: Auto da fé xiii
1 The Sins of his Youth 1

2 The Armour-Plated Gazetteer 23
3 A King’s Ransom 45
4 Figaro’s Nemesis 73
5 On His Majesty’s Secret Service 103
6 Poacher Turned Gamekeeper: Morande, Police Spy 131
7 The Magician, the Necklace and the Poisonous Pig 155
8 The First Revolutionary Journalist 179
9 Afterlife: Morande in Fiction, Myth and History 207
Glossary 215
Abbreviations 217
Notes 219
Sources 257
Acknowledgements 265
Index 267
Illustrations
1 Contemporary British map of the Battle of Vellinghausen 8

2 Chancellor Maupeou 34
3 Frontispiece from the Gazetier cuirassé 41
4 The Introduction of the Countess Du Barre [sic] to Louis XV 60
5 The French Lawyer in London 71
6 Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais 74
7 The Female Minister Plenipotentiary 95
8 Charles-Claude Théveneau de Morande 107
9 Frontispiece from Le Diable dans un bénitier 139
10 Madame de La Motte 169
In memory of
Danalee Burrows
La calomnie, Monsieur, vous ne savez guère ce que vous dédaignez, j’ai vu les
plus honnêtes gens prêts d’en être accablés.
Calumny, Sir, you hardly know what you are disdaining: I have seen the best
of men laid low by it.
BEAUMARCHAIS,
THE BARBER OF SEVILLE
Prefatory note
For readability, I have used English versions of French book and manuscript
titles and editions wherever a suitable equivalent exists. Where feasible I have
consulted English language editions and used their translations. Other transla-
tions, save where indicated, are my own.
Where no translation is given for a French phrase or title, it is because the
wording is too close to the English equivalent to require one. In a few cases, it
has been necessary to use French or eighteenth-century English terms that are
unfamiliar and lack precise modern English equivalents. Most are explained at
first use. A short glossary is also provided.
Noble titles have been anglicized. However, in order to distinguish between
the two titles, vicomtesse and marquise have been rendered as viscountess and
marquise respectively rather than as marchioness.
There were approximately 24 French livres to the pound sterling; 20 livres
made a Louis. British money equivalents for French figures are usually given in
the text.
Prologue: Auto da fé
On a late April evening in 1774, a cart stacked high with freshly printed books
turned out of Duke Street. It wound a few hundred yards through the streets
of London and took the road to Mary-le-Bone, then still a village on the city’s
outskirts. There, in the kiln of a glasshouse hired for the occasion, the volumes
were burned. That very night in Versailles King Louis XV of France fell terminally
ill. Within a fortnight he was dead: poisoned, according to one satirical report, by
toxic fumes wafted across the English Channel from the bonfire of malodorous
books. Just one copy of the fatal text was saved from the flames, to be ritually
dismembered and distributed among the six men who witnessed or recorded
this strange auto da fé.1
This select crowd contained some of the most extraordinary, celebrated
and notorious Frenchmen of their era. It included the renegade diplomat,
the Chevalier d’Eon, a French agent who had helped to negotiate for the sup-
pression of the books.2 In the mid 1760s, d’Eon had stunned Europe with his
unprecedented exposés of French diplomatic life and startling allegations that
the ambassador to London had conspired with the foreign minister to kill him.
Subsequently, even more extraordinary rumours had begun to circulate about
him: it was said that he was a woman.
The second witness was Marie-Félix Guerrier de Lormoy, a one-time cavalry
officer and Captain of Hunts to Louis XV’s grandson, the Count de Provence.
Lormoy was famous for his large horse-breeding establishment, which had been
founded with government encouragement. Unfortunately, Lormoy’s business
acumen was no match for his horsemanship; his enterprise collapsed, and he fled
to London. There, he too attempted to negotiate the book’s suppression.
The third witness was the dramatist Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais,
the rising star of French theatre. His comic creation and alter ego, the wily
intriguer Figaro, would soon establish him as the acknowledged successor to
Voltaire. Beaumarchais had been sent to London by Louis XV himself to sup-
press the book and hoped his mission would restore him to favour after suffering
two disastrous legal judgments. As cunning as his alter ego, Beaumarchais had
succeeded where other negotiators had failed. The books were burned as part of
a deal he had brokered.
Accompanying Beaumarchais was his secretary, Paul-Philippe Gudin de la
xiv PROLOGUE
Brenellerie. As Beaumarchais’ first biographer, Gudin would one day chronicle

these events.
Then there was the aristocratic Count de Lauraguais, a playboy pamphleteer,
who had introduced the sport of horse-racing to France. Lauraguais’ family
was among the most prominent in France: it supplied the court with both royal
mistresses and government ministers, including the Duke de Choiseul, France’s
leading minister in the 1750s and 1760s. However, to his contemporaries
Lauraguais was best known for his stormy on-off love affair with the actress
Sophie Arnould, a celebrated wit and courtesan who was perhaps the most
talked-about French woman of her age. Their antics provided endless copy for
gossipy newsheets such as the Mémoires secrets for more than a dozen years.3
However, Lauraguais was also a bosom companion of Louis XV, who had scan-
dalized Europe by taking to his bed in close succession four of Lauraguais’ aunts,
the aristocratic Nesle sisters. The scandal was not just about morality: it had
serious political and religious repercussions. As the Church considered sexual
relations with sisters to be incest, many of Louis’ subjects believed subsequent
political and military disasters were divine punishment for the king’s sin.
The concern of Louis’ subjects only worsened when the king abandoned tradi-
tion by taking his last two long-term mistresses from beyond the charmed circle
of the aristocracy. It was bad enough that one, Madame de Pompadour, was the
wife of a wealthy financier. But most of the royal court found his last mistress,
the young, stunningly beautiful but decidedly plebian Jeanne Bécu, known to
history as Madame du Barry, completely beyond the pale. For if she had not
exactly been a streetwalker, she had certainly been a courtesan, working her way
up through noble lovers with the assistance of her ambitious pander, the Count
du Barry. Eventually she caught the eye of ambitious courtiers, who slipped her
into the royal bed and married her to du Barry’s destitute good-for-nothing
brother, the Viscount du Barry, in order that she could be named official mistress,
an honour reserved for the nobility. In a society where power was determined
by proximity to the king’s body, her elevation infuriated the powerful Choiseul
clan, the aristocracy and most of the royal family, many of whom snubbed her
publicly or spread malicious rumours about her. Thus the royal sex life fuelled
widespread discontent at all levels of society. By 1774, Louis XV was probably
the most unpopular king in French history.
Lauraguais was among those who risked the king’s wrath over du Barry,
particularly when he audaciously nicknamed Laurence Lefebvre, the serving-
girl he had just taken as his mistress, la comtesse du Tonneau [the Countess of
the Tun]. This sarcastic word play on the wits’ punning nickname for du Barry,
la comtesse du Baril [the Countess of the Barrel], did not amuse the king.4 As
Lauraguais’ opposition extended beyond such drollery to writing pamphlets
against du Barry’s ministerial allies, he found it prudent to remove himself from
PROLOGUE xv
court. So it was that he found himself in self-imposed exile in London and able
to play a part in suppressing the malodorous book. This might help to win back
the favour of the king and Madame du Barry, for the book concerned them.
The final witness was the author of the books. His name was Charles-Claude
Théveneau de Morande and he is the subject of this biography.5 After his dissolute
youth and a life of crime and debauchery, Morande came to the attention of the
French government and public in 1771 as the author of Le Gazetier cuirassé ou
anecdotes scandaleuses de la cour de France [The Armour-Plated Gazetteer or
Scandalous Anecdotes of the French Court]. This satirical and sexually salacious
pamphlet attack on the French government brimmed over with anecdotes attack-
ing government ministers, courtiers and high society. Chief among its targets
were Louis XV and Madame du Barry. The work enjoyed a succès de scandale,
selling like hot cakes to English aristocrats and underground bookdealers in
France. The French secret police considered it one of the most toxic libels they
had ever encountered.
Flush with success, Morande turned to blackmail, threatening to publish
revelations concerning some of the most distinguished people in France. And
because he wrote from the haven of London there was little that they could do
to stop him. In 1772, Morande turned his attentions to Madame du Barry, who
had every reason to fear his pen, particularly since his insinuations that she had
jumped straight from brothel to royal boudoir by reinvigorating the jaded sexual
appetite of the libertine monarch were not so far from the truth.
Morande’s writings had already shown that he was familiar with the demi-
monde of Parisian courtesans in which she began her career, even if rumours
that he was once her lover are probably a later invention.6 Indeed, the very title
of Morande’s new work – Secret Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure, or Historical
Researches on the Adventures of Madame la Countess du Barry from her Cradle
until the Bed of Honour – threatened more intimate revelations than any previous
biographer had dared. Already in the Gazetier cuirassé Morande had ‘revealed’
that she had turned tricks in the celebrated brothel of Madame Gourdan and
perfumed her genitals with an amber douche to keep herself fresh for her royal
lover. No wonder then that du Barry was worried about further ‘revelations’ and
persuaded the king and his foreign minister, the Duke d’Aiguillon, to try to stop
Morande’s work seeing the light of day.
At first the negotiation went slowly. The blackmailer demanded more than
the French government had expected, and so a plot was hatched to kidnap him
instead. This was a time-honoured way for the French to deal with scandalmon-
gering authors, but this time it went spectacularly wrong. The kidnappers were
thwarted and had to flee England and, in the aftermath, Morande was paid off
by the royal treasury. In April 1774, he agreed to destroy every copy of his work
and associated manuscripts and never again to publish or contribute to printed
xvi PROLOGUE
attacks on the royal family, ministers or servants of the French Crown. In return
the monarchy paid him a large lump sum and a life annuity. For the French gov-
ernment this was a shameful transaction, and it soon became notorious. A traitor
who had tarnished the reputation of the French crown and its ministers had
extorted riches beyond the dreams of most of Louis XV’s subjects. For Morande
it was a spectacular coup. As he watched the last books being thrown into the
kiln, he was entitled to feel a mixture of satisfaction and trepidation. He had
blackmailed a monarch. But how much longer would he live to tell the tale?
This was the defining moment of Morande’s life and reputation. For con-
temporaries and historians it established him as the most notorious and
successful blackmailer and scandalous pamphleteer of his age. The Chevalier
d’Eon denounced him as ‘nothing but a vile libeller, an infamous Aretin,7 and the
basest coward that ever existed in the kingdom of scoundrels’. To Beaumarchais
he was ‘a monster who has never known any sense of gratitude but to knife me
if he were able to’. And in the words of the prominent revolutionary Girondin,
Pierre-Louis Manuel, ‘he was a thief even before he became a libertine, and first
visited a brothel in order to steal a gold box’.8
Historians have treated Morande in much the same way. He has been vari-
ously described as ‘the incarnation of an eighteenth-century rogue’, ‘a minor king
among blackmailers’, and ‘a flesh and blood Figaro, so devious that he exploited
Beaumarchais himself ’.9 This is not to say that he has been universally dismissed
as a mere criminal. The influential American historian Robert Darnton reserves
a more important role for him. He thinks Morande’s Gazetier cuirassé served as
the prototype for the scurrilous works of a generation of hack pamphleteers who
dragged the reputation of the French monarchy through the gutter, stripping it
of political legitimacy. He thus supplied one of the sparks from which the French
Revolution exploded.10 According to Darnton’s figures, Morande was also one of
the five best-selling authors supplying France’s extensive clandestine book trade.
In the 1770s and 1780s, his works supposedly outsold those of every philosophe
except Voltaire and the Baron d’Holbach.11
Yet Morande was much more than a petty criminal and pedlar of popular
infamies. In his efforts to make a pretty penny and rehabilitate himself with the
monarchy he had besmirched, he was to turn his hand to many other activities.
He was by turns a secret police agent, spy, journalist, political theorist, practi-
cal reformer, and apologist for constitutional monarchy. Such activities had a
considerable, though often concealed, influence, particularly as he was associated
with many of the most colourful and influential literary, political and criminal
figures of his day. Thus Morande’s life-story serves as a means both to discover
the seamier side of life and letters in the eighteenth century and to follow the
tumultuous political developments on both sides of the English Channel in the
Age of the Revolutions.
1
The Sins of his Youth
On 10 November 1741, Louis Théveneau and his wife Philiberte Belin bap-
tized their first-born child in the parish church of Saint-Laurent in the small
Burgundian town of Arnay-le-Duc. They named him Charles-Claude in honour
of his uncle, Claude Théveneau, and his godfather and paternal grandfather
Charles.1 As was customary, a crowd of friends and relatives gathered to welcome
the day-old infant into the family of Christ and worldwide Roman Catholic
communion. Among them were Philiberte’s cousin, Claude Bauzon, a lawyer and
local attorney, and his wife Claudine Ravier, who was the child’s godmother. Had
they the gift of prophecy, the godparents might have renounced responsibility for
bringing up the little devil by the font. For in later life this same Charles-Claude
Théveneau would be described as ‘the greatest scoundrel in three kingdoms’. His
name, in a century notorious for dissolute morals, would become a byword for
immorality.2 But for now, all that lies in the future.
There is nothing in the child’s background to hint at such a destiny. His family
are solidly bourgeois and impeccably respectable members of Arnay’s tightly knit,
small-town élite. Louis Théveneau is a notary [procureur du roi], and Charles
Théveneau senior a master surgeon. Claude Théveneau, also a surgeon, holds
an MA in medicine. The baby’s maternal grandfather is a merchant, as are the
child’s great uncle Guy Théveneau and several of his cousins. Other relatives are
successful tanners, while his uncle Claude Riambourg is another lawyer. In short,
Charles Théveneau’s relatives are big fish in a small pond; they are also pillars of
their little community.3
Although upwardly mobile for several generations, no one in this extended
family enjoys noble status and the taxation and legal privileges that go with it.
Doubtless it is something they dream of, but for now it remains a distant aspira-
tion. Nevertheless, by 1765, Charles-Claude Théveneau will have awarded himself
the noble title Chevalier de Morande. As a lie is always most effective when it
contains a grain of truth, he takes his ‘title’ from a small parcel of family land,
one of several the Théveneaus rent to peasant farmers. Such fraudulent titles were
a common conceit among those who aspired to move up in the world. Before
the revolution of 1789 did away with nobility, even prominent future Jacobins,
including ‘Georges d’Anton’, ‘Maximilien de Robespierre’ and ‘Jacques-Pierre
Brissot de Warville’, gave themselves airs in this manner. In Morande’s case,
2 A KING’S RANSOM
however, the title is taken as a criminal alias and a means of rubbing shoulders
with the nobility in search of a better class of dupe. Only after his identity is
rumbled by the police will he start calling himself Théveneau de Morande.4 But
as Morande is the name we find most often in contemporary sources, it is also
the name we shall use.
In 1741, Arnay-le-Duc was a small provincial town of a little over 2,000 inhab-
itants, strategically placed on the river Arroux on the road between Autun and
Dijon. As the largest community between these two regional centres, it served as
a commercial and social centre for the surrounding farms and villages. It hosted
the local market every Thursday, and a fair six times a year. Due to its strategic
position, it had also been heavily fortified. By the time Morande was growing
up, its ancient walls were falling into disrepair, but during the wars of religion
in the sixteenth century, the protestant champion Henri IV won his first battle
under the town’s ramparts.
In its small way, the Arnay of Morande’s youth was a vibrant community, home
to small-scale manufacturing and several important local institutions. Situated
away from the main wine-growing regions of Burgundy, it depended on other
industries, particularly the cloth trade, which employed Morande’s merchant
relatives. Arnay was also a religious centre, the site of an Ursuline convent where
Morande’s cousin Rose-Nicolle Théveneau would take the habit in August 1767.
It was also home to a Capuchin monastery; the eleventh-century priory of Saint-
Jacques; a sixteenth-century hospital; and a collège [high school]. The town was
also the seat of a royal baillage [local court], where Morande’s father practised
law. These institutions all attracted people and business to the town, bringing the
townsfolk into contact with the wider world and oiling the wheels of commerce.
During Morande’s youth the townsfolk were prosperous enough to rebuild their
ancient parish church.5
Arnay’s social elite tended to mix and marry among themselves. The tight,
family-orientated focus of their social world is clearly evident in the records of the
town’s baptisms, marriages and deaths. The Théveneau clan appear regularly as
the witnesses at one another’s weddings, as godparents to one another’s children,
and mourners at family funerals. Marriages between cousins or those already
related by marriage are not uncommon. The complex web of their family connec-
tions can be revealed by considering some of the guests who sign the marriage
register at the wedding of Louis Théveneau and Philiberte Belin on 10 January
1741. Among the bride’s relatives is Jeanne Ravier, who in 1745 will marry
the groom’s brother, Claude. On the groom’s side, Louis Théveneau’s cousins
Dominique Noirot and Louise Théveneau are already married to each other.
The next two generations of the family will also witness marriages between first
cousins.6 This is doubtless partly a strategy to keep property within the family,
but it also indicates a lack of suitable marriage partners in the neighbourhood.
T H E SI N S OF H I S YOU T H 3
Louis Théveneau was a widely respected man of integrity, who dreamed his
son would follow him into the legal profession. The Chevalier d’Eon, who knew
the family, describes him as ‘honest’, as do several other literary and police
sources. Morande’s own memoirs depict a stern but loving father, driven to his
wit’s end by a dissolute and uncontrollable son. Morande’s mother, Philiberte,
was devoted to her brood and warmly welcomed Morande’s wife and children
when they visited her in the 1780s, but for many years she disowned him and
resisted his increasingly desperate appeals for money. Philiberte was in later life
deeply religious and strongly influenced by her spiritual advisors. Shortly before
she died, she was reconciled with Morande, and there was enough evidence of
her change of heart for her will to be quashed in his favour.7
Louis Théveneau and Philiberte Belin had a large family. The mid eighteenth
century was a period of economic growth and good harvests, and they and their
affluent relatives were spared the worst of the devastating visitations of infant
mortality that plagued the poorer sections of the community and earlier genera-
tions of their own families.8 By 1754, Philiberte had given birth to Morande;
Rose-Antoinette (born in July 1743); Jean-Claude (February 1745); Antoine-
Claude (July 1746); Françoise (November 1748); Louis-Claude-Henri-Alexandre
(February 1751) and Lazare-Jean (September 1754). Of these, only Jean-Claude
and Antoine died in childhood.
Morande’s two surviving brothers had distinguished careers. Louis entered
the legal profession, remained in Arnay and rose to local prominence. Morande
considered him a feeble, well-meaning ‘sot’. Lazare-Jean by contrast travelled
widely and was a young man of considerable talents. Through Morande’s recom-
mendation, he was employed as a secretary by Beaumarchais and visited London
and the nascent United States, where he channelled money and weapons to the
American revolutionaries. Thereafter he was appointed conseiller-secretaire du
roi and contrôleur de la chancellerie. Of all his siblings, Morande seems to have
been closest to Lazare-Jean, in spite, or perhaps because of, the 13-year age gap.
Lazare-Jean was only about 10 when Morande fled the family home, and perhaps
this made it easier for him to forgive or romanticize his wayward brother. In any
case, Lazare-Jean, who styled himself Théveneau de Francy, seems to have been
Morande’s temperamental opposite. He was admired for probity and honesty as
well as for his application and administrative talents.
Morande’s sisters seem to have been two very different characters. Morande
describes Françoise as ‘honest’, ‘religious’, ‘tender’ and generally well-disposed
towards him, though lacking strength of character. However, her piety was a
stumbling block: Morande believed that she was prejudiced against his children
merely because his wife was not a Catholic. His other sister, Rose-Antoinette,
who was of a different mettle, married Jean-Bernard Villedey, a lawyer from
Autun. Morande claimed to hate them both, and in his correspondence regularly
4 A KING’S RANSOM
disparaged them. He described Rose-Antoinette as devious, malevolent and

grasping, ‘the worst shrew that ever lived’.9
Morande developed a malicious, spiteful and imaginative sense of humour at
a young age, as is clear from his youthful pranks. One day, while still a schoolboy,
he visits the marketplace and finds a peasant selling a basket of eggs and butter
from a large pot. As if to check that the eggs are fresh, he takes the basket from
the unsuspecting yokel, makes him fold his arms across his chest and, having
carefully examined each egg in turn, places them on the man’s arms. Once the
peasant is laden with eggs and dares not move, Morande nimbly undoes the
buttons on the man’s breeches, pulls them down to his knees, and retreats into
the crowd with the pot of butter. The peasant attempts to give chase, but falls. The
eggs tumble everywhere and break, and there is much merriment at his expense.
Meanwhile, Morande spreads the butter on his bread, all the while laughing at
his victim.
On another occasion he is crossing the market carrying half a hollowed-out
baguette when he spies a peasant woman selling pots of cream. He asks the price,
takes some cream and pours it into the hole in his bread, then hands the woman
half the agreed sum and walks off. When she shouts after him demanding the rest
of her payment, he turns with a grin and announces ‘since you are not content,
give me my money back and take back your cream’. With that, he snatches back
his coins, pours the cream back into her pot, and saunters off with his bread nicely
soaked in cream and the laughter of the market traders ringing in his ears.
However, Morande’s favourite targets were not hapless peasants but the local
Capuchin monks. According to local legend, he would sneak into the monastic
kitchen whenever it was unguarded. Once there, he would slip the lid off the
large stockpot of bubbling soup and add whatever new ingredient took his fancy,
whether the cat snoozing by the fire or an old wig. Such pranks rapidly became
public knowledge and survived in Arnay’s folk memory for decades afterwards.
However, as he grew older, they might also get him into serious trouble. This
is precisely what happened when he decided to pick on the monks’ Father
Superior.
The rules of their order required Capuchins to grow their beards only from the
point of their chin and to leave only a narrow ring of hair below their tonsure. In
consequence, they had to have both their face and the top of their heads shaved
regularly. Morande learns that the monks are shaved by their barber in a special
cell containing a heavy wooden armchair. The Father Superior always goes first.
One day, he is already seated in the cell waiting to be shaved, with a heavy cloth
napkin wrapped round his neck and the chair, when he hears a commotion. It
is Morande, who has been lying in wait, shouting and knocking over furnish-
ings in the great cloister. The Father Superior, alarmed, sends the barber out to
discover the cause of the disturbance. As he awaits the barber’s return, Morande
creeps into the cell behind him, grabs the corners of the napkin, twists them
tightly and fastens them securely to the back of the chair with a gimlet. Before
the Superior has realized what is happening, Morande has left the cell, locked the
door, and slipped the key into his pocket. He steals out of the monastery while
the Capuchin, firmly pinned to his chair, desperately spins around and crashes
about in a bid to free himself. Meanwhile, outside his cell, the hapless barber cries
at the door, unable to free the prisoner inside.10
This escapade soon became the talk of the town, but Morande was no longer
a schoolboy and his father feared serious repercussions. He therefore decided
to send the boy to Dijon to continue his education, reckoning emotions would
soon simmer down. He still hoped that his son would pursue a legal career and
eventually succeed him as procureur at Arnay. Morande was almost certainly
a pupil at the prestigious Collège Godrun, where he was, if we can believe his
memoirs, something of a prodigy, excelling particularly in logic. Both of Dijon’s
collèges were run by Jesuits, a dedicated teaching order, and the Collège Godrun
was perhaps the finest school in Burgundy. It was there, doubtless, that Morande
acquired his erudition, making good use of the magnificent library – now Dijon’s
university library – which had been bequeathed to the school in 1708. Thereafter,
he probably continued his studies in the University of Dijon’s law faculty.11
Exposure to Jesuit teachers probably helped to nurture the rebellious teenager’s
innate anti-clericalism and religious irreverence. Both are features of his later
work, and the Jesuits come in for particularly heavy criticism. Morande was not
alone in his antipathy to the Jesuits, which had political ramifications. Founded
at the height of the Counter-Reformation to reclaim souls for Catholicism, the
Jesuits were by the eighteenth century a force to be reckoned with. Many Catholic
rulers had Jesuit confessors and their order was extremely rich. But it also had
many enemies. These included the parlements, sovereign law courts who claimed
to represent the people against the Crown, and the Jansenists, advocates of an
austere, simplified form of Catholicism, whom the Jesuits and the Crown were
determined to stamp out. During Morande’s youth, the political struggle between
the Jesuits and their enemies was reaching a climax. The result was a total victory
for the Jansenist-parlement faction. In 1764, the Jesuits suffered a disastrous legal
judgment and Louis XV reluctantly permitted their dissolution.
Louis Théveneau lived to regret sending his son to Dijon. Compared to
Arnay, the Burgundian capital was a veritable metropolis. With a population
approaching 20,000, it offered undreamed of distractions and illicit pleasures
for Morande, as well as a protective anonymity. Morande quickly ran up large
debts, doubtless from his first encounters with the delights of gambling, fast
women, and debauchery. Soon Louis Théveneau was receiving reports of his son’s
misbehaviour. At his wit’s end, he refused to pay off Morande’s debts and decided
on drastic action. He could have applied to have his son locked up indefinitely
6 A KING’S RANSOM
by a lettre de cachet. This was an order bearing the royal seal and the standard
way for dealing with wayward wives and children in eighteenth-century France.
Instead, according to Morande, his father summoned a friend who was a captain
in the dragoons and asked him to enlist the boy in the French army. On 15 April
1760, Morande enlisted for six years service as a common dragoon in the Prince
de Bauffremont’s regiment. The regiment had a long and proud history and was
at that time campaigning in Germany. Thus, at the age of 18, Morande found
himself heading off to war.
Regimental records describe Morande as five foot three inches, a respectable
height for the period, with chestnut hair, blue eyes and a large nose. They also
reveal that he enlisted with two other lads from Arnay-le-Duc, one of whom,
Claude-François Bouillotte, would later desert. Morande’s company commander
was Laurent le Bas de Claireau d’Egremont, a career soldier from an aristocratic
background, who was described by his superiors as ‘a very good officer with a
fine unit. Full of valour . . . an excellent subject, [who] has kindliness and lots of
willpower’ and ‘in every respect made to be at the head of a corps’. Both company
and regiment seem to have been well-led and they suffered surprisingly light
losses in the campaigns in which Morande participated in 1760 and 1761.12
Despite his rebellious nature, Morande found himself well suited to the rigours
of military life. He was physically large, powerfully built and well aware how to
use his bulk to intimidate and bully. In terms of sheer strength, few soldiers could
match him. It is generally supposed that the rank and file of old regime – that is to
say, pre-French Revolutionary – armies was composed of desperate men: crimi-
nals who joined up to avoid punishment, knaves with no prospects, vagabonds,
and the destitute. However, the French army, comprising over 200,000 men in
wartime, was too large to conform to this image. This was particularly true of
dragoon regiments, which travelled by horse, though they sometimes fought on
foot. Dragoons needed to be competent horsemen, and a high proportion of the
Bauffremont regiment were also literate. Even so, few of Morande’s comrades
were bourgeois. This probably mattered little to Morande, who clearly enjoyed
their camaraderie.13 Their coarse language, manners and entertainments were
also to his taste.
Morande was less impressed by the majority of the army’s exclusively noble
officer corps and wrote with disdain of their incompetence. He once asserted
that not four in two hundred knew even the basic rudiments of their trade. These
allegations had serious implications because the French nobility claimed to be
a military caste. They justified their privileged place in society through their
leadership on the battlefield. The suggestion that they were unfit for this role
undermined their entire raison d’être and with it their position at the top of the
social pyramid. Morande had looked at the army and found it wanting. The army
had begun to shape him into a patriote reformer.14
Morande was not alone in criticizing the army’s performance, for the war in
which he was fighting ended in the most disastrous military defeat the Bourbon
monarchy ever suffered. For a country that had aspired to be the dominant
European and world power for over a century, this was a terrible shock, especially
as defeat stripped France of colonial possessions in Canada and India. Moreover,
many Frenchmen believed the war was fought on behalf of an unworthy ally,
the Austrian Empire. Austria and France were traditional enemies, so when
the two powers signed an alliance in 1756, it sent shock waves through Europe.
Nor did it seem a short-term shift in alliances, since the treaty was sealed by the
promise that an infant daughter of the Austrian Empress would marry the future
Louis XVI of France, who was then a small child. The ruler who had most cause
to be alarmed by these developments was Frederick the Great of Prussia. In 1740,
Frederick had seized the Austrian province of Silesia, unleashing the Wars of the
Austrian Succession. Despite their best efforts, the Austrians had been unable to
win Silesia back, and in 1748 an uneasy peace had been agreed. Now Frederick
feared that the Austrians and their French and Russian allies were encircling
him. He therefore launched a pre-emptive attack, precipitating the Seven Years’
War. Three years later, after a brief period of basic training in drill and the mass
manoeuvres required by the tactics of the day, Morande and his comrades were
sent to fight in Germany.
If we may believe his memoirs, young Charles Théveneau was excited by the
prospect of action, and dreamed of nothing but glory. However, his ardour was
quickly cooled by a bullet in the leg and the sight of friends lying dead beside him.
He was found in agony several hours later and stretchered to a nearby farmhouse.
There he found ‘kindness, virtue, fresh straw and soup’. A barber-surgeon from
the nearest village applied a dressing to his wounds. Having survived the night, he
was taken to a military hospital in the French base at nearby Lippstadt. Six months
later he hobbled back to his regiment before limping home to Arnay-le-Duc. In
January 1763, before he could return to active service, the war ended and Morande
was decommissioned. His brief and inglorious military career was over.15
That, at least, is Morande’s account. Assuming it is true, Morande must have
received his wound during the summer of 1761, while his regiment was cam-
paigning with the Army of the Upper Rhine on the river Lippe. It was probably
inflicted during July 1761, after the French advanced out of Lippstadt during the
Vellinghausen campaign. Most likely, it was at the battle of Vellinghausen itself,
a bloody defeat for the French fought on the river Lippe close to Paderborn on
15 July 1761. In all, the French suffered some 5,000 casualties and were forced to
beat a hasty retreat, while the allies’ official death toll was 434. Fortunately for the
Marshal de Broglie and his forces, and particularly for Morande, the allies were
slow to follow up their victory. This renders the tale of Morande’s rescue from
the battlefield a little more credible.16
8 A KING’S RANSOM
Plate 1. Contemporary British Map of the Battle of Vellinghausen. Courtesy of the

Brotherton Collection, Brotherton Library, University of Leeds.
Morande’s enemies, above all the Chevalier d’Eon, tell a more picturesque tale.
They say Morande deserted from the French army and served under the banners
of both Russia and Prussia’s Black Hussars.17 These allegations emerged at a time
when d’Eon and his friends were trying to provoke Morande into fighting a duel
and are probably false. They are not mentioned in police dossiers, which record
that he served with the Bauffremont regiment, nor by his enemies during the
revolution. A regimental register of troops, which was maintained thoroughly
until at least June 1762, makes no mention of his leaving the regiment, whether
through desertion or discharge. His name does not appear in the next register,
which only starts in March 1763. As the regiment retreated into France in late
1761 and played no part in the 1762 campaign, Morande’s version of events,
though impossible to confirm, is consistent with surviving registers. Equally, the
charge that he fought for the Russians, who withdrew from the war early in 1762,
appears chronologically incompatible with the documentary record.18
Morande’s counter-claims that he transferred into an elite cavalry regiment,
the Carabiniers, and was promoted to the rank of sub-lieutenant, through the
patronage of its commander, Monsieur de Poyane, also appear to be false. The

surviving records of the Bauffremont and Carabiniers regiments contain no evi-
dence that he was ever promoted. The French police doubted the story and a letter
from Poyane to the Morning Chronicle denied it outright.19 There is, however,
evidence that he suffered a serious wound, as later physical descriptions suggest
that he walked with a pronounced limp. It is quite possible, of course, that his
long absence from his regiment gave rise to rumours of desertion. If this is the
case, d’Eon, who came from the Burgundian town of Tonnerre, could well have
got to hear them. However, d’Eon frequently spread lies and distortions about
his enemies. His colourful version of Morande’s military career is probably just
one more example.
If Morande’s family hoped that the rigours of a military career would reform
his morals, they were sadly deluded. No sooner had he returned to Arnay than he
resumed his gambling and womanizing. In an age when a young woman’s reputa-
tion was often her only asset, he was every mother’s worst nightmare. A wounded
war hero, he was worldly, handsome, strong, witty, well-educated and came from
a good family. No wonder the local girls fell at his feet. Soon, he was writing
poems in praise of those who encouraged his advances and maligning those who
scorned him.20 Such tactics were intended to inflame the social aspirations of his
conquests as well as their vanity and passion, for poetry writing was a mark of
gentility. Not surprisingly, Morande’s memoirs hint that he debauched several
girls at this period; local folklore insists he also got away with murder.
Among Morande’s most devoted conquests, according to local legend, is
the pretty young daughter of Madame Finel, who runs the local coaching inn.
Morande seduces her, abandons her, then cruelly mocks her foolishness. Mortified
and crushed, the girl fades away and dies of a broken heart. Unfortunately, she
has a brother in the army. He learns what has happened, comes home on leave,
confronts Morande, and forces him into a duel.
They meet alone, swords in hand, at La Flenne, a secluded hillside field above
Arnay’s Faubourg Saint-Jacques. They fight for several moments, then Morande’s
sword snaps. Finel agrees to abandon the combat until Morande can get a new
sword. They descend the narrow track from La Flenne in single file, Morande
still carrying his broken sword-hilt. Suddenly, Finel loses his footing and stum-
bles. Morande seizes his opportunity. He thrusts the stub of his sword into his
rival with all his might, wounding his own palm as he does so. Finel staggers a
few steps and dies, gurgling incoherent accusations. Morande, too, cries out,
bewailing his wounds and the death of his adversary. But when the townsfolk
arrive, the evidence speaks against him. It is clear that Finel was stabbed in the
back; Morande’s own wound is further evidence. Powerful voices speak out
in Morande’s favour, but the authorities are informed. Morande flees to Paris,
where he is unknown and anonymous. Meanwhile, his father intrigues to protect
10 A KING’S RANSOM
him and calm things down. But the judgement of the townsfolk is inflexible: he
cannot return.21
This, at least, is the version of events given by César Lavirotte in a short
unpublished biography of Morande. A nineteenth-century mayor and historian
of Arnay-le-Duc, Lavirotte in his youth had long conversations with Morande.
Thus, parts of his manuscript appear to draw on Morande’s recollections, while
others draw on Lavirotte’s memories, published sources or local tradition. His
account of the duel was clearly part of Arnay’s folklore and, in the absence of
other evidence, unreliable. Indeed, the records of baptisms, marriages and burials
for Arnay-le-Duc appear to contradict the tale conclusively.22 However, several of
Lavirotte’s details chime with Morande’s own version of the 16 months he spent
in Arnay between January 1763 and May 1764. Morande, too, speaks of a duel
over a girl; a broken sword; wounding a rival; legal proceedings; and fleeing to
Paris to escape the consequences. If Lavirotte’s version is false, it apparently offers
a distorted reflection of real events, which were no less interesting.
The heroine of Morande’s version is the lovely Hélène. She is beautiful, charm-
ing and virtuous, but vain and coquettish. She encourages Morande to pen verses
in her honour and he concludes that he has won both her heart and the right to
her favours. He is doubly mistaken. Hélène has another swain, a muscular youth
who courts her assiduously. Morande grows insanely jealous. One day, he meets
the couple arm-in-arm. Though armed with just a riding crop, he insults his rival,
who unsheathes his sword. Luck is with Morande. He disarms his opponent. The
sword snaps and cuts a serious gash in his adversary’s head.
Morande’s wooing of Hélène ends in a lawsuit for damages. Louis Théveneau
decides his son is not to blame. He acquitted himself with honour, having been
attacked. He allows Morande to defend the case. The court finds in his favour.
And there things should have ended.
Unfortunately, Morande’s rival is a soldier. His comrades insist he should
avenge the affront to his honour. He acquiesces and returns to Arnay-le-Duc. He
seeks out Morande and challenges him. Morande accepts. A time and place is
agreed. Before the combat, Louis Théveneau is informed. Distraught, he storms
into his son’s room, seizes his pistols, his sword and his clothes and locks them
up. He leaves Morande only his dressing gown and slippers, assuming this will
prevent him from leaving the house.
A few days later, Louis Théveneau learns that his son has been climbing out
of a window at night and appearing around town dressed in a lady’s riding coat.
He does not know what to do. Determined to prevent a duel, he redoubles his
vigilance and applies for a lettre de cachet, just in case. But he hesitates to use
such severity. Instead, he pleads with Morande. Morande listens in silence. He
does not wish to appear to be avoiding his opponent.
In late 1763, Louis Théveneau allows Morande to accompany him to Autun.
The ancient representative body of the province, the Estates of Burgundy, is

meeting there and he has much business to attend to. But before long Louis learns
that Morande is frequenting gambling dens and that his rival is in town. Still he
does not enforce the lettre de cachet.
Morande loses money at the gaming tables night after night. He grows desper-
ate. One day, he calls on a business contact to try to arrange a loan. To his horror
his father walks in from a neighbouring room. He has heard everything. It is the
final straw. Morande is arrested that very night and taken into the custody of
the local Franciscan monks. He is placed in a cell on the ground floor in solitary
confinement.
Immediately, Morande starts trying to dig through the thick walls. He suc-
ceeds within eight days and hurries to a house of ill repute to celebrate and boast
of his escape. His secret soon reaches the monks. Their Master, a giant of a man,
comes after him, accompanied by his deputy and six other brothers. The posse
bursts in while Morande is eating and drags him back to prison. He is placed in
a more secure cell, whose barred windows are surrounded by wooden joists. The
walls are 18 inches thick. Morande rises to the challenge. He loosens one of the
beams and softens the stone around the bars with water. He removes two of the
bars and, after just 12 days, escapes for a second time.
This time, Morande is more cautious with his liberty. He is convinced that
his second escape will soften his parents’ hearts, by proving his character and
determination. Instead, an unexpected revelation overturns his hopes: he has
a child. The unfortunate mother, whom Morande never names, had concealed
the identity of her baby’s father throughout her pregnancy, but on learning of
Morande’s arrest she became inconsolable and let her secret slip. The news shocks
Morande’s parents and particularly strains his relationship with Philiberte. His
escape only makes matters worse.
Morande takes refuge with a female relative who attempts to broker a recon-
ciliation with his father. They meet. Louis receives him warmly, but the meeting is
not a success. At 11 in the evening, Louis leaves the house unplacated and tearful.
Morande, too, is disappointed. He reflects on how he handled their meeting. Had
he not shown enough remorse? Had he not seemed submissive enough? There is
only one thing for it. He will write his father a letter. He scribbles until two o’clock
the next morning then tumbles into bed.
Morande is still not asleep when he hears the door open gently. In the shadows
he can make out four armed men creeping up on him. Suddenly he surges for
the door. He makes it in a single bound. Surprise is on his side. Two swords are
raised against him. They do not stop him. The man closest to him attempts to
seize him mid stride, tearing at his shirt. Morande fells him with a single punch.
He takes Morande’s shirt with him. Morande lunges for the open door. He slams
it behind him and locks it on those charged with arresting him.
He is naked but for a shirt sleeve. It is early January. The ground is frozen solid.
Somehow adrenalin carries him. He scales a ten-foot wall; he crosses the little
river Arroux, breaking the ice as he goes. After covering a mile and an half, he
finds himself at the house of a friend of his father. He wakes the household and
is lent some clothes. His host agrees to help broker a truce. The mayor of Arnay
and Monsieur Godard, father of one of Morande’s college friends, negotiate on
his behalf. Louis Théveneau capitulates and accepts Morande’s submission. The
lettre de cachet is annulled. He is welcomed back into the parental home. For four
months Morande lives there, tormented by the idea of following a legal career
and in perpetual fear of new attempts on his liberty or his person. At last, in May
1764, he slips away from home and takes the road to Paris.23
We will probably never know how much of Morande’s tale of thwarted love,
libertinage, family rows, imprisonment and miraculous escapes is true as, apart
from Lavirotte’s brief rival version, we lack accounts of his youth. However, a
relative, Juliot, a lawyer in the Paris Parlement who served as Louis Théveneau’s
legal representative, has left a summary of events. It is contained in a letter written
in about May 1768 to the chief of the Paris Police, Antoine-Gabriel de Sartine,
to ask for a new lettre de cachet and confirms that much of Morande’s testimony
is at least loosely based on fact. Juliot discloses that Morande had caused Louis
Théveneau ‘all kinds of grief ’. He continues:
He [Louis Théveneau] did all he could to correct him; he had him locked up in several
prisons [maisons de force] . . . But as soon as Charles Théveneau was released . . . he gave
his father new, ever more serious, causes for disappointment. The different means . . .
used to bring his son back to his senses have never had any effect. Charles Théveneau
found ways to escape . . . and he always announced his liberation with excesses that made
his family tremble. He disappeared several years ago and came to Paris. The supplicant
[Louis Théveneau] has learned recently that his behaviour has been no better than it was
in Burgundy and that he survives . . . only by his intrigues, having neither employment
nor revenues. Charles Théveneau is routinely found with prostitutes; police Inspector
Marais is fully informed about this.24
There is no reason to doubt Juliot’s testimony that Morande had been arrested
more often than he admits, especially as Morande himself seldom lied outright.
He preferred to play the arch-hypocrite, masking the extent of his wrongdoing
behind partial revelations, or making candid confessions while feigning contri-
tion. These stratagems often allowed him to name respectable witnesses who
could vouch for what he had said.25 Fortunately, after his arrival in Paris we have
more solid evidence about Morande’s activities.
Paris in the 1760s was a genuine metropolis, the second largest city in Europe
and home to over 500,000 people. In the late seventeenth century Louis XIV
had moved his court to Versailles, some 13 miles away, to place himself at a safe
distance from the tumult of the capital, but most leading noblemen kept palatial
townshouses in Paris, as well as residences at Versailles. As a result, Paris gradu-
ally replaced Versailles as the country’s cultural and social centre. Increasingly
Paris was a centre for fashion, artists, literature and recreation. It was Europe’s
capital of pleasure, replete with theatres, the Opéra, fashionable boutiques and
coffee houses to suit every pocket. It also boasted pleasure gardens, libraries and
reading rooms, gambling dens and some of Europe’s most celebrated brothels.
The notorious police of Paris watched over all this with a jaundiced eye, often
tolerating cafés, bars, brothels and gambling dens to remain open only in return
for information on the opinions and activities of their clientele. Much of what
they learned was written up into weekly reports by Inspector Marais, who was
charged with overseeing public morals, and sent to the king for his information
and amusement.26
In many ways Paris was a medieval town. Running alongside the gated palaces
of the aristocracy – built defensively around courtyards with their windows fac-
ing inwards – were cramped winding streets and tall apartment buildings where
the poor and middle classes daily rubbed shoulders. The most affluent apartment
dwellers lived in spacious lodgings on the first floor, above the hubbub of the
street. The poorest faced the daily drudgery of carrying water, firewood and food
up the worn wooden stairs to tiny garret rooms nestled on the fourth, fifth or
sixth floors where entire families shared a bed. Many lived from hand to mouth,
going without food and firewood in hard times, keeping one step ahead of the
rent collector and changing address frequently. Gambling and prostitution – usu-
ally a temporary measure rather than a lifestyle choice – were rife. Some estimates
suggest that Paris had as many as 10,000 prostitutes, though this total includes a
small army of courtesans and kept mistresses, as well as those who occasionally
supplemented their meagre income by selling sex. At the top end of the scale of
vice were the girls of the Opéra and actresses at the Comédie française, whose
celebrated talents and beauty attracted wealthy admirers and protectors. The
most legendary of them consumed the fortunes of a parade of wealthy lovers.
Morande arrived in Paris with about 4,500 livres (£185) in borrowed or
stolen cash.27 In the mid eighteenth century this might just support a modest
gentleman’s lifestyle for a year, including the rent on a town house, small coach,
and a handful of servants. It would not long support a life of luxury, libertinism
and debauchery. Morande thus needed to find ways to support his lifestyle. This
meant finding patrons and protectors. They alone might supply him with a posi-
tion and honest income, the appearance of respectability, and rich contacts to be
pumped, fleeced or robbed.
According to his own account, Morande soon gained admission into the
best homes in Paris. But in the process he needed to spend money, to maintain
appearances and keep up with his associates. As his money ran out, he resorted
to gambling, getting ever deeper into debt. Once again, this is not the whole
story. By January 1765 he was well known to the police and had teamed up with a
certain Sieur Daubigny. Together they preyed on young gentlemen fresh from the
provinces, luring them to gamble in Daubigny’s house, where they would fleece
them or steal their money and watches. In some cases they imprisoned them,
too.28 Those who protested were threatened with violence. Perhaps there is more
to it than that: Inspector Marais suspected that Morande was also an enthusiastic
sodomite [‘entiché du pêche antiphysique’].29 This was a very serious allegation.
In theory men found guilty of sodomy might be strangled by the public hang-
man and then burned. However, this punishment was only meted out nine times
by the Parisian executioners across the entire century, and in seven such cases
the victims were guilty of other capital offences. By the 1760s the police almost
winked at the offence, imprisoning commoners for a couple of weeks and letting
nobles off with a warning.30
Marais does not give reasons for his suspicions. However, much circumstantial
evidence lends weight to the charge. Morande’s writings show that he was well
acquainted with the homosexual underworld and several of its most celebrated
denizens. Moreover, some of his favourite haunts were popular with antiphy-
siques, particularly the brothel and gambling den of Madame Hecquet in the rue
Feydeau, at the heart of a district notorious for its male prostitutes. Although
Hecquet’s establishment was a favourite resort for many heterosexual libertines
and had a large stable of girls, it also employed more pretty young boys than
most Parisian brothels. Yet even if he did have sex with other men, we should
be cautious about labelling Morande a bisexual or homosexual: sodomy was
often part and parcel of an eighteenth-century libertine lifestyle. It could even
be seen as masculine behaviour, so long as one played the active, penetrative
role, rather than that of the passive bardache. There is no proof that Morande
visited la Hecquet’s bordello to have sex with men. However, one evening in early
February 1765, he and Daubigny call in to play cards. Morande loses heavily. At
the evening’s end he owes Daubigny 280 livres. It is a debt of honour, but that
means little to Morande. Later that night, he goes to Daubigny’s house armed,
drags him out of bed, and threatens to kill him if he ever mentions the debt or
tells the police.31
By this time Morande is suffering from syphilis, the scourge of eighteenth-
century libertines. The disease can be slow torture over many years. At the outset,
it has few visible signs, but eventually it disfigures its victims, drives them insane,
and often kills. The only hope lies in a treatment almost as bad as the illness itself:
a course of mercury is applied to the body across several days. Not for nothing is
the process of applying it called ‘frictions’. Morande submits to a course of fric-
tions in the days following his attack on Daubigny. Eight days into his treatment
he visits widow Longpré’s brothel. While he is there police Inspector de La

Janière arrives with orders to arrest a scoundrel called Charles-François Lebeau.
Dame Longpré, who has heard whispers of Morande’s treatment of Daubigny,
denounces him, too. Both men are dragged off to Fort l’Évêque prison. La Janière
boasts to Sartine with some satisfaction that Morande is well known to him as
Daubigny’s accomplice, a ‘crapulous libertine’ and ‘brute’ who falsely claims to
be employed by the Prince de Limbourg.32
Fortunately, Morande has a real protector, a wealthy Burgundian gentleman
named La Saule. La Saule probably first met Morande in 1763 in Autun while a
member of the Estates of Burgundy. At the time of his arrest, Morande is living
under La Saule’s roof in the rue du Batoir in the Faubourg Saint-Germain. On
learning of Morande’s arrest, La Saule pleads with Sartine for his release, asking
him to excuse the follies of youth. He adds that Morande’s condition is visibly
deteriorating due to the interruption to his treatment and will soon be without
remedy as ‘the mercury works so horribly on him that a longer stay in Fort
l’Évêque will inevitably prove fatal’.33 Sartine proposes that Morande be sent to
the prison infirmary, but La Saule begs that he be spared from the ‘horror that
reigns in that place, which is only inhabited by the dregs of humanity’. He adds
that if Morande’s imprisonment continues, it will inevitably become known in
Burgundy, where his father fears dishonour more than death. La Saule finishes
by contradicting allegations made against Morande. Morande is not without
resources. His family regularly send him money and he is also supported by the
Prince de Limbourg who has promised him a position. He even suggests that
his quarrel with Daubigny was not occasioned by his debt, but by Daubigny’s
cheating. If only Sartine will release him, La Saule promises to support Morande
through his convalescence then send him away from Paris.
Struck by La Saule’s assurances, Sartine intercedes with the Count de Saint-
Florentin, the Keeper of the Seals, to secure Morande’s early release. He tells
Saint-Florentin that Morande ‘is ill and requires care promptly. His liberty is
requested by people of consideration. He promises to cease visiting gambling
dens and appears to have been sufficiently punished’. On 14 March 1765, Saint-
Florentin gives the order to set him free.34
Why did La Saule go to such lengths to secure Morande’s release? At first
glance, it seems that he was blinded by affection for the young reprobate and
completely taken in by Morande. Morande claims that La Saule and his wife
always treated him like a son because they were childless. Was La Saule, who
knew much of Morande’s history, really taken in? It seems more likely he
endorsed Morande’s untruths because they were lovers. If so, the relationship
was largely commercial: Morande provided sex in return for large sums of cash,
the price of his silence and acquiescence. Needless to say, Morande never took
a job with the Prince de Limbourg; his family were not supporting him; and no
other source mentions Daubigny’s cheating. Nor does La Saule send Morande
away from Paris when he is recovered. Instead, over the next four years, he does
all he can to keep him there.35
If Morande does not now mend his ways, he at least changes his operating
methods and stays out of gaol. He continues to insinuate himself with the
wealthiest aristocrats: one hapless creditor reports that both the Duke de Bethune
and Duchess de Châtillon vouched for his bona fides.36 Judged creditworthy,
he continues to borrow large sums. By mid 1768 he has amassed a staggering
52,000 livres (about £2,150) of debt with Parisian merchants, as well as allegedly
squandering 30,000 livres of his father’s money and large sums advanced by the
ever-indulgent La Saule.37 More astonishing still, until late 1767 he even pays
many of his bills.38 With this much money, Morande cuts a fine figure in society.
He has a coach and a light cabriolet and keeps five horses.39 He runs up bills of
1,784 livres on fancy lace cuffs and fine Pekin cloth embroidered with flowers;
2,069 livres on jewellery; and over 700 livres on four coats for himself and his
manservants.40
He funds his lifestyle and services his debts largely by vice.41 Where once
he spent his money in brothels, he now lives from the earnings of high class
courtesans and kept women. He insinuates himself into their lives by feigning
passion, then exploits and bullies them without scruple. He so terrifies one of
his early conquests, la petite Desmares, the one-time mistress of Prince Camille
de Rohan, that she flees home to Bordeaux to escape his rage. And this was a
girl so compliant, energetic and vigorous in her love-making that more than
one customer was said to have been unable to remount his horse after having
‘ridden her too much’. Another of his conquests was la Beauchamp, a former
lover and travelling companion of Casanova. Beauchamp’s brothel in the rue
des deux portes was a magnet for aristocratic libertines: on one occasion Paulmy
d’Argenson, the son of the foreign minister, was serviced there by no less than
five girls. In la Beauchamp, Morande meets his match. When his depradations
become too much, she escapes his clutches by telling the police that he stole her
watch during a trip to the royal palace at Fontainebleau. Morande is arrested
and briefly imprisoned, probably in Bicêtre, a gaol for common prostitutes and
criminals, but manages to secure his release.42 He then sells his services to visitors
to Paris, offering to show them around Paris and sneak them into the homes of
the leading courtesans and mistresses of aristocrats, who, he claims, are under
his ‘protection’.
By 1767, Morande is attempting to worm his way into the affections of the
mistresses of some of the richest men in France. Among them was Mademoiselle
Souville, the mistress of Monsieur de Bourgogne, who the police said ‘was known
to all the world’. Souville had worked her way round most of the most notorious
brothels of Paris. She began her career chez la Montigny before plying her trade
in Brissault and Hecquet’s establishments, even while she was being ‘kept’ by
Monsieur de Vauvray, a one-time Master of Requests at Versailles. By 1767, she
was keen to abandon a life of ‘guerluchonnage’43 to devote herself entirely to
Bourgogne, with whom she was besotted. Indeed, when Bourgogne took back a
promissory note for 20,000 livres, Souville’s response was to redouble her caresses.
Morande apparently got nowhere with her.
Morande apparently had more luck with Mademoiselle La Cour, a flame-
haired beauty celebrated for her libertinism. La Cour, mistress to the Prince de
Lamballe, was known as palais d’or [gold palate] because her palate was reputedly
so ravaged by the effects of Dr Keyser’s pills, a celebrated treatment for venereal
disease, that she replaced it with a new one constructed of precious metal.44
This little dampened the ardour of Lamballe and Morande, both of whom were
already infected. Morande may briefly have wooed La Cour away from Lamballe,
but soon afterwards he was forcing his way into the houses of both Souville and
La Cour by violence.45 When they attempt to bar their doors, he threatens to
have them imprisoned in Bicêtre. Thwarted in his designs, he revenges himself
in anonymous letters to Lamballe, which are passed to the police. Several years
later, he publishes anecdotes about La Cour in his Gazetier cuirassé, including a
cruel epigram, which plays on the ambiguity of the French word ‘palais’, which
means both palate and palace:
Let’s fear Dr Keyser’s secrets

And their deplorable effects
La Cour, alas, is an example;
Wishing to purify her temple [of Venus, i.e. vagina],
She demolished her palace/palate.46
However, upsetting women with powerful protectors is dangerous: Morande is

making powerful enemies.
La Cour is not the only female acquaintance Morande denounces: he also
tells Inspector Marais ‘horror stories’ about a certain demoiselle d’Oppy, with
whom he had ‘close relations’. Just how close is a moot point, for d’Oppy, a well-
born married lady and mother, was accused of adultery by her husband, who
embroiled her in a notorious divorce case. d’Oppy’s troubles began on 15 April
1768, when she was arrested at Madame Gourdan’s bordello in the rue des deux
ponts. While this might appear damning evidence against her, d’Oppy claimed
that she had been tricked into going to the brothel by a friend of her husband’s
family. He had introduced her to Madame Gourdan, assuring her that Gourdan
was a lady of quality, and across the next two years d’Oppy visited her three
times. d’Oppy insisted that she had never suspected that she was frequenting a
place of prostitution, but Gourdan accused her of ‘debauches worthy of the most
degraded of her own infamous pupils’. Denying all such accusations – which were
presumably corroborated by Morande’s testimony – d’Oppy asserted that she was
the victim of a conspiracy whereby her in-laws hoped to have her locked away
permanently in order to gain control over her property.
Amazingly, after many legal twists and turns, the divorce petition was quashed
and, in June 1776, d’Oppy was acquitted through lack of evidence. For her part
in the mysterious affair, Gourdan, who had fled Paris, was sentenced in absentia
to be led through the streets riding backwards on an ass. Two of her accomplices
were gaoled. What we make of Morande’s involvement depends on whether we
accept d’Oppy’s defence. If she was innocent, Morande was part of a conspiracy
to ruin her reputation, strip her of her property, and have her falsely imprisoned
for life. However, we must draw a different conclusion if, like some contemporary
commentators, we refuse to accept that d’Oppy could live for two years in blissful
ignorance of Gourdan’s profession and dine innocently in a brothel with a crowd
of male strangers. In that case, Morande is guilty only of debauching and perhaps
corrupting an adulterous lady of quality who was willingly led astray.47
By this time rumours of Morande’s behaviour are trickling back to Burgundy.
Morande concludes that one of his servants has been bribed to pass reports to
Louis Théveneau, who comes under intense pressure from his family to have
Morande locked up for good. At the end of January 1768, Louis yields and
sends a power of attorney to Juliot, instructing him to apply for a new lettre de
cachet. This time, Louis Théveneau suggests that Morande should be imprisoned
at Charenton, a prison for the insane, then sent into penal servitude aux îles
[i.e. the West Indies].48 However, nothing is done to execute the lettre de cachet
for several months. Perhaps Louis is still reticent? Perhaps Juliot is waiting for
an opportunity to ensure that it will be granted? Maybe it is shown to Morande
and held over him as a threat? Or maybe the old regime bureaucracy just acted
with characteristic slowness? Indeed, it might never have been enforced but for
an Opéra girl known as Mademoiselle Danezy.
Like most Opéra girls, Danezy is a lady of easy virtue and extremely pretty.
Originally from Lyon, she had married a certain Derigny, who was transported
to the West Indies shortly thereafter. Forced back on her own resources, Danezy
went to Paris where for two or three years she survived from her ‘galanteries’. She
became the mistress of Monsieur Rollin, a wealthy tax farmer, whose fortune she
consumed with her lover and pimp, the Chevalier Delamotte. Unfortunately,
Delamotte was arrested, and Rollin, on learning of her inconstancy, abandoned
her. Subsequently, she had a number of amorous adventures, and between lovers
occasionally serviced clients chez La Brissault.49
Danezy first encounters Morande at a ball at the Opéra in about January 1768.
They speak and she gives him her address. Soon, he is both her favoured lover
and her pimp. She uses different names and has a succession of paying lovers,
yet struggles financially. She sells off her furniture a piece at a time. When her
dressmaker hires a bailiff to pursue her for a 55 livre debt, Morande promises to
pay it, fearful that he will lose her. On 1 March he signs a paper to that effect. The
bailiff, Desmoulins, calls frequently at Morande’s house over the following weeks,
but Morande always fobs him off with empty promises. Early in the morning
on 8 April, Desmoulins calls once more, determined to collect the debt, but the
servant tells him that Morande is not at home. He asks to leave a message. He is
shown to the study. As he enters, he is ambushed. A frenzied Morande sets about
him with a pair of heavy metal tongs. A visitor intervenes to protect his head, but
Morande continues to beat Desmoulins across both legs. Desmoulins escapes and
immediately writes to ask Sartine’s assistance.50
Soon afterwards Danezy flees her appartment in the rue Saint-Florentin and
takes up lodgings near the Palais Royal. Morande accuses an older woman,
Madame de Clermont-Arnoul, an architect’s wife, of turning Danezy against him.
He becomes aggressive. Madame de Clermont-Arnoul says she will report him
to the police and warns him never to approach Danezy again. Morande writes
to the police himself, denouncing Madame de Clermont-Arnoul as a malicious
and dishonest old procuress who arranges ‘intrigues’ for ‘women who do not
give their names’.51 He threatens to denounce her to her husband and the wider
world unless she stops bad-mouthing him. He turns up at her house and creates
a disturbance.52 Is this just a dispute between pimps for control of la Danezy? Not
according to the lady herself, who complains of his obsessive behaviour.
Danezy grows more and more alarmed. She recruits friends and relatives to
solicit protection from the most powerful official in her home province, Jacques
de Flesselles, the Intendant of Lyon, who is in Paris. He responds positively, per-
haps motivated initially by revenge: Morande is said to have seduced Flesselles’
mistress Mademoiselle Cressy.53 On 12 May, Flesselles writes to Sartine asking
for Morande to be banned from Danezy’s house. Inspector Marais speculates that
Flesselles fancies her for himself. It is certainly strange that he should trouble
himself for a woman of her reputation. Flesselles provides Danezy with a little
house and garden near the barrière de Mousseau. It appears that she has become
his mistress.54
Somehow, Morande discovers Danezy’s refuge. On 22 May he scales her
garden wall and begins shouting for her. Perhaps he hopes to win her back: his
memoirs claim he wished to rescue her from Flesselles’ custody. Danezy shuts
herself up in the house. Morande gives up and departs. Two days later, early in
the morning, he returns and forces his way past her doorman. He storms up
the stairs to her bedroom ‘like a madman’ but she barricades herself inside. She
is terrified that he will break down her door. In desperation Danezy threatens
to go to the Lieutenant of Police. Morande replies that he has already written
to Sartine himself. His bluff frightens Danezy, but her threats calm him and he
leaves. At once, Danezy scribbles a semi-literate account of events and sends it

to the police chief. The following day, Sartine commands that provisional orders
be drawn up for Morande’s arrest.55
Although Saint-Florentin signs the order to arrest Morande on 27 May, he
is not picked up for nearly a month. The delay apparently stemmed from a
technicality: before they can act the police want the original of Louis Théveneau’s
request for a lettre de cachet and to know where he wishes Morande to be gaoled.
The last consideration is a serious one: as the family has solicited his imprison-
ment, they will bear the costs. In the interim, Morande realizes something is
afoot and desperately attempts to forestall punishment by intimidation. He calls
on Juliot, whom he suspects is his father’s informant, and threatens to ‘wash his
hands in his blood’. Inspector Marais learns of the incident and takes pre-emptive
action, even though Louis Théveneau’s wishes are not yet known. On 25 June, he
arrests Morande and takes him to Fort l’Évêque, where he is held ‘in secret’, in a
fourth-floor cell with just a bed and a window smaller than a fist.56 As far as his
associates and creditors are aware, Morande has simply disappeared. But he is
not prepared to vanish quietly.
By 6 July, the prison concierge, Duvergé, has had enough. He is weary of
Morande’s incessant shouting and alarmed by the crowds that gather daily outside
the prison, drawn by the commotion. He decides he must speak to the prisoner to
discover what is going on. Accompanied by a turnkey, he climbs the long wind-
ing staircase to the fourth floor and unlocks the door. As they enter they spot a
suspicious bulge beneath the prisoner’s trousers. Morande refuses to explain what
he is concealing, but after a brief struggle several fragments of paper covered in
writing tumble from his breeches. Mystified, his gaolers search his room. In his
bed they discover a rope made of shreds of blanket two inches wide and long
enough to reach the ground. Morande has been using it to smuggle messages in
and out of the prison via his window.57 The Duke de Bethune probably learned of
his imprisonment by this means, for he has already written to Sartine petitioning
for Morande’s release.58
Morande is now transferred to an isolation cell, where he can cause no further
problems. However, several days later Louis Théveneau requests that he be held
in the monastery of Armentières, or any other similarly priced prison where he
can be prevented from communicating with other prisoners. Morande is duly
transferred to Armentières on 22 July, together with instructions that he be
closely watched.59
Such surveillance proves unnecessary. Morande has realized that his liberty
depends on his ability to convince the Superior, his family and the Lieutenant
of Police that he is a reformed character. He writes to Sartine protesting that
his crimes have been magnified by his enemies. He also asks permission to
write – without giving his whereabouts – to reassure his creditors and to appoint
someone to look after his financial affairs. Sartine, who has been receiving letters
from Morande’s creditors almost daily, readily agrees.60 Inside the monastery,
Morande’s behaviour remains exemplary over many months. His family are
informed and Louis Théveneau, always indulgently optimistic, relents and
requests his son’s release. However, the final decision rests with Sartine.
On 4 May 1769, Bernard Croquison, the Superior at Armentières, writes to
Sartine to inform him of Morande’s reformation, enclosing a letter from Morande.
It expresses sincere repentance and promises he will mend his ways. Sartine, who
sees many petty crooks, needs to be reminded of the details of Morande’s case.61
However, he soon learns of more pressing reasons to release him: Morande’s health
is deteriorating rapidly. He is unlikely to survive if he is confined much longer and
needs to convalesce in the open air. Sartine responds quickly: on 7 June he asks
Saint-Florentin to order Morande’s release. Five weeks later Morande is free.62
When he feels well enough, Morande writes to thank Sartine and repeats
his promises of good behaviour. Nevertheless, on 3 August Sartine orders that
Morande should leave Paris. Morande responds with a request to stay, arguing
that he must remain to clear his remaining debts, which total 22,000 livres. His
presence is essential because La Saule, who has already paid off 30,000 livres for
him, has given him a stake in several enterprises and agreed to act as his guaran-
tor. In return, he wants Morande to manage several of his business interests. By
these means Morande expects to clear his debts within three years. Morande’s
letter supplies names and details so that Sartine can verify his story. After quiz-
zing Morande and conferring with Marais, who presumably confirmed some of
Morande’s claims, Sartine grants his wish.63 Morande’s relationship with La Saule
cools rapidly thereafter. There is no evidence that he took up La Saule’s offer,
which was doubtless just a ruse to keep Morande near to him, and La Saule’s
name disappears from Morande’s correspondence.
Within three months, Morande is up to his old tricks. He slips into the home
of a rich lawyer, Monsieur de Bignicourt, and extorts a loan of 60 livres from the
terrified magistrate. He gives a false address and, when Bignicourt starts making
enquiries, sends him threatening letters. The police are informed and Sartine
approaches Saint-Florentin again, but somehow Morande is not arrested.64 He is
not so lucky the following May, when the Count de Narbens approaches Sartine
for help retrieving money he has lent Morande. Narbens gives Sartine worrying
intelligence: Morande is gambling in the Venetian and Danish embassies every
evening. This raises questions about what else he is up to and Sartine immediately
orders his arrest as a ‘bad subject’.65 Inspector Marais finds Morande at Versailles
in the Grand Common, a barracks for palace servants. Morande, forewarned,
warns Marais that he is armed and will not be taken. He runs off and Marais
gives chase. Marais is short of breath and heavy. Morande, fleet of foot, soon
outpaces him.66
Morande suspects the game is up. The next day he sets out through Champagne
for Liège, then an independent archbishopric. From there he travels to Brussels
and Ostend, where he embarks on a ship for England. He will not set foot in
France again for 21 years.67
Notes
Notes to prologue: Auto da fé
1 On the auto da fé and manoeuvres that preceded it, see above, pp. 57–70.
2 It is not certain that d’Eon was personally present at the burning, though he suggested the
venue. Both Beaumarchais and d’Eon claim that they first met the following year, though they
offer contradictory accounts of their meeting. See Donald Spinelli, ‘Beaumarchais and d’Eon:
what an affair’ in Simon Burrows, Jonathan Conlin, Russell Goulbourne and Valerie Mainz, eds,
The Chevalier d’Eon and His Worlds: Gender, Espionage and Politics in the Eighteenth Century
(London: Continuum, 2010), pp. 57–71, at pp. 60–1.
3 See, for example, MSB, I, 1 January 1762; VII, 13 February 1774.
4 MSB, VII, entry for 7 June 1773.
5 The only previous biography of Morande is Paul Robiquet, Théveneau de Morande: étude sur le
XVIIIe siècle (Paris: Quantin, 1882). This can be supplemented by BCE, which contains over 600
documents, many of which relate to Morande, and my own works, notably, ‘A literary low-life
reassessed: Charles Théveneau de Morande in London, 1769–1791’, Eighteenth-Century Life 22:1
(1998), 76–94, and Blackmail, Scandal, and Revolution: London’s French Libellistes, 1758–1791
(Manchester University Press, 2006).
6 These rumours – repeated in several nineteenth-century sources – are probably a case of
mistaken identity, as one of Louis XV’s servants and procurers was named Morand.
7 The satirist Pietro Aretino [Aretin] (1492–1556), the inventor of modern literary pornography,
famed for the depictions of sexual positions that accompanied his works.
8 Beaumarchais to unknown correspondent, Paris, 24 January 1781, in BCE, I, 112–15, at p. 113;
CPA 517 fo 242, d’Eon’s second ‘billet’ to Morande, 8 August 1776 (the original French text
appears in CPA 517 fos 239–40 and CPA supplément 17 fos 11–12); Pierre-Louis Manuel, La
Police de Paris dévoilée, 2 vols (Paris: Garnery, l’an II de la liberté [1791]), II, 265. Manuel’s
statement was republished by Jacques-Pierre Brissot in Patriote françois no. 740, 19 August 1791,
p. 212, in an article entitled Réponse de Jacques-Pierre Brissot à tous les libellistes qui ont attaqué
et attaquent sa vie passée, which had appeared as a pamphlet several days earlier.
9 Gary Kates, Monsieur d’Eon is a Woman: A Tale of Political Intrigue and Sexual Masquerade
(New York: Basic Books, 1995), p. 214; Peter Wagner, Eros Revived: Erotica of the Enlightenment
in England and America (London: Paladin, 1988), p. 91; Robiquet, Théveneau de Morande,
p. 307.
10 Robert Darnton, ‘The high enlightenment and the low-life of literature in prerevolutionary
France’, Past and Present no. 51 (1971), 81–115.
11 Robert Darnton, Forbidden Best-Sellers of Pre-Revolutionary France (London: Harper Collins,
1996), p. 65. Unfortunately Darnton’s figures, which come from orders to a single publishing
house, attribute to Morande several works that were almost certainly produced by other
writers.
Notes to Chapter 1: The Sins of his Youth
1 Morande’s uncle’s full name was also Charles-Claude but he was apparently known as Claude.
2 Andrea de Nerciat, André-Robert (attrib.), Julie philosophe, ou le bon patriote, 2 vols (Paris: Le
Coffret des Bibliophiles, 1910 [original edition, 1791]), II, 10.
220 N O T E S T O PA G E S 1 – 7
3 Genealogical and professional information on the Théveneau family is taken from the État Civil
d’Arnay-le-Duc in the Mairie of Arnay-le-Duc (which is indexed) and the unindexed copies
in ADCO, 2E26/4–24. I have also consulted miscellaneous articles from the Pays d’Arnay (the
bulletin of the Association des Amis du Pays d’Arnay) supplied by its editor, Bernard Leblanc.
See also the brief article by A. Albrier, ‘Charles Théveneau de Morande’, Bulletin du Bouquiniste,
15 December 1875, 1–4.
4 His first documented use of the name ‘Théveneau de Morande’ is in Arsenal, MS 12,345 fos
198–9, Morande to Sartine, 4 August 1769. For rental contracts on his family’s small holdings
see ADCO, 4E64/261.
5 The information in this and the preceding paragraph is from E. Badin and M. Quantin,
Géographie départementale, classique et administrative de la France. Département de La Côte
d’Or (Paris: J. Debochet, Le Chevalier et cie, 1847) and the 1793 census of the district of Arnay-
sur-Arroux (the revolutionary name for Arnay-le-Duc): ADCO, L 1274. In 1793, the canton of
Arnay had a population of 2,550. No other settlement in the district (total population 6,804)
had a fair.
6 Both Morande’s son and his brother Lazare would marry first cousins. Others who signed
Morande’s parents’ wedding register included Philiberte’s parents, Antoine Belin and Marie
Hoüard; her brother Gabriel Belin; her maternal cousin Claude Bauzon; the groom’s parents
Charles Théveneau and Rose Despres; his uncle Guy Théveneau; and his first cousin Pierre
Guichot.
7 See p. 192.
8 Morande’s grandparents, Charles Théveneau and Rose Despres, lost 10 children in early infancy.
9 The best source of information on Philiberte Belin and Morande’s siblings is the Morande-
Beaumarchais correspondence in the Archives de la Famille Beaumarchais [AFB], which remain
in private hands. A significant portion of this correspondence is published in BCE, but letters
concerning Morande’s family are mostly omitted or abridged. For example, the quotes in this
and the previous paragraph are from AFB fos 22–5, Morande to Beaumarchais, 24 January 1786,
but do not appear in the published version, BCE, document 460.
10 The tales of Morande’s youthful escapades come from César Lavirotte, ‘Notice sur M. de
Morande’, unpublished manuscript. I thank M. Bernard Leblanc for supplying a transcribed
copy of this manuscript, which was uncovered by Claude Guyot (1890–1965), mayor of Arnay-
le-Duc, among Lavirotte’s papers. Lavirotte’s sources included local folk memory; his own
recollections; conversations with Morande; and published materials. Many episodes Lavirotte
recounts can be verified, often only from sources unavailable to its author. Where Lavirotte
makes verifiable errors it is usually due to reliance on published sources. The stories recounted
here probably came from village legend or Morande himself.
11 Morande, Réplique de Charles Théveneau Morande à Jacques-Pierre Brissot: sur les erreurs, les
infidélités et les calomnies de sa Réponse (Paris: Froullé, 1791), p. 7, says he continued his studies
until 17 years old. This implies he attended university.
12 SHD, 4YC11, Contrôle des troupes, dragons de Bauffremont, 1748–1760: 6e Etat, Compagnie
d’Aigremont; YB605, Contrôle des officiers: Bauffremont, fo 22. The former document appears
to refute Morande’s statement that his father’s friend took him to join up in late 1759.
13 The table of the social backgrounds of over 16,000 soldiers recruited between 1753 and 1763 in
André Corvisart, L’Armée française de la fin du XVIIe siècle au ministère de Choiseul. Le Soldat,
2 vols (Paris, 1964), I, 467, suggests that less than 1 per cent came from bourgeois families.
Corvisart also reveals (I, 533–4) that in a sample of 138 soldiers in Morande’s regiment, over
70 per cent could sign their name and almost 38 per cent held a pen well.
14 Morande’s critical comments are found in Le Gazetier cuirassé ou anecdotes scandaleuses de la
cour de France (n. p. [London], 1771), pt I, ‘Le Gazetier cuirassé’, pp. 37–8, 59–60, 66, 151–2; pt
II, Mélanges confus sur des matières forts claires, pp. 3–5. The Gazetier also contains a third part,
Le Philosophe cynique. As each part resembles a separate pamphlet and is paginated separately,
henceforth they are referred to as Parts I, II and III respectively.
15 This account of Morande’s military career is taken from Morande, Réplique à Brissot, p. 7.
Lavirotte’s ‘Notice sur Morande’ says his father bought him out.
16 There appears to be some poetic licence in Morande’s description of his ‘comrades’ lying dead,
since SHD, 4YC11, Contrôle des troupes, dragons de Bauffremont, reveals that no one in his
regiment was killed in July 1761.
N O T E S T O PA G E S 8 – 1 4 221
17 BL, Add. MS 11, 340, fo 21, cutting from Public Advertiser, 5 September 1776 and passim.
18 SHD, 4YC11: Contrôle des troupes, dragons de Bauffremont, 1748–1760; 7YC3: Contrôle des
troupes, dragons Bauffremont, Lorraine 1763–1776.
19 For the regimental records see SHD, 4YC11; 6YC73; 7YC3; YB104; YB605; YB839. For other
documents concerning Morande’s claims, see BL, Add. MS 11, 340, fos 24 and 34, Westminster
Gazette, 3–7 and 10–14 September 1776; Morande, Réplique à Brissot, p. 18; Arsenal MS 12,345,
fos 132–3, Marais to Sartine, 17 May 1768; Morning Chronicle, 12 October 1776. Poyane’s letter
read: ‘In the corps of Carabiniers, Sir, there has been no such officer as Demorande, and no Field
Officer, nor even any other Officer of that corps has been in England.’ Thus Morande’s counter-
assertion (Morning Chronicle, 14 October 1776) that he had claimed only to be in the ‘suite’ of
the Carabiniers [i.e. a staff officer] and not a ‘Field Officer’ was specious. An accompanying
letter from the (conveniently deceased) Marquis de Chauvelin, which turned down Poyane’s
recommendation of Morande to serve as Chauvelin’s aide-de-camp in Corsica in 1768, was
also irrelevant to the discussion, and perhaps a forgery. When Morande was arrested in 1765,
he seems only to have mentioned his service in the Bauffremont regiment. His narrative of his
military service in the Réplique à Brissot leaves little time for his promotion to an elite unit. The
story is also improbable because neither side suffered cavalry losses at Vellinghausen.
20 Morande, Réplique à Brissot, p. 8.
21 Lavirotte, ‘Notice sur Morande’.
22 The indexes to the Etat Civil at Arnay-le-Duc reveal that there was indeed a widow Finel or
Finelle in Arnay. Her maiden name was Anne Follot, and between May 1723 and April 1747 she
had 15 children by three different husbands. Her final spouse was Etienne Finelle, a merchant,
who originally came from Précy-sous-Thil, 30 kilometres from Arnay. Ten of her children were
buried at Arnay, but all died either in childhood or after 1805. Of the remaining five, only one,
Jacques Noirot, was male. He was 38 or 39 at the time of the alleged duel and so, quite apart from
the burial evidence, seems an unlikely candidate for fighting a man almost 20 years his junior.
Nor is it likely that Lavirotte was merely confused about Morande’s rival’s identity. Only four men
aged between 14 and 35 were buried in Arnay between 1762 and 1764 (the years when the duel
could have occurred). They comprised a saddler, a tailor, a gardener who died of an infection,
and a passing soldier, who was found dead in his lodgings. None seems a likely challenger for
Morande, and none shared a surname or next of kin (where listed) with any woman who died
in the same time period. Moreover, the Follot and Théveneau clans remained tied by blood and
friendship. Anne Follot was related to the Théveneaus through her first husband, Jean Noirot,
and in 1841 a Dr Jean-Jacques Follot married Morande’s granddaughter, Louise Guiot. Louis,
Claude and Charles Théveneau were witnesses at Anne Follot’s wedding to Etienne Finelle.
23 This account of Morande’s adventures follows Morande, Réplique à Brissot, pp. 8–12.
24 Arsenal, MS 12,345 fo 136, Juliot to Sartine, undated letter [c. May 1768].
25 Morande, Réplique à Brissot, p. 12. Morande cited as a witness for his life history up until 1764,
M. Buillote, curate at Arnay-le-Duc, who at the time that Morande wrote (1791) was a deputy
in the National Assembly.
26 Pamela Cheek, ‘Prostitutes of “political institution”’, Eighteenth-Century Studies, 28 (2) (1994–5),
pp. 193–219.
27 Arsenal, MS 12,247 fos 315–16, La Saule to Sartine, rue du Battoir, 3 March 1765. La Saule claims
this money was given to Morande by his family and that they sent further sums subsequently.
His father’s testimony that Morande had slipped away contradicts this. It is not clear whether
La Saule was aware of the truth.
28 His victims probably included Monsieur de Seguenot, a Burgundian gentleman; Monsieur
Faillers [?], doctor to the King of Poland; and Monsieur de La Chaise, whose watches had all
been pawned by Morande. All are named in an explanatory letter to La Janière, who was suspi-
cious about the watches. Morande claimed that all been lent to help him raise funds following
gambling losses, and that he had repaid their owners. He added that La Saule could confirm
these facts. See Arsenal, MS 12,247 fos 311–12, Morande to La Janière, 22 February 1765.
29 Arsenal MS 12,345, fos 132–3, Marais to Sartine, 17 May 1768. Marais repeated his assertion
that Morande was strongly ‘suspected of pederasty’ in an annotation on MS 12,345, fo 196–7,
Morande to Sartine, 26 July 1769.
30 This discussion of eighteenth-century French homosexual sub-cultures is drawn primarily
from Olivier Blanc, ‘The Italian taste in the time of Louis XVI’ in Jeffrey Merrick and Michael
222 N O T E S T O PA G E S 1 4 – 1 8
Sibalis, eds, Homosexuality in French Culture and History (Binghampton, NY: Haworth Press,
2001), pp. 69–84; Jeffrey Merrick, ‘The Marquis de Villette and Mademoiselle de Raucourt:
representations of male and female sexual deviance in late eighteenth-century France’ in Jeffrey
Merrick and Bryant T. Ragan Jr., eds, Homosexuality in Modern France (Oxford University Press,
1996), pp. 30–53.
31 Arsenal, MS 12,247 fos 303–4, La Janière to Sartine, 17 February 1765. (This letter is reproduced
in AB, XII, 475).
32 Ibid.
33 Arsenal, MS 12,247 fos 315–16, La Saule to Sartine, 3 March 1765.
34 Ibid., fo 320, Sartine to Saint-Florentin [undated]. Annotated by Saint-Florentin ‘bon pour ordre’,
14 March 1765.
35 Ibid., fos 315–16, La Saule to Sartine, 3 March 1765; MS 12,345 fos 198–9, Morande to Sartine,
4 August 1769.
36 Arsenal, Bastille MS 12,345 fo 164, Antoine Durand, lace merchant, to Sartine, rue de Grenelle,
Faubourg St Germain, undated letter received 15 July 1768. Of the three ducal branches of the
family, Durand probably meant to indicate the Duke de Sully-Bethune: members of that branch
are mentioned in Morande, Réplique à Brissot, p. 18.
37 Arsenal, MS 12,345 fos 198–9, Morande to Sartine, 4 August 1769; fos 132–3, Marais to Sartine,
17 May 1768. (The latter letter is reproduced in AB, XII, 481–2.)
38 Ibid., fos 160–1, Jumeau (tailor) to Sartine, undated letter received 14 July 1768.
39 Ibid., fos 132–3, Marais to Sartine, 17 May 1768 (reproduced in AB, XII, 481–2); fo 162–3,
Sébastien Frelle to Sartine, undated letter received 15 July 1768; fo 165, Lasagne dit La Forest to
Sartine, undated letter received 16 July 1765.
40 Arsenal, Bastille MS 12,345 fo 164, Antoine Durand to Sartine, rue de Grenelle, Faubourg St
Germain, undated letter received 15 July 1768; fo 159, Ketteng (jeweller) to Sartine, 14 July 1768;
fos 160–1, Jumeau (tailor) to Sartine, undated letter received 14 July 1768.
41 Save where indicated, the detail in this and the next three paragraphs is taken from Arsenal,
MS 12,345 fos 132–3, Marais to Sartine, 17 May 1768, (AB, XII, 481–2). Intriguingly, two of the
women this letter mentions, Mesdemoiselles La Cour and Desmares are also mistreated in an
anonymous pamphlet sometimes attributed to Morande, Les Joueurs et M. Dusaulx (Agripinae
[London]: N. Lescot, 1781 [first edition, 1780]). The attribution is nevertheless almost certainly
wrong: see pp. 152–3.
42 Quote in Anon., Joueurs, p. 9. Bicêtre is mentioned only in Anne-Gédeon de Lafite de Pelleport
(attrib.), Le Diable dans un bénitier et le Gazetier Cuirassé transformé en mouche (London, 1783),
p. 34 and CPA 516 fos 211–18, d’Eon to Vergennes, London, 27 May 1776 [also at BMT, R20]. The
rest of the incident is mentioned by Marais. On Charlotte Desmares and Angélique Delavaux,
a.k.a. la Beauchamp, see also Camille Piton, ed., Paris sous Louis XV: rapports des Inspecteurs de
police au roi, 5 vols (Paris: Mercure de France, 1906–1914), I, 353; II, 135; IV, 78–106. I have been
unable to verify la Beauchamp’s relationship with Casanova from his Memoirs.
43 Guerluchonnage was a contemporary term and is used by Marais, although it does not appear
in any modern or historical dictionary I have consulted. It signifies the practice of having more
than one lover while supposedly a kept woman and presumably derived from the term greluchon,
which means the favoured, secret lover of a woman who makes other men pay for her favours.
Morande himself provides a brief definition of greluchon in his Gazetier cuirassé (pt. III, clef des
nouvelles, p. vii), where he says that custom allows theatre girls three lovers: ‘un entreteneur, un
bon ami, et un troisième amant domestique, qui s’apelle [sic] un greluchon’.
44 On La Cour see Piton, ed., Paris sous Louis XV, II, 253, 258; MSB, XVIII, entry of 7 April 1768
(this entry is out of chronological sequence: 7 January 1768 is probably intended). On Sonville or
Souville, also known as Fredérique, see Piton, op. cit., I, 335, 339; II, 212; III, 188, 202, 261–2.
45 Manuel, Police dévoilée, I, 265 affirms that Morande took La Cour away from Lamballe. If true,
she must have returned to Lamballe, as she refused to leave his deathbed until offered a large
sum of money. Lamballe died after falling from a horse: see Alain Vircondelet, La Princesse de
Lamballe: l’ange de Marie-Antoinette (Paris: Flammarion, 2005).
46 [Morande], Gazetier cuirassé, pt III, p. 87.
47 On the d’Oppy case see Mathieu-François Pidansat de Mairobert (attrib.), L’Espion anglois, ou
correspondance secrète entre Milord All’Eye et Milord All’Ear, nouvelle édition, 10 vols (London:
John Adamson, 1779–1785), II, 50–64 (which is sceptical of d’Oppy’s defence); and MSB, IX,
N O T E S T O PA G E S 1 8 – 2 3 223
entries for 19, 20 and 23 June 1776. The link to Morande is made in Arsenal, MS 12,345 fos
132–3, Marais to Sartine, 17 May 1768. Although Marais refers to d’Oppy as ‘demoiselle’, a term
usually reserved for unmarried women, he also says her papers are ‘under seals’. This seems
to confirm that Morande’s d’Oppy is indeed the gentlewoman arrested a month earlier chez la
Gourdan. A letter from Morande was found among her papers.
48 Morande, Réplique à Brissot, p. 13; Arsenal, MS 12,345 fo 136, Juliot to Sartine, [undated]; fos
137–8, copy of the power of attorney of Louis Théveneau; fo 152, certified true copy of letter of
Claude Théveneau to [Juliot]; fo 153, certificate of Juliot and (on the reverse) the original of the
power of attorney of Louis Théveneau, dated Arnay-le-Duc, 27 January 1768.
49 For Danezy’s history see Arsenal, MS 12,345 fos 132–3, Marais to Sartine, 17 May 1768 at fo
133 (AB, XII, 482). Delamotte is no relation of Henri de La Motte or the Count and Countess
de La Motte who feature later in this book.
50 Ibid., fos 126–7, Desmoulins, huissier à cheval to [Sartine], 8 April 1768.
51 Ibid., fos 124–5 Morande to Sartine, 5 May 1768. (This letter is reproduced in AB, XII,
479–81).
52 Ibid., fos 130–1, Clermont-Arnoul to Sartine, 17 May 1768.
53 Manuel, Police dévoilée, I, 265.
54 Arsenal, MS 12,345 fos 128–9, Flesselles to Sartine, undated letter, [c. 11 May 1768]; fos 131–2,
Marais to Sartine, 17 May 1768 (AB, XII, 481–2); Morande, Réplique à Brissot, p. 13.
55 Arsenal, MS 12,345 fos 134–5, Danezy to Sartine, 24 May 1768; Sartine’s annotations on the
same, dated 25 May 1768; Morande, Réplique à Brissot, p. 13. Saint-Florentin signed an order
for Morande’s arrest on 27 May.
56 Arsenal, MS 12,345 fos 141–2, Marais to Sartine, 25 June 1768; fos 139–40, Saint-Florentin to
Sartine, 27 May 1768.
57 Ibid., fos 148–9, Duvergé to Sartine, Fort l’Évêque, 6 July 1768. (This letter is reproduced in AB,
XII, 483–4).
58 Ibid., fos 143–4, Bethune to Sartine, 2 July 1768. Bethune, a member of one of France’s leading
noble families, claimed Morande’s family had asked him to look out for him. One can only
imagine the reply that Sartine sent him five days later!
59 Ibid., fos 150–1, Juliot to Sartine, 10 July 1768; fo 154, Louis Théveneau to Sartine, 9 July 1768;
fos 168–9, Marais to Sartine, 22 July 1768 (AB, XII, 486).
60 Arsenal, MS 12,345 fos 175–6, Morande to Sartine, Armentières, 27 July 1768; fos 177–8,
Morande to Sartine, Armentières, 10 August 1768. The letters of Morande’s creditors are filed
in MS 12,345. Several are cited above.
61 Arsenal, MS 12,345 fos 183–4 Croquison to Sartine, Armentières, 4 May 1769 (this letter is
reproduced in AB, XII, 485); fos 185–6, Morande to Sartine, Armentières, 4 May 1769; fos 187–8,
Juliot to Sartine, undated letter; fo 189, procuration of Louis Théveneau, Arnay-le-Duc, 30 May
1769.
62 Arsenal, MS 12,345, Croquison to La Saule, Armentières, undated letter, annotated 1 June 1769;
fo 192, Sartine to Saint Florentin, 7 June 1769; fos 194–5, Croquison to Sartine, Armentières,
17 July 1769 (this letter is reproduced in AB, XII, 485).
63 Ibid., fos 196–7, Morande to Sartine, 26 July 1769, including annotations; fos 198–9, Morande
to Sartine, 4 August 1769 and annotations; fos 202–3, Morande to Sartine, 13 August 1769.
64 Ibid., fos 200–1, Morande to Bignicourt, undated letter; fos 204–5, Commissaire Chénu to
Sartine, Amiens, 8 December 1768.
65 Ibid., fos 210–11, Narbens to Sartine, 13 May 1769, and Sartine’s annotations on the same.
66 Morande, Réplique à Brissot, p. 17.
67 Ibid., pp. 17–18.
Notes to Chapter 2: The Armour-Plated Gazetteer
1 AN, 277AP/1, dossier Morande, fos 347–8, Morande to d’Eon [1773].

2 Ibid., fo 377, Morande to d’Eon, undated letter [1770 or 1771].
3 [Morande], Gazetier cuirassé, pt I, p. vi.
4 CPA 502 fos 177–9, d’Eon to Broglie, London, 13 July 1773, implies that Morande had told d’Eon
Index
Notes: (1) Illustrations are indicated by italics. (2) ‘n.’ after a page number indicates the number
of an endnote on that page. (3) Morande’s relationships are classified under the names of the
people involved; other entries involving him appear under the appropriate entry e.g. ‘youth’.
abbés de cour 197 Ami du Roi 200

abolition(ists) see slave trade Amis des noirs see ‘Friends of the Blacks’
Acciaioli, Cardinal 37 Amours de Charlot et Toinette 132, 136,
Actes des apôtres 190 236n. 105
Addington, Mr. Justice 92 Amours et aventures du visir de Vergennes 135–6
Adhémar, Jean-Balthazar, Count d’ 32, 136, Amsterdam 69, 76, 131, 147
139, 140, 162, 163 Anecdotes sur Madame du Barry 210, 231n.
and Count de La Motte 168 100
and Morande 109–10, 119, 136–7, 164 Angelucci, Guillaume (alias William
see also diamond necklace affair [H]Atkinson) 76–9 passim, 101, 232n. 8,
advertising see Courier de l’Europe n. 10
affairs see sexual affairs Anhalt, Princess d’ 42
agents provocateurs 46, 79, 194 Anisson-Duperron, Etienne-Alexandre 75
Aiguillon, Armand du Plessis, Duke d’ xv, 58, Annales politiques, civiles et littéraires 146–7,
70–1, 225n. 38 149, 179, 245n. 96
attacks on 32, 35, 43, 57, 58 anti-clericalism (Morande) 5, 16, 37, 38, 43,
and du Barry 32, 33, 57–63 passim, 229n. 44, 47, 52, 187, 191, 197
and Gazetier cuirassé 35, 43 Archives de la Bastille 210
and Maupeou crisis 33 Aretin, Pietro xvi, 58, 87, 219n. 7
and Morande 32, 35, 57, 229n. 63 Argand, Aimé 119, 239n. 53, n. 59
resignation 108 Argenson see Paulmy d’Argenson
suppression negotiations 59–70 Argus patriote 191–4 passim, 196, 200, 209,
Ainslie, Sir Robert 118, 234n. 74, 239n. 55 210, 212, 251n. 13, 254n. 237
Alarm Bell against French Spies 135 see also political ideology (Morande)
Alarm Bell for Kings see Tocsin des Rois aristocracy, British 23, 33
Albrier, A. 227n. 2 French xiv, 13, 39, 42, 44, 54, 188
Alcibiades 51, 228n. 31, 242n. 17 see also nobility
aliases (Morande) 2, 85, 88, 113 Arnay-le-Duc (sur-Arroux) 1–4 passim, 6–10
Alexandria 118 passim, 192, 202–5 passim 220n. 5
America 69, 73, 96–7, 137, 161, 170, 201 battle of (1569) 2
Declaration of Independence 74, 128 see also Association des Amis du Pays
French alliance, 73–4, 125 d’Arnay, Pays d’Arnay
Revolution/Revolutionary War 3, 74, 79, Arnould, Sophie xiv, 69
99, 111–28 passim, 138, 171, 179, 185 Arroux, river 2, 12
Peace of Versailles 118 Artois, Comte d’ (subsequently Charles X)
see also Boston Tea Party, Canada, 132, 134, 242n. 22
Coercive Acts see also Amours de Charlot et Toinette
268 INDEX
assassination see murder Bartholo 76

Assembly of Notables 169 Basra 118
assessments (of Morande) 205 Bassompierre, François de 47
contemporary xvi, 1, 25, 29–30, 88, 96, Bastille 40, 45–8 passim, 96, 131–64 passim,
109–10, 142, 195, 202 187, 207, 208, 227n. 2
modern xvi, 211–13 case histories 47
nineteenth century 209–10 demolition 189
self-assessments 207–8 fall, Morande’s reaction 187, 190
see also overviews of Morande’s career regime 46–7
Association des Amis du Pays d’Arnay 220n. 3 secret dépôt 132, 175, 250n. 131
Atkinson, William see Angelucci see also Archives de la Bastille, Bastille
attributed works (Morande) 152–3 dévoilée, Mémoires sur la Bastille,
Aubert, Jean-Louis, abbé 144, 181, 182, 185 Rémarques historiques sur la Bastille
August decrees 189 Bastille dévoilée 256n. 5
Austen, Jane 106 Bate, Rev. Henry 97–9, 126, 235n. 98
Australia 120 battles see Arnay-le-Duc, Lexington, Minden,
see also Botany Bay Pondicherry, Rossbach, Saratoga, Trafalgar,
Austria 7, 52, 147, 152, 160, 177, 197, 198 Valmy, Vellinghausen, Waterloo
and France Baudouin 104, 113–28 passim, 132, 238n. 35,
alliance 76, 175 239n. 56
recognition of French constitution 198 Bauffremont, Prince de 6–9 passim, 221n. 19
see also Marie-Antoinette, Pillnitz, Baume, M. de 120
Silesia, Vienna Bauzon, Claude 1, 220n. 6
Austrian Netherlands see Belgium Bauzon, Claudine, née Ravier 1
Austrian Succession, wars of 7 Bayle, Pierre 38
Authentic Memoirs of Madame De Barre 59, Bearcroft, Edward 93
61 Beauchamp, Mlle Angelique 16, 222n. 42
Autun 2, 10–11, 15 Beaumarchais (Molinaro) 208
Auxonne, Countess of 42 Beaumarchais, Pierre-Augustin Caron de xiii,
Avignon 33, 43 3, 70–1, 74, 109, 213, 219n. 2, 224n. 14
Avis à la branche espagnole 76–85 passim, allegations against 96, 104, 201, 232n. 13
100, 231n. 6, 232n. 8, n. 11, n. 12 and America 73–4, 96–7
Azile 170, 172 and Amours de Charlot et Toinette 236n.
105
Babillard 194 and Angelucci/(H)Atkinson 232n. 8
background (Morande) xv-xvi and Avis à la branche espagnole 76–9,
see also assessments 231n. 6, 232n. 8, n. 11, n. 12
Baker, Sir George 116–7 and Calonnes 171, 173
Baldwin, George 118, 239n. 55 and Courier de l’Europe 79, 173
Ball 239n. 57 and Daudet 185
Balsamo, Joseph (or Guiseppe) see Cagliostro and Dutens 231n. 100
Balthymore see Cagliostro and Eliza Morande 24–7 passim, 173
Barber of Seville 73, 75–6 and d’Eon 79, 80–3, 93, 96, 97, 225n. 36,
Barbier, Antoine-Alexandre 231n. 99 232n. 13
Barthélemy, François 161–3 passim and Francy 75, 80, 106, 233n. 31
and Morande 110, 119 and George-Louis Théveneau 124, 201
and regency crisis 116–7 and Goëzman
and spy network 104 court cases 68
INDEX 269
judicial memoirs 78, 100 Bernis, Cardinal 37

and Gotteville 75, 230n. 79, 231n. 5 Bethune, Duke de 16, 20, 50, 222n. 36,
and Kornmann case 185–6, 252n. 31 223n. 58
and Lauraguais 97 Bew, John 176
and Le Turc 119 Bible 38
and Linguet 147 Biĉetre 16, 17, 55, 85, 222n. 42
and Mirabeau 151, 184, 185, 186 Bignicourt, M. de 21
and Morande xvi, 25–7, 75–86 passim, 97, Biographie universelle 209
100–9, passim 119, 124, 127, 137, 142, biography, of Morande (Robiquet) 10, 210,
147, 148, 151, 171, 173, 181, 184, 185, 381n. 5
186, 201, 204, 209, 210, 237n. 14, 249n. blackmail (attempts and allegations) 145, 176
104, 252n. 31 justification 209
political influence 73–5 by La Mottes 168–9, 176–7
and Sainte-Foy 129 by Morande xv-xvi, 27, 45, 49–51 passim,
and Sartine 75, 231n. 6 57–70 passim, 85–105 passim, 123, 159,
spying 73, 97, 108, 125 244n. 59
suppressions 79 motivation 108, 140–1
legal framework 70 by Pelleport 134–5
negotiations 68–73 passim, 232. n. 21, n. see also Cagliostro, Calonne (C-A),
25, 233n. 39, n. 44 Mirabeau
and Swinton 100–1, 173, 204, 234n. 74 Blake, William 166
and Tort 232n. 13 Bligh, William, Capt. (R.N.) 110
and Vergennes 73–4, 79, 85 Bohémiens 25, 207, 242n. 20, 256n. 5
and Vernancourt 83 Boinot and Gaillard 227n. 23
and Vignoles 83 Boissière, David 51, 62, 131, 132, 135, 146,
and Voltaire 148 228n. 36
see also Barber of Seville, Beaumarchais and Morande 135, 229n. 70
(by Molinaro), Beaumarchais et son and Pelleport 133, 134, 152
temps, Figaro, Marriage of Figaro, and Receveur 135–9 passim
Tarare, Transaction, Bonaparte, Napoleon 151, 204
Beaumarchais et son temps 209 Bon-homme anglois 147–8
Beaumont, Christophe de, Archbishop of Bonnington, Moira 234, n. 68
Paris 38 book sellers/publishers see Boinot and
Beccaria, Cesare Bonesana, Marquis de 144, Gaillard, Boissière, Boosey, Larrivée,
244n. 77 Poinçot, STN, Virchaux
Bécu, Jeanne see du Barry book trade xvi, 109, 131
Bedford, John Russell, 4th Duke of 125, Boosey, John 23
241n. 98 Boston Port Act see Coercive Acts
Belgium 131, 147, 151, 199 Boston Tea Party 73
see also Brussels Botany Bay 110, 120, 122, 163, 239n. 65
Belin, Antoine 220n. 6 Bouillon, Godefroy de La Tour d’Auvergne,
Belin, Gabriel 220n. 6 Prince de 44
Belin, Philiberte see Théveneau, Philiberte Belin Bouillon, Louise de Lorraine, Princess de
Bellanger see Béranger 134, 140
Benamore 163 Bouillotte, Claude-François 6
Benavent, François 60, 61, 156, 157, 247n. 18 Boulogne 79, 101, 103, 126–9 passim, 140,
Béranger 64–70 passim, 229n. 70 141, 158, 191
Bergasse, Nicolas 185, 189 Boulton, Matthew 119, 239n. 59
270 INDEX
Bounty (H.M.S.) 110 and Dutch patriot revolution 114–15

Bourgogne, M. de 16–17 finances 116
Bourgeois de Boynes, Pierre-Etienne 35 Foreign Office 229n. 66
Brancas see Lauraguais and France 24, 116, 198
Brenellerie see Gudin de la Brenellerie government 24
Breteuil, Louis-Auguste le Tonnelier, Baron liberty of speech/political freedom 24
de 143, 160–9 passim mercantile empire 23
and Marie-Antoinette 168 merchant navy 23
Brienne see Loménie de Brienne national debt 245n. 111
Brissac, Mme. (brothel keeper) 42 opposition (political) 28, 121, 122
Brissault (brothel keeper) 16, 18, 50 and Secret Memoirs of a Woman of
Brissot de Thivars 143, 244n. 70 Pleasure 69
Brissot de Warville, Jacques-Pierre 1, 25–6, and Spain 125
143, 146, 151, 179–87 passim, 197, 203, 208, see also London, regency crisis, stamp
213, 244n. 78, 255n. 144 duties, Royal Navy
arrest 141, 143 Brittany 33, 43, 115
and Chabot 255n. 136 nobles’ boycott of Estates General 187
and Cox 143 Brodie, Mr 112
and Danton 255n. 136 Broglie, Charles-François, Count de 24,
and desacralisation 211 28–30 passim, 50, 56, 96
and Desforges 142–3, 195–6 suppression negotiations 63–4
embezzlement alleged 143, 194–5, 254n. 109 Broglie, Victor-François, Marshal-Duke de 7
innocence 141, 143, 196, 243n. 57 Brooks 239n. 57
and Lenoir 143–4, 243n. 57 Brossais du Perray, Joseph-Marie 227n. 2
libel suit 144 brothels xv, xvi, 123, 195
and Lion 143 Autun 11
and Manuel 194, 253n. 91 London 24, 25, 85, 97
and Morande 125, 141–4 passim 190–211 Paris xv, 13–18 passim, 42, 44, 50, 152, 155
passim, 244n. 65, 245n. 110, 255n. 136 Brown, Dignam 253n. 95
and Moustier 141 Brunswick, Duke of 118, 201
and Pelleport 25–6, 141, 143, 144 Brussels 69, 131
police connection 208–9 Buard de Sennemar 140, 195
and Receveur 141 Buillote, M 221,n. 25
and Robespierre 202, 255n. 139 Buller, Francis 93–4, 150
and Serres de La Tour 243n. 56 and Morande 151
and slave trade 174 Bulletin de Londres see Courier de l’Europe
and Swinton 141–2 Bureau of Ordnance 121, 241n. 103
see also Lycée de Londres, Mémoires de Burgoyne, Gen. John 74
Brissot, Patriote françois Burgundy 202
Brissot, Félicité 25, 207, 243n. 55 London networks 27
Britain see also names of individual towns
Bank of England 245n. 111 Burke, Edmund 122, 176
Channel Islands 103, 123, 124 Buttet, Perrine 147, 150, 157, 245n. 112
colonies 23, 69, 73 Butts, Charlotte (Mrs Pellevé) 115
see also names of individual territories
commerce 23 ‘C’, M. de 59
constitution 188–9 Cagliostro, Joseph Balsamo, self-styled Count
customs officers 122 de 157–64 passim 208, 248n. 61
INDEX 271
(auto)biographies 164, 165 Cecil, Mme. 82

blackmail of (possible) 244n. 59 censorship 33–4, 79, 144, 149, 181–5 passim
and Carbonnières 164 Chabot 255n. 136
and Gordon 160–2 passim Chalmers (Pittite M.P.) 121
and La Motte 157, 158 and Morande 172
and Morande 158–68 passim, 185, 207, Chamorand (alias) see Fini
244n. 59, 248n. 62 Champ de Mars 193
sucking pig affair 165–6 Channel Islands see Britain
séance 247n. 56 Charlotte of Mecklenburg, Queen of England
and Swinton 157–8 240n. 70
see also freemasonry, Sarastro, venereal Charpentier, Louis 256n. 5
disease Chartres, Duke de, see Orléans
Cagliostro, Seraphina ‘Countess’ de 157–8, Chasley, Capt. 234n. 74
164, 168 Chatham 121, 240n. 69
and Morande 167 Châtillon, Duchess de 16
Cairo 118, 239n. 55 Chauvelin, Bernard-François, Marquis de 221
Calais 65 n. 19
Calonne, Charles-Alexandre de 119, 150, Chemilly, Préaudeau de 68
169–70 passim, 185, 245n. 110 Chénon, Pierre 143, 160
blackmail of (possible) 244n. 59 Cherbourg 122–3, 126
and Courier de l’Europe 173 Chile 120
financial reforms 171 Choiseul, Etienne-François, Duke de xiv, 33,
and Montmorin 249n. 104 44
and Morande 170–3 passim 244n. 59, Choiseulists xiv, 44
249n. 98, n. 100, n. 104, 250n. 112, n. 122 Choissy, abbé de 225n. 33
and Necker 171, 172, 185, 249n. 99 Clairon, Mlle. 51
and Serres de la Tour 169–70 Clarkson, Thomas 194, 195
legal case 170, 249n. 93 and Morande 200
and Swinton 172–3 Clavière, Etienne 185, 203, 253n. 95
see also Requête au Roi clergy
Calonne, Jacques-Ladislas-Joseph de, abbé Morande’s denunciations 187, 197
150, 171 see also abbés de cour, anti-clericalism,
Cambis de 162 Jesuits
Campo, Marquis de 122 non-juring 197, 198, 200
Canada 7 Clermont-Arnoul, Mme de 19
Capuchins 4–5, 156 Clootz, Anarcharsis 253n. 95
Carbonnières see Ramond de Carbonnières Coercive Acts 73
Caribbean 137 coffee houses 23
see also names of individual islands Collège de Navarre 124
Carra, Jean-Louis 185, 203 Collège Godrun 5
and desacralisation 211 Collet d’Hauteville, M. 50
and Morande 199 colonies see America, Britain, France,
Casanova, Giacomo 16, 222n. 42 Netherlands, Spain and under names of
Cassandra 256n. 20 individual colonies
Castries, Charles-Eugène-Gabriel, Marquis de Comédie française 13
104, 109, 113, 134, 138 commerce 2, 23, 73, 118, 120, 124, 127, 146,
Catherine II (the Great), Empress of Russia 181–2, 184, 188
53, 163 commercial treaty see Eden treaty
272 INDEX
commercial ventures (Morande) 49, 105, 106 Cressy, Mlle 19

cover for espionage 120, 127 Crivio 122
Committee of General Security 202 Cronk, Nicholas 228n. 36
Committee of Public Safety 203 Croquison, Bernard 21
Commune of Paris 190, 201–2 Crosne, Louis Thiroux de 164, 248n. 62
and Brissot 202
and Morande 202 Danezy, Mlle 18–20 passim
Compte rendu des finances 171 Danton, Georges 1, 201, 202
Condé, Prince de 197 and Brissot 255n. 136
Consitutent Assembly see National Assembly Darnton, Robert xvi, 211, 219n. 11, 225n. 43,
constitutional ideas see political ideology 242n. 20, 253n. 68, 256n. 5, n. 9
Conti, Prince de 237n. 17 Daubigny 14–16 passim
Convention 200, 202 Daudet de Jossan 185
Cook, Capt. James (R.N.) 120, 145 and Morande 252n. 28
Cornwall 123 Dayet 239n. 57
Costa (alias) see Benavent death (Morande) 205, 207
counter revolution 198 Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen
Courcelle, Constance de 31–2, 225n. 36 189
Courcelle, Count de 31–2, 48–9, 64 Delacroix de Contaut, Charles 251n.13
Courcelle, Countess de 31–2 Delamotte, Chevalier 18, 223n. 49
and d’Eon 48–9 Delavaux see Beauchamp
and Morande 48–9 Déoda, Mlle 141
Courier de l’Europe 140–4 passim, 149, Deptford 112, 240n. 69
159–65 passim, 175–212 passim, 253n. 69 Derigny, M. 18
and abolitionists 250n. 125 dérogeance 181
advertisements 180 desacralisation 211
on British economy 181 Desforges de Hurécourt 142–4 passim, 195–6,
Bulletin de Londres 180–1 243n. 55, 244n. 65
circulation 79, 179, 191 Desgenettes, Dr Nicolas Dufriche 151,
contemporary reaction 127–8 245n. 115
content 128, 145, 148, 151, 158, 172, Desmares, Charlotte 16, 152, 222n. 41, 42
180–8 passim, 248n. 72, 253n. 68 Desmoulins (bailiff ) 19
control/ownership 172–3 Desmoulins, Camille, 202, 255n. 139
editorship/style 75, 142, 173, 179, 180, despotism 147, 207
181, 243n. 59 attacked by Morande 23, 35, 43–8 passim,
format 180 182, 188, 198–9, 211, 197, 212
and fugitives 145–6 attacked by parlements 35
influence 179–80, 183, 204, 212 attacked by Pelleport 138
Lettres d’un voyageur 181–7 passim, reform proposals 108–9
251n. 10 Despres, Rose 220n. 6, n. 8
and Linguet 245. n. 111 Désoeuvré, ou, l‘espion du boulevard du temple
and Morande 75, 78–9, 106, 122, 126–9 152, 153
printing 101, 140, 143 Deux-Ponts, Duke of 63–4
readership 180 Devonshire, Georgiana, Duchess of 157
see also censorship, gazettes dévots 33
Courrier du Bas-Rhin 180 Diable dans un bénitier 96, 137–9, 139, 143,
Covent Garden 25, 85 144, 195, 210, 246n. 124
Cox, William 143 content 138–40
INDEX 273
diamond necklace affair 153–68 passim, 175, Eden treaty 116, 118, 182
176, 246n. 1 Morande’s view 182, 199
trial 155–6, 158 Edinburgh 156, 157
and Morande 156–68 passim, 176 education (Morande) 5, 220n. 11
Dijon 2, 5, 56 Egremont, Laurent le Bas de Claireau d’ 6
Directory 202, 204 Egypt 118, 157, 163, 165, 166, 204
Douai see Jacquet de Douai see also Alexandria, Cairo, Suez
Douglas, Sir Charles 112 Elliott (French agent) 115
Doutes sur la liberté de l’Escaut 150 Elliott, Sir Gilbert 150–1
Dover 65, 81, 103 emigration (Morande) 45
Dratz, George 77 émigrés 176, 192, 197, 198
Drogard 53 Morande’s comment 197–8
du Barry, Jean, Count xiv, 58, 59, 62 England see Britain
du Barry, Jeanne Bécu, Countess 60, 129, 203 Eon de Beaumont, Charles-Louis-Auguste-
background xiv-xv passim, André-Timothée, Chevalier d’ 40, 95, 109,
exiled 70, 108 219n. 2, 224n. 7, 235n. 86
and Gazetier cuirassé 35–6, 39–42 passim, alias 28
41, 44, 58 and America 96
and Maupeou crisis 33 background xiii, 27–9 passim
and Morande 57–69 passim, 177, 209, and Beaumarchais 25, 69, 79, 80–93 passim,
229n. 63 97, 225n. 36, 232n.13, 233n. 39, 233n. 44
see also Anecdotes sur Madame du Barry, and British opposition 28–9, 80
Authentic Memoirs of Madame De Barre, and Courcelles 31, 48–9
venereal disease and Courier de l’Europe 75
du Barry, Guillaume, Viscount xiv cross-dressing 28, 80–3, 89, 95, 225n. 27,
du Bertrand, 124 n. 33, 232n. 25
Dubourg 40 and Eliza Morande 24–5, 63, 67, 82, 84
du Coudray, ‘Mr’ 96 and France
Ducrest, M. 116 claims against 79–85 passim, 95, 233n. 29
Du Droit des français 53 return to/from 95
duels/challenges (Morande) 8–10, 56, 63, and Francy 80, 82, 96
86–92 passim, 98–9 and Franklin 96
Dufriche Desgenettes see Desgenettes on Gazetier cuirassé 32, 37
Dundas, Henry 173 gender xiii, 29, 80–6 passim, 96, 232n. 25
Du Perray see Brossais du Perray insurance policies on 29, 75, 82–8
Dupont, Félicité see Brissot, Félicité passim 92, 95, 225n. 29, 233n. 31,
Dupont, Marie-Catherine see Voragine 234n. 74
Dupré, Jacques 233n. 44 legal proceedings over 93–4, 235n. 79
Duquesnoy 194 and Guerchy 27–8, 81, 92
Durand, Antoine 222n. 36 law suits against 28
Dutch Republic/crisis see Netherlands and Linguet 147, 245n. 96, n. 106
Dutens, Louis 231n. 100 and Lormoy 230n. 77
Duval, banker 233n. 44 and Louis XV 28
Duvergé (prison officer) 20 and Mairobert 227n. 23
Duvernet, abbé 153 and Morande 14, 27–31 passim, 48–69
Dyatt see Dayet passim, 81, 82, 207, 210, 226n. 64, 233n. 31
accusations against xvi, 8–9, 56, 96,
East India Company 23, 121 232n. 16
274 INDEX
Eon de Beaumont, Charles-Louis-Auguste- finances (Morande) 5, 12–16 passim, 20–1,

André-Timothée, Chevalier d’ (continued) 26, 27, 32, 49, 50, 70, 73, 100–7 passim, 191,
breach/reconciliation 35, 48, 64, 85–93 200–5 passim
passim, 95, 96 Finel, Anne (née Follot), Mme 9, 221n. 22
legal action against 92–3 Finel, M. 9
and Secret du Roi 28, 80 Finel, Mlle 9
and Tort 96 Finelle, Anne see Finel
settlement of claims see Transaction Finelle, Etienne 221n. 22
suppression negotiations 63–4, 67–8, 70, Finet, police officer 64, 65
231n. 99 Fini, Jean-Claude (alias Count Hyppolite
on Théveneau (Louis) 3 Chamorand) 144–6 passim
and Vignoles 31, 80 Fitzherbert, Maria Anne 117
virginity 81, 225n. 33 Fitzjames, Duke de 115
see also freemasonry, Gaillardet, kidnap Flesselles, Jacques de 19, 190
Ephraim 253n. 95 Foisset, M. 209, 227n. 2, 228n. 34
Eprésmesnil, Jean-Jacques Duval d’ 159 Follot, Anne see Finel, Anne
espionage see spying activities Follot, Jean-Jacques, Dr 221n. 22
Espion anglois 195 Fontainebleau 16
Essai historique sur Marie-Antoinette 131–2, Fontaine, Chevalier 61–2, 65, 135
153, 242n. 7 Morande’s comments 229n. 70
Estates-General (France) 173, 181–7 passim, Fontaine (police commissaire) 164
205 Forster, Johann Reinhold 120
and slave trade 174 Forth, Nathaniel Parker 96, 116, 150, 153
Mirabeau elected 186 Fouquier-Tinville, Antoine-Quentin 203
Estates-General (Netherlands) see Fox, Charles James 116, 140
Netherlands France
Executive Directory 204 army
Carabiniers 221n. 19
‘F’, M. de la (possible alias of Pelleport) 138 Morande’s comments 6, 39, 187
Faillers, M. 221n. 28 Morande’s regiment 220n. 13, n. 16,
Falkland Islands 32 221n. 19
family background (Morande) 1, 220n. 9 recruits, social background 220n. 13
Fauche, Samuel 36 American alliance 74, 118, 125
Fauques de Vaucluse, Marianne Agnès Austrian alliance 7, 76, 131, 134
Pillement de, 50 and British commercial treaty 116, 118,
Favras, Thomas de Mahy, Marquis de 190–1, 182
253n. 69 Church/state relations 37, 189
femmes galantes 37, 44 colonies 7, 137, 194, 195, 203
Fenwick see Kenwick commerce 118, 184
Ferrers, Washington Shirley, Fifth Earl 64, Falklands mediation 32
81–2, 83, 95 finances 114, 169, 171–3, 191
Feuillants 193, 196 see also Calonne (C.), Necker
fictional treatments and George III 116–7
of Morande 25, 207 intelligence service 109
see also Mordanes see also Beaumarchais, La Motte (H.),
see Voragine Pellevé, police, Secret du Roi, spying
Fielding, Sir John 67, 69, 91, 92 activities
Figaro 2, 73, 76, 210 judicial/penal system 45, 48, 182–3
INDEX 275
torture 46, 183, 189 Friends of the Blacks 174, 196

see also lettres de cachet and Morande 200
monarchy-moral/theological basis 37–8, Friends of the Constitution 190
39, 53 Friends of the King 190
navy 96, 99, 111, 112, 113 Fronde rebellion 33
and Netherlands Froullé, Jacques-François 200, 254n. 133
diplomatic pressure 230n. 95 Frouville M. 161
and Dutch patriot revolution 114–15, Fry, Marie 163
118 Fulham 80
newspaper readership 179
Ottoman alliance 52–3 Gaillardet, Frédéric 225n. 33
parliamentary bodies see Convention, gambling 13, 29, 62
Estates-General (France), Legislative Morande’s 5, 9, 11, 14, 21, 43, 65, 105
Assembly, National Assembly campaign against 153
Assembly, Convention Gazetier cuirassé xv, xvi, 36–50 passim, 137,
political theory/structure 6, 34–5 149, 184, 202, 208, 211, 220n. 14, 225n. 34,
pre-revolutionary crisis 182, 184 n. 38, n. 43
Morande’s treatment 182, 184 circulation 33
revolutionary war, with Austria 177, 197, comparisons 231n. 100
200 confiscations 36
and Spain 32, 111, 242n. 23 contemporary reaction 35–9 passim, 45,
taxation 34, 169, 171 48, 54
see also Du Droit des français, Eon, French content 17, 35–44 passim, 50, 51, 58, 71,
Revolution, names of individual towns 155, 227n. 2
and regions, especially Paris, Versailles, despotism attacked 43–4, 138, 211, 212
public opinion and desacralisation 211
Franciscans 11 and Lauraguais 54
Francy see Théveneau de Francy legacy 177
Frankfurt 40 origins 32
Franklin, Alfred 209–10, 227n. 2, 228n. 34 price 32, 36
Franklin, Benjamin 96 reprint 210
Fratteaux, Louis-Mathieu Bertin, Marquis de symbolism 40
40, 65, 133 women, treatment of 41–2
Frederick II (the Great), King of Prussia 7 see also Eon
freemasonry Gazette de Leyde 180
and Cagliostro 157, 162, 163, 166 Gazetteer 128
and d’Eon 31 Gazette noire 152, 153
and Morande 163, 166, 248n. 69 gazettes (international) 33, 79, 140, 179–80,
and Vignoles 31 275n. 44
free trade 118, 182, 188 General Advertiser 97, 128
French Revolution 115, 131, 189–204 General Assembly 202
elections of 1791, 193–4 General Council 202
Parisian 196 general warrants 28–9
historians’ analysis 132 Geneva 200
Mirabeau’s influence 186 George III, King of England 31, 56, 97, 114,
origins xvi, 114, 131–2, 211 116, 121, 171, 225n. 33
see also press (revolutionary), Terror and Argand 239n. 53
Fréron, Elie 51 and Brunswick 118
276 INDEX
George III, King of England (continued) Guadeloupe 208

health 116–7 Guay d’Oliva, Nicole 155, 156
and Lauraguais 229n. 51 Gudin de la Brenellerie, Paul-Philippe xiii-
and Morande 116–7 xiv, 69
George IV, King of England (as Prince of Guerchy, Claude-Louis-François Regnier,
Wales) 116, 117, 157 Count de 27–30 passim, 81, 89, 92
Georgel, Jean-François 249n. 85 Guerlichon femelle 153
Germany 7, 33, 204 guerluchonage 16, 222n. 43
see also Frankfurt, Hamburg, Lippstadt, Guerrier de Lormoy see Lormoy
Neustadt, Nuremberg Guichot family 190
Ghuy see Marcenay Guichot, Philiberte 106, 243n. 36
Glasgow Star 253n. 68 Guichot, Pierre 220n. 6
Gustav III, King of Sweden 198 Guiot, Antoine 205
Gibbon, Edward 52 Guiot, Louise, 221n. 22
Gibraltar 122 Guyot, Claude 220n. 10
Gillray, James 167
Girondins 6, 202, 203, 209 habeas corpus 24
Godard, M. 12 Haiti see Saint-Domingue
Godeville see Gotteville Hamburg 143
Goëzman, Louis-Valentin 78, 100, 109, 146, Hammersmith 80
242n. 23 Harcourt, Simon, Earl of 61, 62
and Beaumarchais 68, 78, 100 Hardy, Jacques-Philippe 150–1, 185,
and libellistes 132–6 245n. 115, 246n. 120
and pornographic illustrations 132, 134 Harris, J. R. 239n. 57
Goncourt, Edmond and Jules de 210 Hartley, Mrs Elizabeth 97
Gordon, Lord George Harvelay, Mme de 170
and Cagliostro 160, 162 Hatkinson, William see Angelucci
and Morande 126, 160–3 passim Hautville see Collet d’Hauteville
trial 247n. 49 Hawkesbury, Charles Jenkinson 1st Baron
Gordon riots 160, 190, 247n. 31 121, 240n. 70
Gorsas, Antoine-Joseph 211 Hayes, surgeon 93, 94, 95, 234n. 74
Gotteville, Anne (Marie-Madeleine) de la health (Morande) 201, 205
Touche 65–6, 75, 230n. 79, 90, 231n. 5 Hébé (frigate) 113
see also Voyage d’une françoise Hébertists 239n. 56
Gourdan, Mme xv, 17–18, 42, 54 Hébert, Jacques-René 211
see also Portfeuille de Madame Gourdan Hecquet, Mme 14, 17
Goux see Le Goux Hélène, Mlle 10
Goy, Jean (the older) 99, 126, 250n. 135 Henri IV, King of France 2, 187
Goy (the younger) 250n. 135 ‘High Enlightenment and the Low-Life of
Gray, Robert 176 Literature’ 211
Great Britain see Britain Histoire secrète de la cour de Berlin 186,
Great Stanmore see Stanmore 252n. 36
Green, General 123 Historical Essay on the Life of Marie
Greenland Dock 80 Antoinette see Essai Historique
Grenoble 190 Historical Remarks on the Bastille see
Grizel, abbé 37 Rémarques historiques sur la Bastille
Grouber de Groubentall de Linières, Marc- Holbach, Paul-Henri Thiry, Baron d’, 38
Ferdinand 172, 250n. 107 see also philosophes, Systême de la nature
INDEX 277
Holland see Netherlands see also anti-clericalism, dévots

homosexuality 14, 15, 38, 43, 49, 50, 51, 91, Joseph II, Emperor of Austria 160
221n. 30, 224n. 24 Jossan see Daudet de Jossan
lesbianism 37, 42, 43 Jossecourt, Col. 63
sodomy 25–7 passim, 37, 42, 43, 44, 50, Jouers et M. Dusaulx 152–3, 222n. 41
51, 134 Journal de Berlin 247n. 56
Maupeou accused 43 Journal du Lycée de Londres 142, 143, 144
Morande suspected 14, 221n. 29 journals see gazettes and under individual
Pelleport suspected 134, 242n.17 titles
Hood, Samuel, Admiral Lord 122 Julie philosophe 25, 207
Horneck, Capt. Charles 91–2, 97 Juliot, M. 12, 18, 20
Horne Tooke, John 189 Junquières, Jacques-Louis-Antoine de 237n.
horse breeding/racing xiii, xiv, 54, 63 17
Hoüard, Marie 220n. 6
Howard, John 45 Kates, Gary 225n. 33, 232n. 25
Hurécourt see Desforges de Hurécourt Kaunitz, Anton, Prince von 78
Hyde Park 86, 91, 92, 98 Kehl 148
Kenwick or Kendrick 240n. 67
Iliad 256n. 20 Keyser, Jean, Dr 17
imprisonment/escapes (Morande) 11, 15, 16, kidnap attempts, xv
20–1, 107, 136, 201, 210 on d’Eon 28, 40, 41, 133
India/Indian Ocean 7, 111, 114–5 on La Motte 156–7
see also Madras, Pondicherry, Tipu on Morande xv, 11, 61–2, 64–7 passim,
Sultan 131, 133, 229n. 70, 230n. 78
industrial espionage/sabotage see spying Kornmann, Catherine 185, 186
activities Kornmann, Guillaume 185–6
infancy and childhood (Morande) 9–13 and Beaumarchais 185, 252n. 31
passim and Morande 185–6, 252n. 31
Inquisition 37, 48, 167 Kutsleben, Baron de 122
insurance policies see Eon
international gazettes see gazettes La Chaise, M. de 221n. 28
(international) La Chèvre 233n. 44
Ireland 118, 156 La Cour, Mlle 17, 42–3, 153, 222n. 41, n. 45
Irving, John 173 see also venereal disease
Italy 165, 167, 204 Lafayette, Marie Joseph Paul Yves Roch
‘Italian sin’ 37 Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de 185, 193
and Morande 193
Jacobins 1, 41, 191, 193, 196, 200–2 La Fite de Pelleport see Pelleport
and Morande 191, 199, 202 La Janière, de (police inspector) 15, 221n. 28
Jacques, Mr 93, 95 Lally, Thomas Arthur, Count de 47
Jacquet de Douai, Jean-Claude 133 Lally-Tollendal, Trophime-Gérard de 189
and Morande 131, 153 La Luzerne 239n. 62
Jaffa 151 La Marche, Count de 44
Jamaica 110 Lamballe, Prince de 17, 42, 222n. 45
Jansenism 5, 38 Lamballe, Princess de 121, 153, 177,
Jenkinson see Hawkesbury 251n. 141
Jersey see Britain La Motte, Henri de 103–5, 110, 125, 194,
Jesuits 5, 16–17, 33, 43, 47 195
278 INDEX
La Motte, Jeanne de Saint-Rémy, Countess de La Vrillière see Saint-Florentin

155, 156, 168, 169, 170 Lebeau, Charles-François 15
and Cagliostro 157, 158 Le Bel, Dominique-Guillaume 59
and Calonne 171 Leblanc, Bernard 220n. 3, 10, 237n. 17
Life 176–7 Lefebvre, Félicité, see Swinton
suppression 177 Lefebvre, Laurence xiv, 53, 100
Memoirs 168–70, 175–6 legal cases and trials 28, 53–4, 68, 92–4, 140,
attempts to negotiate suppression 144, 155–6, 158, 177, 185–6, 235n. 79,
168–70, 175 247n. 49, 249n. 93, 252n. 31
Burke’s view 176 Legislative Assembly 177, 195, 197, 199, 200
Morande’s view 175 Le Goux, surgeon 94
and Menneville 250n. 134 Le Havre 96
and Morande 171, 174–6 passim 250n. 134 Leiden 131, 153
and Stuart 250n. 135 Lenoir, Jean-Charles-Pierre 77, 131–44
La Motte, Count Nicolas de 155–7, passim, passim, 185
168, 169, 176, 249n. 83 and Brissot 243n. 57
and d’Adhémar 168 and Pelleport 243n. 57
and Calonne 171 Lequesne 146
and Menneville 250n. 134 lesbianism see homosexuality
and Montmorin 168 Lettre aux électeurs 254n. 111
and Morande 171, 174–6 passim, 250n. 134 lettres de cachet 162, 183
and Vergennes 168 abolition 189
Lander, James 232n. 25 abuse/increase 40, 44, 46
Landis (Landine) 134–5, 242n. 23 against Morande 6, 10–20 passim, 23
Lanthénas, François-Xavier 196 against parlementaires 34
La Pérouse 112, 118 against Pelleport 134
Larrivée, bookseller 143 campaign against 159
La Roche de Champreux 230n. 78 definition 6
La Saule 15, 16, 20, 221n. 27, 28 symbolism 40
La Touche, Count de 104 Lettres d’un voyageur see Courier de l’Europe
La Touche Gotteville see Gotteville Le Turc (or Le Ture) 118–9
La Tour see Serres de La Tour and Morande 119, 239n. 57
Launay, Bernard René Jourdan, Marquis de Lexington, battle of 73
104, 113, 160, 190 libel laws 50, 54, 64, 69, 146
and Morande 164, 238n. 35 libel suits 28, 54, 56, 93, 101, 144, 146, 163
Launay, Louis-Claude-César de 133, 242n.16 libelles xv, 37, 40, 45, 50–4, 59, 70, 73, 78, 86,
Lauraguais, Louis-Léon-Félicité de Brancas, 108, 131–41 passim, 144, 170, 190, 202 and
Count de xiv-xv, 56, 78, 79, 235n. 86 passim
and Beaumarchais 97, 100 see also libellistes and under titles of
Drogard case 53–4 individual pamphlets
and George III 229n. 51 libellistes xvi, 45, 51, 64, 131–41 passim, 144,
and Morande 53–7, 85, 108, 195, 207, 168, 208, 209, 210 and passim
229n. 50 Morande’s memorandum on 242n. 19
suppression negotiations 69, 70 see also Angelucci, Jacquet, La Motte (J.),
La Vauguyon, Duke de 44 La Motte (N.), Pelleport, Serres de La
Lavirotte, César 10, 12, 24, 27, 202, 207 Tour, Vernancourt, Vignoles
on Morande 204, 205, 220n. 10, 221n.22, libraries
229n.70 Boosey’s lending 23
INDEX 279
d’Eon’s 31 Louis XIV, King of France 12, 46, 47, 188

of Collège Godrun 5 Louis XV, King of France xii-xvi passim, 5, 40,
Morande’s 255n. 148 46, 54, 59, 60, 70–1, 108, 213
Lichfield, Mr 239n. 57 and d’Eon 28, 63, 81, 84
Limbourg, Prince de 15 in Gazetier cuirassé 35, 37, 39–40, 43
Linières see Grouber de Groubentall and Maupeou crisis 33
Linguet, Simon-Nicolas-Henri 48, 146–57 and Morande 57, 63, 68, 69, 188, 205, 213
passim, 179, 203 see also Secret du Roi, venereal disease
and Beaumarchais 147, 245n. 96 Louis XVI, King of France 7, 76, 77, 78, 120,
and Buttet 147, 150, 245n. 112 131, 134, 135, 175, 176, 190, 208
and d’Eon 147, 245n. 96, 106 abdication 200
and Hardy 150 and America 73–4
and Hayes vs Jacques 245n. 96 and Amours de Charlot et Toinette 132
and Mirabeau 150 and blackmail 108, 177
and Morande 147–50 passim, 195, 245n. and Cagliostro 160, 164, 165
96, 110 and Calonne 170
political stance 147 and constitutional monarchists 193
and Vergennes 147, 149 and d’Eon 80, 84, 95
see also Annales politiques, diamond and Estates-General 184
necklace affair, Mémoires sur la flight to Varennes 192, 193
Bastille government reconstruction/reform 108–9,
Lion, typesetter 141 188
Lippstadt 7 and Linguet 147
lit de justice 34 and Mallet du Pan 200
Lloyds of London 118 and Morande 75, 106, 164, 188, 191, 197
Loménie de Brienne, Etienne-Charles de, and parlements 108
Archbishop of Toulouse 171 royal veto 197
Loménie, Louis de 209 and war with Austria 197, 199, 200
London 23–4 see also Avis à la branche espagnole,
coffee houses 23 diamond necklace affair, Marie-
culture 23 Antoinette
mob activity 29, 41, 66, 91, 92, 133, 135, Louis XVIII, King of France see Provence
160, 161, 199 Low Countries 131
Morande’s view 23, 199 Lucas, High Constable 92
policing plan (Morande) 133, 138, 242n. Lüsebrink, Hans Jürgen 48
14 Lutterloh, Henry 103–4, 110
press/publishing 23 Lycée de Londres 141, 143, 144, 195, 196
see also brothels, Lloyds of London, names see also Journal du Lycée de Londres
of individual suburbs
Longpré, Mme 15 ‘M’, Chevalier de 59
Longpré, police officer 145 Mackay, Marie Barbara 144–6
Lorient 119 Mackay, Mr and Mrs 144–5
Lormel, Mme de 48 Macdermott 156, 246n. 16
Lormoy, Marie-Félix Guerrier de xiii, 63–70 MacMahon, Joseph Parkyns 128, 141, 156,
passim 230n. 75 157, 168, 170, 241n. 111, 246n. 16
Lottin 251n. 13 MacNamara, M.P. 117, 121
Louis XI, King of France 46 Madras 118
Louis XIII, King of France 46 Magic Flute 166, 248n. 72
280 INDEX
Mahy de Comère, Guillaume François de Maurepas, Jean-Frédéric Phélypeaux, Count

253n. 69 de 79, 108
Mairobert see Pidansat de Mairobert Maurice, M. 139–40
Mairobert corpus 70 Maurice, Mme 25, 139
Malesherbes, Chrétien-Guillaume de McCalman, Iain 211, 248n. 69, n. 72
Lamoignon de 77, 108 Medway 240n. 69
Mallet du Pan, Jacques 200 Mémoires de Brissot 141
Malon, physician, 94 Mémoires secrets 3, 35, 148, 151, 210
Malouet, Pierre-Victor 189 Mémoires secrets d’une femme publique see
Mandement du Muphti 52–3, 228n. 36 Secret Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure
Mandrin littéraire 227n. 23 Mémoires sur la Bastille 146, 147
Mansfield, William Murray, Lord Chief memoirs (Morande) see Réplique à Brissot
Justice 69, 88–95, passim, 150, 235n. 78 Memoirs and Gallantries of a Prince of Abo see
Manuel, Pierre-Louis xvi, 191, 202, 203, 208, Vie privée
242n. 19, 256n. 5 Menneville, Louis Pocholle de 126–9 passim,
and Brissot 195, 253n. 91 176, 241n. 103, 250n. 134
and desacralisation 211 Menneville, Mme de 126–7
and Morande 104–5, 125, 191, 194, 195, mercantile projects (Morande) see
207, 208, 210 commercial ventures
Marais (police inspector) 12–21 passim, 50, Mercure d’Angleterre 140
131, 221n. 29, 222n. 42, 223n. 47 Mercy-Argenteau, Florimond-Claude, Count
Marat, Jean-Paul 187, 190 de 77
Marcenay de Ghuy 153 Mesmer, Franz Anton 186
Maria-Theresia, Empress of Austria 7, 77, 78 military service (Morande) 6–9, 221n. 19
Marie-Antoinette, Queen of France 7, 79, Millican, Dr Peter 246n. 124
121, 131–5 passim, 153, 163–76 passim, 208, Mills (British spy) 115
212, 242n. 22 Minden, battle of 39
and Avis à la branche espagnole 76–8 Mirabeau, Honoré-Gabriel Riquetti, Count
and Breteuil 168 de 48, 151, 179, 185, 213, 252n. 39
and Calonne 170 and Beaumarchais 185
and Rohan 168, 175 blackmail by Morande (suspected) 244n.
trial 177 59
see also Amours de Charlot et Toinette, death 186, 191
diamond necklace affair, Essai historique and Linguet 150,
sur Marie-Antoinette, La Motte (J.), La and Morande 150–1, 184, 185, 192, 195,
Motte (N.), Passe-tems d’Antoinette 207, 244n. 59
Marigny, Abel Poisson, Marquis de 42, 50–1 police connection 209
Marin, censor 35–6, 226n. 47 see also Estates-General, Histoire secrète de
marriage (Morande) 24–7 passim la cour de Berlin
Marriage of Figaro 76 Molde see Saiffert von der Molde
Mash, brother, freemason 167 Molinaro, Edouard 208
Massachusetts Government Act see Coercive monarchiens 189, 204
Acts Montblanc, Section de 201, 202
Matouchkine, Dmitri Mikhaїlovitch 62 Montesquieu, Charles Louis Secondat, Baron
Maupeou, René-Charles-Augustin de 34, 35, de la Brède, 188
36, 41, 108 Montigny, brothel keeper 16
crisis 33–5, 43, 44, 46, 53, 68 Montmorin, Armand-Marc, Count de 201,
and Gazetier cuirassé 35, 43, 44 241n. 103
INDEX 281
and Calonne 171–2, 249n. 104 and France 198, 230n. 95

and Mirabeau 186 and Secret Memoirs of a Woman of
and Morande 109, 113–28 passim, 146, Pleasure 230n. 95
171–86 passim, 249n. 104 patriot revolution 114–15, 118
Morand, courtier 219n. 6 see also Amsterdam, Low Countries,
Morchiladze, Aka 208, 256n. 6 Orange, Stadholder(ate), The Hague
Mordanes (satirical representation of Neuchâtel 134, 226n. 50
Morande) 25, 207–8 see also STN
Morangiés, Count de 230n. 79 Neustadt 76
Morgan, M. de 144, 245n. 100 Newcastle 156
Morning Chronicle 9, 54–7 passim newspapers see gazettes and under individual
Morning Post 56, 67, 82–98 passim titles of newspapers
Morocco 163 New Zealand 120, 239n. 64
Mounier, Joseph 189 Nivernais, Louis-Jules-Barbon Mancini-
Moustier, Eléonore-François-Elie, Count de Mazarin, Duke de 27
32, 110, 133, 138, 139, 141, 236n. 9 Noailles, Count de 44
and Brissot 141 nobility 1, 6, 27, 169, 184
and Goëzman 135 Morande’s denunciations 36, 38–9, 42,
and Morande 133, 137, 139, 141, 181, 187, 188, 197
243n. 41 see also aristocracy
and Receveur 133, 139 Noirot, Dominique 2
Mozart, Wolfgang Amadeus 166, 248n. 72 Noirot, Jacques and Jean 221n. 22
Mullman, Mrs, brothel keeper, 97 Noirot, Louise née Théveneau 2
Muphti’s Decree see Mandement du Muphti North America see America
Murat, Mme 62 North, Frederick, Lord 96, 97, 99, 100, 125,
murder, attempted 28, 156 236n. 100
by Morande (suspected) 9–10 and Morande 241n. 98
Nouvelle biographie générale 209
‘N’, Sir Francis 59 nouvelles à la main 31–2
Naissance du Dauphin 132, 134 Nova Scotia 161
Nantes 115 Nuremberg 76, 77
Napoleon see Bonaparte
Narbens, Count de 21 Of the Laws of the French see Du Droit des
National Assembly 181, 187, 188, 189, 196 français
constitution debates 189, 192, 193 O’Gorman, Chevalier 87–91 passim
see also Feuillants, Jacobins, monarchiens Oliva see Guay d’Oliva
National Guard 193 Opéra 13, 18, 37, 41–2, 222n. 43
Necker, Jacques 171, 185, 186 opposition, loyal, concept of 189
and Calonne 249n. 99 Oppy, Mme d’ 17–18, 222–3 n. 47
and Morande 171, 186 Orange
see also Compte rendu des finances house/Princess of 114
Nehra, Henriette-Amélie van Haren de 150, see also William V
151, 186, 252n. 36 Orléans, Phillipe, Duke d’ 152, 185, 203
Nepean, Evan 121, 172 and Morande 120, 239n. 62
Nesle sisters xiv see also Vie privée du duc de Chartres
Netherlands 33, 36, 131, 147, 160 Oswald, John 253n. 95
colonies 115 Ottoman Empire 52–3, 118, 160
Estates-General 114 see also Egypt
282 INDEX
overviews of Morande’s career xv-xvi, 205, patriote party (France) 35, 44, 48, 109, 187,
211–13 188
Oxford 190 and Brissot 194
patriotes royalistes 187
Pacific Ocean 112, 120 patriotism 48, 189, 198, 208
Pallavieino, Cardinal 37 patriot revolution see Netherlands
Palm, Etta 253n. 95 Paulmy d’Argenson, Marc-René de Voyer,
Palmer, Emily, fictitious representation of Marquis de 16
Mme Du Barry 59 Pays d’Arnay 220n. 3
Palmer, Mr 59 Pelleport, Anne-Gédeon La Fite, Marquis de
pamphlets see libelles 25–6, 133, 137–8, 144, 146, 152, 195, 207–8,
Papal territories see Avignon 242n. 17, 20, 246n. 124, 256n. 5
Paris 12–13, 53, 69 attacks despotism 138
culture 13 background 134
electoral Assembly (1791) 196 blackmail campaigns 134–5
elections 196–7 and Boissière 134–5, 146
gambling 13, 14 and Beaumarchais 96, 104
insurrection (1848) 205 and Brissot 141, 143, 144, 243n. 55, n. 57
Luxembourg gardens 43 confession 141
mob activity 177, 190, 200, 201 and Desforges 143
Morande’s flight to/from/return 9–10, 12, and Fini 144
22, 191 and Francy 96, 104
police 15, 64, 65, 145, 164 on Gazetier cuirassé 32
Morande’s services for 126, 131–168 and Gazette noire 152
passim, 191 homosexuality (probable) 242n. 17
tactics 13, 14, 31, 38, 68, 103 imprisonment 140, 208
and Cagliostro 164 and Lenoir 243n. 57
see also Brissot, Marais, Mirabeau, and Linguet 152
Police de Paris dévoilée, Receveur, and Morande 96, 99, 104–5, 126, 138,
spying activities 139–40, 144, 195, 207, 209, 210, 230n. 89
social conditions 13 comparison with 133–4, 152
water supply 119, 184–5 legal case 140
see also brothels, Beaumont, Comédie offends Fox 140
française, Commune, gambling, Opéra, and Swinton 140
Parlement of Paris and Vie privée 152
Parkyns MacMahon see MacMahon see also Alarm Bell against French
parlements/parlementaires 5, 17, 33–5 passim, Spies, Amours et aventures du visir de
43–8 passim, 53, 68, 108, 109, 159, 162, 172, Vergennes, Bohémiens, Diable dans un
181–6 passim bénitier, ‘F’ (M. de la), Gazette noire,
abolition 184 homosexuality, Mordanes, Naissance du
Morande’s denunciations 187 dauphin, Passe-tems d’Antoinette, Petits
see also lettres de cachet Soupers de l’hôtel de Bouillon, Voragine
Parlement of Paris 12, 33, 47, 48, 155, 184, 186 Pellevé, Mrs. Charlotte see Butts
Passe-tems d’Antoinette 135–6 Pellevé, Robert 115, 238n. 40
patents 182 Peltier, Jean-Gabriel 190
Patriote françois 179, 183 Percy, Miss see Perrochel (Viscountess)
patriote ideology (Morande) see political Père Duchesne 211
ideology Pereyra, Jacob 118, 202, 203, 239n. 56
INDEX 283
Perrochel, Viscount de 122–3 on veto 198

Perrochel, Viscountess de, alias Miss Percy see also monarchiens
and Mme Tuite 122–3 concerning parlements 182, 183
Pétanguele 228n. 29 patriot principles 6, 35, 44, 96, 109, 182,
Petits Soupers de l’hôtel de Bouillon 134, 139, 146 187, 188, 192, 208, 212, 231n. 100
Pexioto, M. 246n. 125 see also Argus patriote, Courier de l’Europe,
Philips, Capt. Arthur (R.N.) 110 Feuillants, Gazetier cuirassé, Rémarques
philosophes xvi, 36, 109, 141, 148 historiques sur la Bastille
Philosophical Dictionary 38 Pompadour, Antoinette Poisson, Marquise de
Photiadès, Constantin 248n. 72 xiv, 40, 50, 61, 108
physique (Morande) 6, 9, 138, 202 see also venereal disease
Picpus, Père Ange 58 Pondicherry 47
Pidansat de Mairobert, Mathieu-François 57, pornography 132, 134, 142, 208, 212, 219n. 7
59, 60, 210, 227n. 23, 231n. 100 Portefeuille de Madame Gourdan 152, 246n.
and Brissot 195 125
and d’Eon 227n. 23 reprint 210
on kidnap 230n. 90 Portsmouth 103, 104, 121, 132, 240n. 69
and Morande 229n. 63 Poyane, M. de 9, 221n. 19
see also Anecdotes sur Madame du Barry, Praslin, Gabriel de Choiseul-Chevigny, Duke
Mairobert corpus de 27, 44
Piennes, Chevalier de 88 press 23
Pillnitz, declaration of 198 as blackmail instrument 141
pimping (Morande) 16, 18, 19 British 40, 56, 92, 105, 117, 180, 183
Pio, 253n. 95 and Calonne 172, 173
Pitt, Morton 121, 138, 243n. 41 freedom of 188, 189, 191
Pitt, William, the Younger 116–7, 173, 191, French 147, 183
243n. 41 revolutionary 179, 183, 187, 193, 209
and Morande 199, 254n. 127 Morande’s innovations 180–3 passim
Plymouth 104, 123 see also gazettes (international) and under
Poinçot, bookseller 250n. 131 titles of individual newspapers
Poland 53, 63, 198 Priestley, Joseph 199
police see Paris (police) privilèges 181
Police de Paris dévoilée 191, 194, 210, 256n. 5 Proschwitz, Gunnar and Mavis von 211,
Polignac, Yolande, Duchess de 135, 168 239n. 57
political ideology, of Morande 109, 182 Protestant Association 160
British influence on 188–9 Provence, Count de (later Louis XVIII) xiii,
concerning constitution 181–93 passim, 134, 190, 253n. 69
211 Provisional Executive Committee 200, 201
concerning despotism 44–8 passim, 188, Prussia 8, 122, 288, 197, 198
198–9, 212 and Dutch patriot revolution 114–15,
concerning French revolution 187, 188, 118
190 recognition of French constitution 198
concerning liberty 181, 188, 192 see also Pillnitz
concerning order 190, 211 Public Advertiser 67, 88, 90, 161, 162, 165
concerning Maupeou crisis 43, 44, 46 Public Ledger 84, 88, 89
concerning monarchy /king 96, 179–200 public opinion 35, 67, 92, 171
passim, 211, 212 publishers see booksellers
regency suggested 193 Pucelle d’Orléans 148
284 INDEX
Questions sur l’Encyclopédie 45, 53 Robiquet, Paul 153, 210, 228n. 36

Quos Ergo (pseudonym) 88–9 Rochford, William Henry Nassau de
Zylestein, Lord 61, 62, 69, 97, 229n. 66
Radcliffe (Ratcliff ), Stephen 103 Rodger, Nicholas 112–13
Ramond de Carbonnières, Louis 156, 164 Rohan, Camille, Prince de 16
Ravaisson, François 210 Rohan, Chevalier de 47
Ravier, Claudine, see Bauzon Rohan, Louis de, Cardinal 50, 162, 176
Ravier, Jeanne, see Théveneau and Marie-Antoinette 168, 175
Receveur de Livermont 64, 68, 131–2, 133–9 and Morande 155
passim, 139, 152, 153 see also diamond necklace affair
and Boissière 135–6 Rois de France dégénérés 132
and Brissot 141 Rollin M. 18
and Linguet 146 Roman Catholic Church 37–8
and Maurice 140 see also anti-clericalism, clergy, dévots,
and Morande 136–40 passim , 144, 195, Franciscans, Jansenism, Jesuits
230n. 90 Rosalie (fille de joie) 155
Recke, Elisa, Baroness von der 247n. 56 Roscoff 115
Reflections on the Revolution in France 176 Ross (foreman) 239n. 57
regency crisis 116–7, 121, 189, 240n. 70 Rossbach, battle of 39
Reichardt, Rolf 45 Rotondo, Jean-Baptiste 253n. 95
religion 197–8 Rouen 69
refusal of sacraments 38 Rousseau, Jean-Jacques 38, 79, 189
see also anti-clericalism, Capucins, and desacralisation 211
clergy, dévots, Franciscans, Gordon Rowe (formerly Sinclair), Jane 24
riots, Jansenism, Jesuits, Protestant Royal Navy 99, 101, 110–11, 118
Association, Roman Catholic Church Admiralty 238n. 43
Rémarques historiques sur la Bastille 49, 69 technical innovations 111–13, 118–9,
authorship 227n. 2 238n. 34, 239n. 57
content 45–8 passim see also names of individual ports
political agenda 46, 47 Royou, Thomas-Marie, abbé 200
Rennes 115 Russia 7, 8, 52, 81, 121, 122, 198
Réplique à Brissot 3, 5, 7, 51, 195, 196 Rutledge, Jean-Jacques 253n. 95
Réponse au dernier mot 254n. 111 Ryder 104
Requête au Roi 171, 249n. 100
Rétaux de Villette, Marc-Antoine 156 sabotage see spying activities
retirement (Morande) Saby, Chevalier 229n. 71
temporary 99 Sacchi, Carlo 247n. 56, 248n. 76
permanent 202–4 Sade, Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis
Riambourg, Claude 1 de 208
Richelieu, Armand-Jean du Plessis, Cardinal Saiffert von der Molde, Dr André 112, 124,
de, 46, 47 239n. 62
Richelieu, Louis-François-Armand du Plessis, Saint Brieux, Bishop of 37
Maréchal-Duc 157 Saint-Clair, Eliza see Théveneau de Morande,
Ridley see White Ridley Eliza
Robespierre, Maximilien-François-Isidore 1, Saint-Domingue 199–200, 208
201 Sainte-Foy, Pierre-Maximilien Radix de 129,
and Brissot 202, 255n. 139 144, 172
and Morande 255n. 139 and Calonne 171
INDEX 285
and Morande 173, 249n. 104 Shee 239n. 62

Saint-Florentin, Louis Phélypeaux, Count de, Shelburne, William Petty, Earl of 105, 115,
(subsequently Duke de La Vrillière) 15, 20, 135, 242n. 23
21, 23, 36, 43, 44, 223n. 55, 224n. 4 Sheridan, Richard Brinsley 122, 157
Salieri, Antoine 75 Siessel, fils 203
Salisbury, Capt. John (R.N.) 122–5 passim, Siéyès, Emmanuel-Joseph, abbé 39, 187
240n. 85 Signature author recognition software 228n.
Salzédo, Eugène 75 36, 246n. 124
Sandwich, John Montagu, Earl of 97 Silesia 7
Santa Esperanza 208 Silvestre, M. 248n. 76
Sarastro 248n. 72 Sinclair, Charles 24
Saratoga, battle of 74 Sinclair, Eliza see Théveneau de Morande,
Sartine, Antoine-Gabriel 12, 60, 138, 223n. 58 Eliza
and Avis à la branche espagnole 231n. 6 Sinclair, Jane see Rowe
and Beaumarchais 60, 75–78 passim, 100 Sirius (H.M.S.) 110
231n. 6 slave insurrections see Guadeloupe, Saint-
and Morande 15, 19–21 passim, 100, 109 Domingue
orders regarding Gazetier cuirassé 36 slave trade 116, 171–4, 194, 200, 209
Scheldt river 147, 149 Morande’s position 171
see also Doutes sur la liberté de l’Escaut see also Courier de l’Europe, Estates
Schuchard, Marsha Keith 248n. 72 General (French)
Scotland 120, 156, 160 Smith, Rev Joseph 236n. 101
Second Chant du coq 194 smuggling 123–5 passim
Secret du Roi 28, 80 books 136
Secret Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure xiv, Société typographique de Neuchâtel see STN
xv, 58–71 passim, 229n. 63 Society Islands 110
full title 229n. 60 Socrates 228n. 31
identification 231n.100 sodomy see homosexuality
illustrations 231n. 101 Sormanie’s gambling establishment 65
suppression xv-xvi, 68, 69–70, 76, 89–90, Southampton 118–9
135, 227n. 22, 237n. 18 Souville [Sonville], Mlle ‘Fredérique’ 16–17,
negotiations for xv, 57–69 50, 222n. 44
Seguenot, M. de 221n. 28 Spa 149
Sennemar see Buard de Sennemar Spain 17, 63
September massacres 200–1 and Britain 32, 125
and Princess de Lamballe 177, 179 colonies 120
and Morande 177, 179, 201, 203, 205, 209 slavery in 174
Serani 124 embassy and Morande 122, 229n. 72
Serres de La Tour, Alphonse-Joseph de 79, and France 242n. 23
142, 143, 169–70 navy 99, 111
and Brissot 243n. 56 see also Avis à la Branche espagnole,
and Calonne 170, 172 Falkland Islands, Inquisition
legal case 249n. 93 Spinelli, Donald 224n. 14
see also Courier de l’Europe spying activities
Seven Years’ War 7, 27, 33, 39, 103 of Beaumarchais 73, 97, 108, 125
Sevrès porcelain works 177 of d’Eon 28, 80
sexual affairs (Morande) 9–12 passim, 16–19 of Morande 73–5 passim, 108
passim, 25, 139, 150, 207 commercial 118–20
286 INDEX
spying activities (continued) and Lauraguais 100

denunciations 126 and Morande 79, 100–1, 125–6, 140–4
for police 126, 131–168 passim, 191 passim, 158, 172–4, 179, 191, 204–5
industrial 118, 137 and Pelleport 140
information transfer/reports 114, 116, and Serres de La Tour 79, 142, 143
125–9 passim, 238n. 35, 253n. 75 and slave trade 173–4
military/naval 104, 110–15 passim, spymaster 101, 128, 236n. 107
117–8, 120–3 passim, 126, 137 venality 250n. 122
political 114, 116–7, 121, 126 and Vergennes 79, 140
sabotage 120 Switzerland 36, 167
under surveillance 125 see also Neuchâtel
detection avoided 125–6 Sydney, Thomas Townshend, Baron 121
see also Beaumarchais, Pellevé, Paris syphilis see venereal disease
(police), Le Turc Systême de la nature 38
St***d **** Mme de 59
Stadholder see William V Talleyrand-Périgord, Charles Maurice de 188
Stadholderate 114 Tamino 248n. 72
stamp duties 79, 140 Tarare 75
Stanmore 99, 105, 236n. 101 Taylor, Capt. (R.N.) 115–16, 238n. 43
Stewart, M.P. 240n. 73 Taylor family, of Southampton 118–9
STN 36, 226n. 50 Termagent (H.M.S.) 123–5 passim
Stormont, David Murray, Viscount 96, 97 Terray, Joseph-Marie, abbé 33, 35, 41, 43
Stuart, Peter 250n. 135 Terror 41, 189, 203
Suez 118, 239n. 55 Tesson, M. 66
Sully-Bethune see Bethune The Hague 36, 114
Supply (H.M.S.) 110 Théveneau, Antoine-Claude 3
suppression attempts/negotiations see Théveneau, Betsey see Théveneau, Elizabeth
blackmail Théveneau, Charles, senior (Morande’s
Surbois, police officer 145 grandfather) 1, 220n. 6, 8, 221n. 22
Sweden 53, 121, 198 Théveneau, Charles-Claude (Morande’s uncle,
Swinton, Félicité née Lefebvre 100 known as Claude) 1, 2, 219n. 1, 221n. 22
Swinton, Samuel 79, 100 Théveneau, extended family members (not
and Ainslie 234n. 74, 239n. 55 otherwise noted) 1–3 passim, 220n. 3, 4
and Beaumarchais 100–1, 173, 204, Théveneau, Françoise 3
234n. 74 Théveneau, Guy 1, 220n. 6
bigamous marriage 100 Théveneau, Jean-Claude 3
and Boulogne-sur-Mer 79, 101, 128, 140, Théveneau, Jeanne (Mme Claude, née Ravier)
141, 144 2
and Brissot 141–4 passim Théveneau, Lazare-Jean see Théveneau de
and Cagliostro 157–8 Francy
and Calonne 172–3 Théveneau, Louis 1–3 passim, 5–6, 9–12
and Courier de l’Europe 79, 101, 125–6, passim, 15, 18, 20, 21, 49, 221n. 22, n. 27
128, 129, 140, 142–4 passim, 172–3, 174, Théveneau, Louis-Claude-Henri-Alexandre
179, 204 3, 203, 205
and Desforges 143 Théveneau, Louise see Noirot
and Dundas 173 Théveneau, Philiberte Belin, Mme 1–3
and d’Eon 234n. 74 passim, 11, 49, 106, 192, 220n. 9
and French government 79, 101, 140 Théveneau, Rose-Antoinette see Villedey
INDEX 287
Théveneau, Rose-Nicolle 2 ‘Transaction,’ (between Eon and

Théveneau de Francy, Lazare-Jean 3, 75, 137, Beaumarchais) 81, 84, 93
220n. 6, 243n. 36 Treyssac de Vergy see Vergy
and Beaumarchais 105–6, 233n. 31 trials see legal cases and trials
and Eliza Morande 24, 26, 80, 106 tribads see homosexuality
and d’Eon 82, 96 Trier, Prince Clemens Wenceslaus of Saxony,
marriage 106 Elector of 198
and Morande finances 105–6 Tristran the Hermit 46
Théveneau de Francy, Mme, see Guichot Tuite, Mme, see Perrochel
(Philiberte) Turgot, Anne-Robert-Jacques 108–9
Théveneau de Morande, Adolphe-Charles Turkey see Ottoman Empire
205 Typographical Society of Neuchâtel see STN
Théveneau de Morande, Eliza (née Elizabeth Tyrie, David 132–3
Sinclair) 24–7 passim, 56–92 passim, 124,
125, 127, 137, 200, 201, 202, 224n. 7, United States of America see America
243n. 36, 254n. 127
and Beaumarchais 107 Valmy, battle of 203
death 205 Van der Noot, Hendrik Karel Nicolaas 122
and Francy 106, 137 Van Neck, Sir Joshua 70
health 205 Varennes 192, 193, 200
see also marriage Vaucluse see Fauques de Vaucluse
Théveneau de Morande, Elizabeth-Nicolette Vaudreuil, Joseph-Hyacinthe-François de
[Elizabeth-Frances known as Betsey] 24, 99, Paule Rigaud, Count de 168
203, 205 Vauvray, M. de 17
Théveneau de Morande: étude au dix-huitième Vellinghausen, campaign/battle 7, 8, 221n. 19
siècle 210 venereal disease 42, 43
Théveneau de Morande, George-Louis 24, 75, and Beaumarchais 81, 84, 85
155, 201, 205, 220n. 6, 224n. 7 and Cagliostro 165
education 124 and Du Barry 44
injury 124 and La Cour 17
marriage 203 and Louis XV 44, 108
naval career 123–5 passim, 240n. 85 and Morande 14–15
Théveneau de Morande, Harriet Hannah and Pompadour 108
(Henriette-Anne) 24, 203 Vergennes, Charles Gravier, Count de 25, 32,
Théveneau de Morande, Manette, née 96, 108, 132, 133
Villedey see Villedey and America 74
Thilorier, Jacques 157, 159 and Amours de Charlot et Toinette 132
Thiroux de Crosne see Crosne and Courier de l’Europe 79
The Times 172 and d’Eon 80, 85, 88, 95
Tipu Sultan 115 and La Motte (J.) 168
Tocsin des Rois 51–2 and Linguet 147, 149
Tonnerre 9 and Morande 109, 113, 126, 136–7, 140,
Tooke, see Horne Tooke 238n. 40, 239n. 59
Tort, Barthélemy 32, 96, 232n. 13, 235n. 86 and Pelleport 140
and d’Eon 235n. 87 and Swinton 140
and Morande 235n. 87 see also Amours et aventures du visir de
trade see commerce Vergennes, diamond necklace affair,
Trafalgar, battle of 112 France (intelligence service)
288 INDEX
Vergy, Pierre-Henri Treyssac de 28 Wallace, Capt. 123

Vernancourt, Mme 79, 82, 83 war see America, Austria, France
Versailles xiii, 21, 42, 59, 82, 146, 147, 155, 190 (revolutionary war), Seven Years’
and French court 13, 134 see also battles, warships
Morande’s sources at 31, 32, 44, 65 Ward, Marion 153
Peace of 118 Warren, Richard 176
rivalry with Paris, 13 warships see Bounty, Sirius, Supply,
and scandalous rumours/libelles xiii, 67, Termagent, Hébé
69, 71, 79, 134, 170, 233n. 31 Warville see Brissot
water supply 119 Waterloo, battle of 205
Vienna 77, 78 Watson, Capt. 92
Vie privée du duc de Chartres 152 Watt, James 119, 239n. 59
Vignoles, Joseph de 31, 79–83 passim West Indies 18, 118
233n. 44 see also Jamaica, Saint-Domingue
see also freemasonry Westminster 92
Villedey, Jean-Bernard 3 Westminster Gazette 88–92 passim
Villedey, Manette 203 and Morande 88, 232n. 16, 234n. 60
Villedey, Rose-Antoinette née Théveneau 3–4 Whigs 122
Villeroy, Duchess de 42 Whitcombe, Sheriff 93
Villette, Charles-Michel, Marquis de 42, 44, White Ridley, Sir Matthew 120
51, 56 Wilberforce, William 116, 173
and Morande 195, 207 Wilkes, John 28–9
Villette, Rétaux de see Rétaux de Villette William V, Prince of Orange, Dutch
violence see kidnap, mobs, murder, Stadholder 114
September massacres, Terror Williams, David 196, 254n. 109
Virchaux, J. G., bookseller 143, 253n. 95 women (Morande’s treatment) 42, 204, 209
Vol plus haut 152, 153 see also sexual affairs, marriage,
Voltaire, François-Marie Arouet 35, 38, 45–53 Théveneau de Morande (Eliza)
passim, 148, 227n. 2, 228n. 36 Woodfall, William 54, 57
and Morande 52–3, 69, 195, 207 Woolwich Arsenal/docks 80, 113, 240n. 69
see also Mandement du Muphti, World 172
philosophes, Philosophical Dictionary, wounds (Morande) 7, 9
Pucelle d’Orléans, Questions sur
l’Encyclopaedie youth (Morande) 4–5
Voragine, fictional mother-in-law of Brissot
208 Zamoro 58
Voyage d’une françoise 230n. 79, n. 90 Zweibrücken see Deux-Ponts

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Copyright © Simon Burrows 2010

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted

First published 2010

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

Typeset by Pindar NZ, Auckland, New Zealand

1 The Sins of his Youth 1

1 Contemporary British map of the Battle of Vellinghausen 8

Brenellerie. As Beaumarchais’ first biographer, Gudin would one day chronicle

The Sins of his Youth

disparaged them. He described Rose-Antoinette as devious, malevolent and

Plate 1. Contemporary British Map of the Battle of Vellinghausen. Courtesy of the

patronage of its commander, Monsieur de Poyane, also appear to be false. The

The ancient representative body of the province, the Estates of Burgundy, is

he visits widow Longpré’s brothel. While he is there police Inspector de La

Let’s fear Dr Keyser’s secrets

However, upsetting women with powerful protectors is dangerous: Morande is

leaves. At once, Danezy scribbles a semi-literate account of events and sends it

Notes to prologue: Auto da fé

Notes to Chapter 1: The Sins of his Youth

Notes to Chapter 2: The Armour-Plated Gazetteer

1 AN, 277AP/1, dossier Morande, fos 347–8, Morande to d’Eon [1773].

abbés de cour 197 Ami du Roi 200

assassination see murder Bartholo 76

judicial memoirs 78, 100 Bernis, Cardinal 37

Bounty (H.M.S.) 110 and Dutch patriot revolution 114–15

(auto)biographies 164, 165 Cecil, Mme. 82

commercial ventures (Morande) 49, 105, 106 Cressy, Mlle 19

Eon de Beaumont, Charles-Louis-Auguste- finances (Morande) 5, 12–16 passim, 20–1,

torture 46, 183, 189 Friends of the Blacks 174, 196

George III, King of England (continued) Guadeloupe 208

Holland see Netherlands see also anti-clericalism, dévots

La Motte, Jeanne de Saint-Rémy, Countess de La Vrillière see Saint-Florentin

d’Eon’s 31 Louis XIV, King of France 12, 46, 47, 188

Mahy de Comère, Guillaume François de Maurepas, Jean-Frédéric Phélypeaux, Count

and Calonne 171–2, 249n. 104 and France 198, 230n. 95

Perrochel, Viscount de 122–3 on veto 198

Questions sur l’Encyclopédie 45, 53 Robiquet, Paul 153, 210, 228n. 36

and Morande 173, 249n. 104 Shee 239n. 62

spying activities (continued) and Lauraguais 100

Théveneau, Rose-Nicolle 2 ‘Transaction,’ (between Eon and

Vergy, Pierre-Henri Treyssac de 28 Wallace, Capt. 123

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A King's Ransom: The Life of Charles Thèveneau de Morande, Blackmailer, Scandalmonger & Master-Spy

A King's Ransom: The Life of Charles Thèveneau de Morande, Blackmailer, Scandalmonger & Master-Spy