Marie-Aurore de Saxe

Marie-Aurore de Saxe (20 September 1748 – 26 December 1821), firstly Countess of Horn and later Madame Dupin de Francueil, was an illegitimate daugther of Marshal Maurice de Saxe and grandmother of George Sand. A notable free-thinker, she was adept to philosophers like Voltaire, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Buffon, her life was marked by the vicissitudes of history and personal dramas.

Life

Origins and Youth

Claude-Louis Rinteau, a lemonade merchant, and his wife, Marie-Anne Dupuy are the parents of two daughters, Marie and Geneviève. Desiring to ensure a brilliant career to his children, but above all to ensure his own success, Claude-Louis Rinteau uses Maurice de Saxe, Marshal of France, known for his military victories, but also for his agitated love life agitated. A great lover of theatre, he ordened that during his campaigns a group of actors followed him to support the morale of his troops. Claude-Louis Rinteau knew that the prettiest actresses are used by the pleasure of Marshal de Saxe and without scruples, he offered his two daughters during the year 1747. Claude-Louis Rinteau in return obtained his appointment as military storekeeper, who proved to be a big source of profits. But his greed had a cost for Maurice of Saxony, who was accused of embezzlement and misappropriation and thanks of his position he could escape from prosecution, but justice must find the culprits. Therefore look towards his subordinates, Claude-Louis was put in prison. While the "bon père de famille" meditated his fate in a dungeon in Brussels, Marie (aged 17), and Geneviève (aged 13), entered into the world of entertainment at the Theatre of the Army. They adopt a stage name from wich both sisters will be known in history: Mesdemoiselles de Verrières. Maurice de Saxe first sets his eyes on the very young Geneviève, but this was a short-lived affair. The oldest sister, Marie, a remarkable beauty and vivid spirit, could seduced the old soldier. She soon became in his mistress and was installed in Le Marais near the Rue du Parc-Royal at Paris. From the affair, a daughter was born on 20 September 1748. She was baptized a month after her birth, on 19 October in the Church of St-Gervais-et-St-Protais. The child was registered as a daughter of certain Jean-Baptiste La Rivière, in fact a non-existed person, and was named after her paternal grandmother, Maria Aurora von Königsmarck. Her godpfather was the adjutant of the Marshal of Saxe, Antoine-Alexandre Colbert, marquis de Sourdis, and the godmother was her aunt Geneviève. The Marshal de Saxe show any interest in the fate of his illegitimate daughter and bequeathed him nothing, just like the other children that he leaves behind. Marshal Maurice de Saxe, in turn, was as a product of the affair between Augustus II the Strong, King of Poland and Elector of Saxony, with the Countess von Königsmarck.

Marie Rinteau, who with her affair with Maurice de Saxe gained certain notoriety, continues her sentimental conquests. Jean-François Marmontel and the fermier général, Denis Joseph Lalive d'Épinay, where among her lovers. The latter spend continously on her, and installed both demoiselles de Verrières in the Quartier d'Auteuil after the death of Maurice de Saxe on 30 November 1750 at the Château de Chambord. From her affair with Charles Godefroy de La Tour d'Auvergne, Duke of Bouillon, Marie Rinteau gave birth a son on 31 October 1750 at Paris, called Charles-Godefroy-Marie de Beaumont. Marie-Aurore was always under the sole care of her mother, but not for long.

One of the nephews of the Marshal de Saxe, the Count of Friesen, known in France under the name of Comte de Frise, provided some financial help to Marie-Aurore, but his death in 1755 deprived the illegitimate daughter of Maurice de Saxe from all support. A petition was addressed to the Dauphine Maria Josepha of Saxony the same year in favor of Marie-Aurore, providing her existence and ensured her education. King Louis XV granted a pension of 800 livres to the demoiselle Aurore.

Following the death of the Count of Friesen, Marie-Aurore (aged 7) was separated from her mother by command of the Dauphine Maria Josepha of Saxony, a niece of the Marshal and mother of three future French Kings: Louis XVI, Louis XVIII and Charles X. Since them, Maria Josepha provides care and education to her cousin. She place Marie-Aurore in an institution for young girls, firstly at the Ursuline convent in Saint-Cloud and later in the Maison royale de Saint-Louis in Saint-Cyr, founded by Madame de Maintenon.

Recognition

The Dauphine also decided Marie-Aurore's future by organizing her marriage with Comte Antoine de Horn. In order to perform this marriage and be considered valid, her baptismal certificate must be amended so the name of her real father appears. Marie-Aurore appealed to the Parlement of Paris and on 15 May 1766, after a serious investigation, the sentence established that Marie-Aurore was the natural daughter of Maurice, comte de Saxe, Marshal of the camps and armies of France and Marie Rinteau. Being finally recognized, Marie-Aurore was authorized to carry the surname de Saxe. Her marriage with the Comte de Horn took place on 9 June 1766 at Paris; however, eight months later (20 February 1767), her husband was killed in a duel at Sélestat, aged 44. According to her granddaughter George Sand, this union was a mariage blanc and thus was never consummated.

Maria Josepha of Saxony died on 13 March 1767 at Versailles, devastated after the death of her husband the Dauphin Louis fifteen months before. Deprived of her protectors, the pension that Marie-Aurore receives as a widow, doesn't allowed her to cover her expenses. She turns initially to Voltaire, an admirer of her father, who recommends her to approach to the Countess of Choiseul, but this was unsuccessful. Then, Marie-Aurore returned to live with her mother, Marie Rinteau. During this period, she learned to singing, comedy plays and discovers a mundane lifestyle. However, she didn't follow the example of her mother and aunt, who in parallel with their careers of actresses, had a life of courtesans. Marie-Aurore maintain an irreproachable conduct. But on 22 October 1775 at Paris, Marie Rinteau died aged 45. Marie-Aurore then retired with a servant to the English convent at Fossés Saint-Victor street in Paris. She was frequently visited there by Louis-Claude Dupin de Francueil, a 62-years-old rich financier and friend of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Louis-Claude wasn't a stranger to Marie-Aurore, since she had already met with her mother; in fact, he was an old lover of Geneviève Rinteau. Louis-Claude asks for the hand of Marie-Aurore, who hesitates; however, she eventually became seduced by his grace, his spirit and amiable character. The wedding was celebrated in London on 14 January 1777 at the chapel of the French Embassy in England, in order to avoid a credible opposition. The fear of the spouses was probably not onloy from their respective families but mostly from the Court of France, protector of the daughter of the Marshal de Saxe. Three months later, the newlyweds returned to France to validated their marriage at Paris on 15 April 1777 in the Church of St-Gervais-et-St-Protais. Years later, Marie-Aurore fondly remembered her husband to his granddaughter, Aurore Dupin de Francueil, better known under the literary pseudonym of George Sand:

An old love more than a young man, she said, and it's impossible not to love who loves us perfectly. I called him my husband my old father. Thus he wanted and never called me her daughter, even in public. And then she added, is that we were never in the old days!...This is the revolution that brought the old age into the world. Your grandfather, my child, was beautiful, elegant, neat, graceful, fragrant, cheerful, kind, affectionate and even-tempered until the hour of his death.

Madame Dupin de Francueil

On 9 January 1778, Marie-Aurore gave birth a son, called Maurice-François-Élisabeth Dupin de Francueil in Le Marais district of Paris; his baptism took place on 18 January, being his godfather the Marquis de Polignac and his godmother Élisabeth Varanchan, by marriage Madame de Chalut. The only child of Marie-Aurore and Louis-Claude Dupin de Francueil, he was named after his maternal grandfather, the Marshal de Saxe.

The couple spends part of the year at Châteauroux in 1783, when Louis-Claude manages the inheritance of his father Claude Dupin. They settled at Château Raoul, the former home of the Princes of Chauvigny, and led a lavish lifestyle well above of their means. In their house, they had a large service and posses a stable, a cavalry and kennels with several dogs. They also celebrated receptions and concerts. Louis-Claude Dupin invests in cloth factories that enrich the Berry citizens without being profitable for the owner. They also have a particular Hôtel located at the nº 15 of the Rue du Roi-de-Sicile at the parish of Saint-Gervais. Louis-Claude Dupin de Francueil died in his home in Paris on 6 June 1786. For the second time, Marie-Aurore was a widow, but this time with a 8-years-old son. Her first task was to paid the considerable debts of her late husband, who left her in a modest position, but could live with an income of 75,000 livres. After her husband's death, Marie-Aurore and her son leave Châteauroux moved to their home at the Rue du Roi-de-Sicile in Paris. During this time, she hired a young tutor to complete the education of her son, Jean-Louis-François Deschartres.

During the revolutionary period, Marie-Aurore decided to acquire a property far away from the bloody events who taken place in Paris. Her relations and habits attached her to the Berry area, so her choice was a mansion in Nohant-Vic near La Châtre. With the remains of her fortune, on 23 August 1793 she buys the property for a total of 230,000 livres to Pierre Philippe Péarron de Serennes, an old infantry officer and Governor of Vierzon, cousin of the family Dupin de Francueil. The property is not limited to the château de Nohant, but the purchase also includes residences like la Chicoterie and several farms; at all her new domain covers more than 240 hectares.

The Revolution and the Empire

Marie-Aurore de Saxe, a freethinker, lives in a convulsed time. She saw the French Revolution without terror, as she was imbued with the ideas of the Age of Enlightenment, being a follower of philosophers such as Voltaire, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Buffon. While still in Paris and busy with her son, Marie-Aurore moved to the nº 12 of the Rue Saint-Nicolas, property of Monsieur Amonin. In these troubled times, in the middle of the Reign of Terror, she hide her values ​​and papers of nobility in the apartment of a gentleman, Monsieur de Villiers. Under a decree, it was forbidden to conceal wealth, especially gold, silver and jewelery. Following a denunciation, a search takes place at night, on 25 November 1793. The goods are found and Marie-Aurore de Saxe was arrested the same day and imprisoned at the English convent. This ancient religious establishment, where she lived after the death of her first husband, was now a prison. If Marie-Aurore indeed had concealed valuables, she also hid incriminating papers who implicated her in the escape of several nobles, like the Comte d'Artois (future King Charles X). These papers aren't found but the risk of a second search was great. Her son and Deschartres forced their way into the apartment under seal to destroy the documents. The revolutionary government didn't survive the fall of Robespierre and Marie-Aurore like many other prisoners, was released on 21 August 1794. From the beginning of September 1794, Marie-Aurore returned to her estate of Nohant and continues with Deschartres the education of Maurice.

Determined to follow the example of his grandfather, Maurice Dupin becomes a soldier during the general conscription of 5 September 1798. He began his military career with the coming to power of General Bonaparte, to her mother's dismay. He participated in the Napoleonic Wars and became a Lieutenant and head of the 1st Regiment of Hussars. Unbeknownst to his mother, he secretly married with a commoner, Sophie-Victoire-Antoinette Delaborde, in Paris on 5 June 1804. This hasty marriage was due to Sophie's advanced state of pregnancy; one month later (1 July), she gives birth to a girl in Paris named Amantine-Lucile-Aurore Dupin, the future George Sand.