Antoinette Saint-Huberty

Antoinette Saint-Huberty
Pastel portrait of Mme. Saint-Huberty by Louise Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun, c.1780. (Private collection; formerly in the museum of Saint-Germain-en-Laye.)
Born	Anne-Antoinette Clavel 15 December 1756 Strasbourg
Died	22 July 1812 Barnes, Surrey
Other names	Mademoiselle Saint-Huberty Madame (de) Saint-Huberty (or, alternatively, Saint-Huberti) Comtesse d'Antraigues[1]
Occupation	Opera singer (soprano)
Years active	c.1774-1790

Anne-Antoinette-Cécile Clavel, better known by her stage name Madame Saint-Huberty or Saint-Huberti (Strasbourg, 15 December 1756 – 22 July 1812, Barnes, London), was a celebrated French operatic soprano whose career extended from c.1774 until 1790. After her retirement from the stage and the publicising of her second marriage, she was also known as the Comtesse d'Antraigues^[1] from around 1797. She was murdered in England at the same time as her second husband.

Early life and musical career

Antoinette Clavel (later known professionally as Madame Saint-Huberty) was the daughter of Jean-Pierre Clavel, a musician employed as a répétiteur in the private opera troupe of Charles IV Theodore, Elector Palatine. Clavel's wife was Claude-Antoinette Pariset, who was the daughter of a grocer from Sélestat.^[2]

Over the years her biographers have often been at variance regarding Saint-Huberty's actual place of birth. Renwick, for example, found instances of it being indicated as Toul, Thionville, or Mannheim,^[3] and Clayton gives it as Toulouse - presumably after having interpreted "Toul" as an abbreviation.^[4] However, after discovering her baptismal certificate in the Archives nationales, de Goncourt was able to establish that she was born in Strasbourg, where she was baptized Anne-Antoinette (or Anna-Antonia on the certificate, which is written in Latin) at the church of Saint-Pierre-le-Jeune on the day after her birth.^[5] There is no mention of the name "Cécile" on her baptismal certificate, and de Goncourt suggests that this is a name which she adopted only in the latter part of her life.^[6] Dorlan, whose career included considerable work on the history of Alsace, traced her birthplace to 131 Grand'rue (modern spelling Grande Rue), Strasbourg (near the junction with rue Sainte-Barbe), and his article is accompanied by a photograph of the house, which, he maintains, was once owned by Pierre Clavel.^[7] Antoinette had at least three siblings: a brother named Jean-Pierre (after his father) who became a gilder and a seller of prints from a shop beneath the house in the Grand'rue;^[2] Pierre-Étienne, who became a pork butcher;^[2] and a sister who appears to have been living in or near Paris during the early 1790s.

Antoinette began the study of singing and the harpsichord under her father's direction at a very young age, and quickly displayed an extraordinary musical talent. Whilst her voice was still maturing, she met the composer Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne in Warsaw in 1770, and it was Lemoyne who then supervised her musical education for the next four years. She became a protégée of a Princess Lubomirska (whom it is difficult to identify with absolute precision, since there was more than one princess of that name in Warsaw at that time^[8]), and she eventually obtained a contract in Berlin, where she sang with some success.

On 10 September 1775, at St. Hedwig's, in the Opernplatz, Berlin,^[9] Antoinette married Claude-Philippe Croisilles de Saint-Huberty, who claimed to be Prince Henry of Prussia's chargé d'affaires and the recruiter of new talent for the Prince's private opera company.^[10] The marriage immediately ran into difficulties. Croisilles was an incorrigible gambler; he was also a wife-beater. On a number of occasions he lost more money than he could afford, and they had to sell valuable items of clothing and jewellery in order to meet his debts. Before long, he was one of the combatants in a duel, after which it became necessary for them to flee Berlin. Aiming to reach Paris, the couple had run out of money by the time they arrived at Strasbourg, and so it was there that they had to stop for a while.^[11][12]

An alternative account of Antoinette's early years as a singer, which appears to have its roots in Edmond de Goncourt's Saint-Huberty and was subsequently taken up unquestioningly by a number of other writers, runs as follows. By the age of twelve she had mastered everything her father was able to teach her, and her vocal tuition was therefore entrusted to other masters; these might possibly have been attached to Strasbourg Cathedral. At fifteen she was a star performer at the local opera house in Strasbourg. Contract offers arrived from other cities in France such as Lyon and Bordeaux, but her parents were concerned that living away from home might lead her into temptations of an undesirable sort, and the offers were therefore declined. Croisilles dit Saint-Huberty arrived in Strasbourg, and, after convincing the inexperienced and naïve girl that he could immediately launch her into the most glittering of all operatic careers, she eloped with him to Berlin. There they married, but his duplicity quickly became apparent. He left her, but she followed him to Warsaw, where he abandoned her again after stealing all her goods. She was rescued by one of the Lubomirska princesses and began singing in Warsaw with some success. Croisilles then lured her (by letter) to Vienna, with more false promises; he stole from her and abandoned her yet again, after which she repaired alone to Paris.^[13]

To return to the earlier account: Antoinette sang at the theatre in Strasbourg until 1777, taking whatever roles she was allocated, but her quickly-growing reputation soon led to her being engaged by the Paris Opera, where, on 23 September 1777, she made her début at the première of Gluck's Armide in the minor roles of Mélisse and a Pleasure.^[14] This particular performance brought her no more than a modest personal success. All too often her acting was impaired by her extreme nervousness,^[15] and Gossec recalled that even though she was a good musician when she arrived, her repeated failure to enthuse the Parisian public during this early part of her career led to her being dismissed by the Opéra at one point, although Jacques de Vismes later readmitted her.^[16] Encouraged by Gluck, she worked hard to improve her singing and acting skills and to correct her slightly German accent, and eventually she was rewarded by being allotted major parts, beginning with Angelique in Piccinni's Roland in 1780.^[17] The award of this role was an important step in Saint-Huberty's career, and it came about largely as a result of Dauvergne's confidence in her abilities and her potential.^[18]

In the meantime, the problems with her marriage continued. Crosilles de Saint-Huberty, who had obtained employment as a storekeeper at the Paris Opéra, still appropriated Antoinette's jewellery and other personal effects, which he then sold or pawned, and by the summer of 1778 it is evident that the couple were living apart - he in rue des Orties, Saint-Rioch, and she in rue de l'Arbre-Sec. On 31 July 1778, Antoinette sought an injunction for the return of some papers, effects and sheet-music which, she alleged, Crosilles de Saint-Huberty had stolen from her apartment whilst she had been at the Opéra the previous day. Crosilles de Saint-Huberty's defence was that, being married, their goods were held jointly, and that Antoinette, acting on bad advice, had illegally abandoned their family home and gone to live elsewhere. On that basis, he applied to be accompanied by Antoinette's lawyer, Chénon fils, when he went to her apartment in the early morning of 31 August (his wife was still in bed) to seize items of furniture and a parcel of twenty-two letters (which, it appeared, were lettres de galanterie). That occasion resulted in a most unpleasant scene, and Antoinette had fought and screamed so loudly that she feared she might have damaged her voice. Chénon later considered it appropriate to submit a detailed report of the incident to the Lieutenant of Police.^[19] Nevertheless, in January 1781 Antoinette was able to obtain an annulment of her marriage: for a woman to be victorious after legal proceedings of this sort was extremely rare in France at that time. Edwards holds that the judges' decision to declare the marriage void was chiefly on the grounds that it had been contracted when she was a minor and without her parents' consent,^[20] as her mother, who by that time was a widow and was the main plaintiff in the case, confirmed. The fact that no children had been born from the marriage could well have been another factor in Antoinette's favour. Antoinette also obtained official permission to retain her married name for professional purposes after the annulment, which is why she is commonly referred to as Madame Saint-Huberty. With regard to the orthography - Huberty or Huberti, it should be noted that she herself invariably used a "y" in her signature.^[21]

Once she had established herself as one of the leading singers at the Opéra following her successes of the early 1780s, Madame Saint-Huberty became more and more demanding and difficult for the management to deal with. At a time when professional indiscipline and petulance amongst the artists of the Opéra was all too common, she soon became known as the worst of the troublemakers.^[22] However, as a result of the early death of Marie-Joséphine Laguerre on 14 February 1783 and the retirement around that time of the two other principal sopranos, first Rosalie Duplant,^[23] and then Rosalie Levasseur not long afterwards, she was able to cement her position as leading premier sujet du chant of the Paris Opéra. Indeed, by 1782 - a year in which Madame Saint-Huberty earned 5,500 livres, which, in comparison with the remuneration offered by the leading Italian theatres, was not a particularly large amount for an artist with her appeal at the box-office, although it was certainly high by Paris Opéra standards^[24] - she was considered indispensable by the Opéra administration, who decided to renegotiate her contract by offering her a further 1,500 livres from Court funds: an amount which had originally been destined for M.lle Laguerre. Antoinette's reply was that she was quite unsure about that: she would have to think the matter over. Soon afterwards she made her own demands known to the Opéra management: (i) 3,000 livres for major roles each time she sang them; (ii) an additional "gratification" fee to be paid to her whenever she appeared; (iii) an immediate one-off payment of 3,000 livres; (iv) a further 1,500 livres annually from the King's music fund; (v) two months' holiday every year, this to include the Easter closure; (vi) no role of hers could be assigned to any other singer without her consent. On 22 March 1783 she settled for an eight-year contract worth a guaranteed minimum of 9,000 livres per annum, along with compliance with all her other demands, although the Minister expressed his confidence that Madame Saint-Huberty would, from time to time, allow others to sing the roles which she had created. She was required, on her word of honour, never to disclose her new salary arrangements to any of her colleagues for fear that it might cause unrest.^[25]

Madame de Saint-Huberty
in the role of Didon
(NWMA, Washington DC)

Madame Saint-Huberty's financial position improved further after the enormous success she obtained in the role of Didon in Piccinni's opera of the same name in 1783. Louis XVI, who was never a great lover of opera, insisted on hearing it three times.^[26] Declaring that the work "had given him as much pleasure as a fine tragedy," he also gave instructions that Madame Saint-Huberty be paid a further pension of 1,500 livres per annum.^[27] Her biographers appear unanimous in their view that Didon was the greatest success of Saint-Huberty's career, and, given her qualities as an outstanding tragedienne,^[28] a role to which she was particularly well suited. Some evidence of the enormous popularity which she enjoyed among opera enthusiasts is provided by the triumphal reception she received on visiting Marseille in 1785,^[29] and throughout the 1780s she was recognised as one of the most famous and most celebrated singers in Europe. Her holiday months were spent touring the French provincial theatres, sometimes appearing in two performances on the same day, and it has been estimated that her earnings from each of these tours was possibly as high as 16,000 livres, which is substantially more than she would receive in an entire year from the Opéra.^[30]

Some of the primary sources maintain that, from around 1786, Madame Saint-Huberty's voice had begun to deteriorate alarmingly. One of these was Dauvergne, the director of the Opéra, who, long before that time, had become completely exasperated by Saint-Huberty's erratic and volatile behaviour. He mentions this deterioration in a memorandum dated 21 July 1787,^[31] where he complains that she had had to withdraw from several important roles which she no longer felt capable of singing. He points to the fact that whilst she was happy to perform twice a day when on tour, she insisted on limiting her performances at the Opéra to one (or occasionally two) per week. In conclusion, he predicts that her singing career would be over within two years - or less than that, if she were to undertake another provincial tour. Another was Gossec, who, in a letter of 8 November 1786, comments that Madame Saint-Huberty was rushing inexorably towards her own destruction.^[32] However, both Dauvergne and Gossec express their concern that no obvious candidate to take Saint-Huberty's place was in sight - thus indicating that, in 1786/87, Saint-Huberty was still regarded, by the director and the head of the École de chant, as the pre-eminent soprano at the Opéra, and one whom they considered was some way ahead of M.lle Maillard (premier sujet) and M.lle Dozon (premier remplacement).

De Goncourt compiled a list of the number of appearances made by Madame Saint-Huberty at the Opéra in each of the years from 1780 to 1789. The results are shown in the following table:^[33]

Provided that de Goncourt's figures are reasonably accurate, it will be seen that Saint-Huberty appeared less frequently at the Opéra as soon as she had consolidated her position there. Furthermore, in the final three years of her career, she created only one new role, which is in marked contrast with what was happening previously. By 1787, however, her motivation appears to have almost entirely evaporated, and to the management she had become a thorough nuisance. In the spring of that year she wrote to Dauvergne to express her "disgust and vexation" brought about by the theatre administration's "continual complaints". She claimed that her health was being adversely affected, and she was seriously considering retirement.^[34] This situation, unsatisfactory for both parties, dragged on until 1790.

She became the mistress of Count Alfonso Maria Turconi, a rich Italian music-lover who owned a magnificent villa (the Villa Turconi) near Mendrisio on the Swiss-Italian border. However, at the same time, she was also the mistress of Louis-Alexandre de Launay, comte d'Antraigues, whom she first met in 1783 and took as a lover during the latter half of 1784.^[35] This double liaison is explained as follows: Turconi served as "the man who was willing to pay the bills," whereas d'Antraigues was more of a gallant-adventurer; d'Antrigues was the man she preferred, but he lacked Turconi's very considerable financial resources.^[36] Both men were well aware of the situation, but they appear to have been ready to accept it. Turconi paid 50,000 francs in order to purchase a small château at Groslay in the vale of Montmorency as a gift for Antoinette, yet d'Antraigues was able to have his own room there.^[37] D'Antraigues was hardly the most faithful of lovers: Duckworth maintains that he was conducting a simultaneous affair with at least one of the ladies at court.^[38]

Prior to the French Revolution, d'Antraigues had been broadly in sympathy with many of the ideas which, in 1789, were to become revolutionary ideals. On 4 April 1789 he was elected to the Estates General as a representative of the noblesse of the province of Vivarais.^[39] However, later in 1789, his attitude underwent a profound change, and he became a counter-revolutionary.^[36] On 27 February 1790, after becoming implicated in a plot which had sought to help the royal family escape from the Tuileries Palace in which they were confined, he fled France and made for Lausanne in Switzerland.^[40]

On or around 3 April 1790, having obtained a passport, Antoinette left Paris in order to share d'Antrigues's fate as an émigré. She would never sing at the Opéra again. She was accompanied by her chamber-maid and by two other servants.^[41] The property at Groslay was seized a few months after her departure, and some of its contents were subsequently sold by order of the district authorities at Gonesse, despite the formal protests of her sister.^[42]

Later years

Antoinette spent the first three months of exile in a village near Lausanne. D'Antraigues lived opposite, although he took his meals with her.^[75] They were married in great secrecy on 29 December 1790 at Castel San Pietro, near Mendrisio, in Italian speaking Switzerland.^[76] Permission to dispense with the formality of banns was granted by the Bishop of Como.^[77] By this time the couple had made their home in Count Turconi's villa, which was to remain their main base during the first few years of their marriage. Although they lived comfortably, they did little or no entertaining there, and the only regular visitors were the clergy who came to perform Mass in the chapel on Sundays.^[78] The fact that they had become man and wife did not become public for over six years. One of the reasons for keeping their marriage secret was that d'Antraigues's mother would have opposed it, and he wished to avoid, or delay, a confrontation with her.^[79]

D'Antraigues continued to be extremely active politically, and in this he was supported by Mme. Saint-Huberty (by which name she was still known).^[80] Apart from the constant stream of counter-revolutionary propaganda he produced, the Comte d'Antraigues was heavily involved in a network of counter-revolutionary intelligence: indeed, as far as the period 1791-1812 is concerned, he has been described as "the central figure in the counter-revolutionary espionage network in Europe."^[81] His functions within this network were threefold: (i) the collection of intelligence; (ii) the assessment of its significance; and (iii) the alteration of intelligence (and, specifically, of diplomatic reports), where necessary, in such a way as to promote the restoration of the monarchy. In order to bring this about, one of the aims was to present intelligence in such a way that the British government might be persuaded to declare war on the French Republic.^[82] The news received from secret agents in Paris was forwarded to contacts in Spain, England, Portugal and Imperial Russia.

In 1791 Antoinette returned to Paris for a while, ostensibly to attend to various business matters which still needed to be settled. She remained there until early 1792, when, around the time she was entering the second trimester of a pregnancy, she left for Milan.^[83] On 26 June 1792 she gave birth to a son, who was baptized Pierre-Antoine-Emmanuel-Jules at a church in Greco (which nowadays forms part of Milan, but in 1792 was a separate municipality) two days later. The actual birthplace of Jules (as he was known) is uncertain, but it is reasonable to suppose that it was either Milan itself, or somewhere in its immediate neighbourhood.^[84] One view is that, during her confinement, Antoinette took lodgings at the house of a Dr Moscati, who lived in a small village outside Milan.^[85] D'Antraigues's presence in the Milan area did not pass unobserved - on 11 February 1792 the Archduke Ferdinand notified Vienna that d'Antraigues was "visiting M.lle Saint-Huberti"(sic), who was believed to be recovering from an illness, and it had been thought prudent to place him under surveillance.^[86] Because of d'Antraigues's wish that their marriage should still remain a secret, Antoinette's chamber-maid, Madame Sibot, was declared to be the mother of the child, although on the certificate of baptism d'Antraigues acknowledged paternity and gave Jules his surname.^[83] Mme. Sibot and her husband were asked to attend to the child's upbringing, and were requested to pass the boy as their own. As soon as Antoinette was fit enough to travel, the family and the servants returned to the Villa Turconi.^[87] D'Antraigues and Antoinette were destined to have no further children, although Pingaud contends that an earlier child, who lived only briefly, had been born to the couple soon after their relationship started.^[88]

It was while they were in - or near - Milan, in March 1792, that d'Antraigues's ancestral home, the chateau of la Bastide at Juvinas in the Rhône-Alpes,^[89] was attacked, ransacked, and then totally destroyed by a band of rioters. This had been the place where, before the Revolution, he used to spend a good deal of his time. Other properties belonging to him were also looted and badly damaged.^[90] Whilst Antoinette had never had any deep personal connection with these places, the knowledge of what had occurred must have done little for her peace of mind as she awaited the birth of her child.

One of d'Antraigues's contacts was don Simon de Las Casas, the Spanish ambassador to the Most Serene Republic of Venice. In June 1793, in order to provide him with a greater degree of political security - and also with an income, Las Casas arranged for d'Antraigues to be appointed to the Spanish legation in Venice. At the same time, the Count of Provence (who, after the execution of Louis XVI in January of that year, had assumed the Regency of France) entrusted him with the diplomatic task of safeguarding his interests in Venice.^[91] The upshot of all this was that the Madame Saint-Huberty, together with her son and her servants, were at last able to make a definitive departure from Villa Turconi. At Verona, whilst on their way to Venice, it appears that there was a quarrel of some sort between Antoinette and Madame Sibot which resulted in the latter's immediate dismissal (or resignation), and the Sibots then returned to France.^[92]

The second treaty of the Peace of Basel (22 July 1795) brought the war between Spain and France to an end. Because of this, in order to regain his political security and also to be able to demonstrate more effectively his support for the Royalist cause, d'Antraigues transferred from the Spanish to the Russian legation at Venice. In doing so, he became the link between Louis XVIII and Catherine the Great, and - simultaneously - also gained Russian protection for himself by virtue of being an attaché at the Russian legation. The move was facilitated by Las Casas, who introduced him to the Russian ambassador at Naples: the ambassador then recommended him to the Empress Catherine.^[93] With regard to Madame Saint-Huberty, extracts from letters written by Las Casas and quoted by de Goncourt indicate that, whilst in Venice, she attended the opera from time to time, and she was also invited to private musical gatherings.^[94] In April 1795 the Republican Paris newspaper L'instituteur national carried a report that Monsieur (i.e. Louis XVIII in exile) had conferred the sash of Saint-Michel to Mme. Saint-Huberty for her services to music, and she now wore it ostentatiously whenever she was at the theatre or out walking. In the same article the writer also drew attention to the common rumour that d'Antraigues, with whom she was living, had married her.^[95]

With the collapse of the Republic of Venice in May 1797 and the occupation of the city by French troops, the Russian legation closed, and on 16 May its members attempted to make their withdrawal from the area. D'Antraigues (taking three portfolios full of papers), Madame Saint-Huberty and Jules travelled with them. At Trieste, which had fallen to Jean Baptiste Bernadotte, they were halted, and, despite the protest of the Russian minister Aleksandr Simeonovich Mordvinov, d'Antraigues was arrested on the evening of 21 May.^[96] While this was happening, Antoinette, who was not being guarded, managed to destroy the contents of two of the portfolios, leaving the third, which she believed contained nothing more than literary manuscripts. She was, however, mistaken - the third portfolio was precisely the one which she should have destroyed first, and the papers it contained were seized. Of these, the key document was one which summarized a conversation that had taken place between d'Antraigues and a spy named Montgalliard the previous year. (Montgalliard - if indeed he really was the man d'Antraigues met - may have been working as a double agent.^[97]) Taking leave of Mordvinov prior to being escorted away, d'Antraigues entrusted Antoinette and Jules to his care, but they refused to abandon him. Their action prompted d'Antraigues to acknowledge publicly, for the very first time, that they were his wife and son.^[98]

The family was taken to Milan, where d'Antraigues was interrogated by Napoleon Bonaparte. Initially he was held prisoner in a former convent, but then, after a few days, he was moved to a cell in the Sforza Castle. Meanwhile, Mme. Saint-Huberty and Jules took lodgings in the city. Quite apart from her newly acquired rank of countess, Mme. Saint-Huberty's international reputation still carried very considerable weight, and she was able to make frequent calls on Joséphine de Beauharnais (a countess herself through her first marriage), who was also in Milan at the time. During one of these visits she had the opportunity to speak to Bonaparte, who, ten years previously, when he was a very young officer in the artillery, had attended and had been deeply moved by a gala performance of Didon which she had given in Strasbourg.^[99] In Milan, however, the circumstances were rather different, but even so, Antoinette was still able to draw on all her acting skills and put on a fiery performance. When Bonaparte reminded her that he could, if he wished, issue an order for her husband to be shot, she pushed the young Jules towards him, and challenged him to have the boy killed along with his father. She then threatened to go to Paris in person "to obtain justice" (by which she meant that she was capable of creating trouble for Bonaparte with powerful people in Paris who already were concerned by his habit of exceeding his allotted powers).^[100] She screamed that Bonaparte was Robespierre reincarnate, and de Beauharnais had great difficulty in calming her. Bonaparte was shrewd enough to realise that eliminating his prisoner there and then would bring no real advantage, and that it could - perhaps - work against his own interests.^[101]

During his captivity, d'Antraigues was treated with ever-increasing laxity. After a few days in cell No. 10 at the Sforza Castle, he had been transferred to a spacious apartment in the same building, where Antoinette and Jules were permitted to join him, and later the family moved, with d'Antraigues being placed under house arrest, to the palace of a Marquis Andreoli.^[102] However, orders were given that Mme. Saint-Huberty be kept in Milan, and that all correspondence from or addressed to either of the couple be intercepted.^[101] Nevertheless, as time went on, d'Antraigues was eventually allowed to pay visits to a library and to take walks, provided that he was attended by guards, who would keep at a discreet distance.^[103]

On the evening of 29 August 1797,^[104] Madame Saint-Huberty, drawing on her years of experience in the theatre and her fascination with theatrical costumery, helped her husband to disguise himself as a priest. He wore a cassock, an ecclesiastical wig, a beard, green-tinted spectacles, and appropriate make-up. His guards failed to recognize him as he made his way to a pre-arranged rendezvous in the church of San Celso, and early the following morning he was taken by closed carriage to Bellinzona. Because Mme. Saint-Huberty let it be known that d'Antraigues was ill and confined to his bed, his escape was not discovered until 4 September, and it was not reported in the Milan newspapers until the 14th.^[105] In the meantime, she had obtained a passport for herself, which was issued on 27 August, i.e. before the escape, on the pretext that she needed to go to Trieste to collect some money - as indeed she informed Mme. Bonaparte. Jules was sent to stay with his former wet nurse for a few days. Antoinette then pretended to change her plans - the journey to Trieste had to be postponed whilst she (supposedly) was caring for her husband, who was far too ill to receive visitors. As soon as she received word that d'Antraigues was safely out of the country, she disguised herself as a peasant herb-seller, and made her way out of Milan. After a few days, she, Jules and d'Antraigues reunited in Innsbruck.^[106] According to a dispatch from Paris dated 21 September, the official Parisian newspapers were silent on news of the escape, although it was variously reported in private prints. For this reason, The Times in London espressed some scepticism as to whether any escape on the part of d'Antraigues and Saint-Huberty had taken place.^[107]

Madame Saint-Huberty and her family lived in Graz (1797-1799), Vienna (1799-1802) and Dresden (1802-1806).^[108] They then moved to London. In 1808 their address was 45 Devonshire Street, Portland Place, although they also had addresses at various times at 67 Princes Gate and at a place known as "Jacobi House."^[109]

Death

Around 1809 the Comte and Comtesse d'Antraigues purchased a house at The Terrace, Barnes, on the outskirts of London. They also had a West End property at 7 Queen Anne Street.^[110]

One day around the beginning of July 1812, during the Comte's temporary absence from the house, the Comtesse was in her bedroom at Barnes, attended by her maid, Susannah Black. They suddenly heard a single loud noise, and, believing that someone might have knocked at the front door, Black ran downstairs to answer, but found no-one was there. On her returning upstairs, the Comtesse met her at the bedroom door and remarked that the noise had sounded like a pistol shot. Black went further upstairs to the Comte's room, and discovered that a Piedmontese non-liveried servant who had been in the family's employment for about three months and who was known simply as Lawrence (or Lorenzo, in some sources) was standing alone inside, holding a smoking pistol. On being asked what he was doing, he replied "Nothing." He later admitted to the Comtesse that he had been handling the pistol and that it had discharged itself accidentally. In consequence of this incident, Lawrence was severely reprimanded.^[110]

A newspaper report, published in the wake of what happened a few weeks later, stated that the Comte d'Antraigues was always in the habit of keeping a pair of pistols ready and loaded in his bedroom, and he also kept a dagger there.^[111]

On the morning of 22 July 1812, the Comte and Comtesse ordered that their carriage be ready for them at eight o'clock, as they wished to travel into London. Their coachman, David Hebditch, brought the carriage to the front door at a few minutes before eight, and on his arrival, Lawrence opened the door of the conveyance and placed a can of oil inside. He then went back into the house momentarily, but soon returned to the pavement. The Comtesse came downstairs, attended by Black (who was carrying some books), and also by another servant, Elizabeth Ashton. Black ordered Lawrence to open the carriage door for her mistress, but instead of doing so, he went back into the house, and very soon afterwards a pistol shot was heard. The Comte d'Antraigues was seen by witnesses to be descending the staircase, followed by Lawrence, who had a pistol in one hand and a dagger in the other. Hebditch saw Lawrence plunge the dagger into the Comte's left shoulder: Lawrence then came outside and stabbed Antoinette in the breast as she sought to return to the front door. She slumped unconscious to the ground. Ashton, in a panic, rushed to the Sun public house nearby to summon help, whilst the other witnesses of the attack attempted to give whatever assistance they could to the wounded. In the confusion, Lawrence managed to re-enter the house once again, and a minute or so later another pistol shot was heard.^[110]

Two surgeons, Matthew Ball, of Barnes, and a Mr. King, were immediately called to the house. King, assisted by Hebditch, stripped the Comte (who had managed to stagger up to his bedroom) and attempted to treat the wound, but there was little that could be done, and he died very soon afterwards. Ball, who examined Antoinette, found that she had suffered a stab wound to her right breast; the blade had then penetrated deeply into her thoracic cavity, passing between the third and fourth ribs. She had lost a great deal of blood, and died within minutes of Ball's arrival.^[110]

Lawrence's body was found lying face down on the floor of the Comte's room. He had shot himself in the mouth. A bullet was found lodged in his cervical vertebrae, indicating that he would have been killed instantly.^[110]

An inquest was held by the coroner for Surrey, Charles Jemmett, at the White Hart Hotel in Barnes, on 23 July 1812. After viewing the three bodies and hearing the evidence provided by various witnesses under oath, the jury, after only five minutes' deliberation, returned a verdict that, firstly, the Comte and Comtesse d'Antraigues had both been murdered by Lawrence, and that, secondly, Lawrence had then committed suicide, "being in his senses" (sic).^[110]

After the inquest, Lawrence's body was buried in a shallow grave on land not far from some houses. A few days afterwards, a correspondent wrote a letter to The Times to denounce the fact that the grave had been opened on a number of occasions purely "to gratify the horrible curiosity of some idle people."^[112] Two stagecoaches conveying men, women and children had paused in order to allow the passengers to view "the disgusting scene" for what was claimed to have been twenty minutes. As if that were not enough, even the two hearses which were carrying the bodies of the Comte and Comtesse d'Antrigues had drawn up beside the murderer's grave so that the hearse attendants might take a glimpse of his corpse.^[112]

On 27 July 1812, most likely after a Requiem Mass, the bodies of the Comte and Comtesse d'Antraigues were buried in the graveyard of St Pancras Old Church, London.^[113] Duckworth, in the early 1980s, made a thorough search of the cemetery, but he was unable to find any headstone or other marker of their grave, which, he assumes, must have been disturbed in the 1860s when the Midland Railway was building its new London terminus, a project which required some excavation work to be carried out in the churchyard.^[114]

Among the deceased Comte's papers, secret clauses pertaining to a number of diplomatic treaties were discovered, together with the original copy of the will made by Louis XVI. These documents were of the very highest political importance.

Madame Saint-Huberty in Fiction and Film

La chanteuse poignardée is a fictionalized biography of Madame Saint Huberty written by Germaine Beauguitte and published as a paperback in April 1962. The book does not profess to be an accurate representation of historical fact, and indeed the author describes it as une biographie romancée.^[115] The plot appears to follow Edmond de Goncourt's biographical study to a large extent, which, in its turn, may sometimes be less than reliable. A particularly odd feature about Beauguitte's book is that it includes a preliminary chapter added as an afterthought, written by the artist and historical biographer Marie-Magdeleine de Rasky (1897-1982),^[116] in which she claimed to be the reincarnation of Madame Saint-Huberty.^[117] Rasky's assertion was made on the basis that (i) her mind was haunted by scenes and visions of places which, although she had never visited them, somehow appeared familiar; on visiting these places (sometimes quite by chance) at a later stage in her life, and recognising that they corresponded with the earlier visions, she had then discovered that they had a close association with Saint-Huberty: and that (ii) although she had not been injured, she nevertheless carried a large scar above her left breast, which seemingly tallied with de Goncourt's account of Saint-Huberty's death. (Although 1812 accounts of the murder were not always consistent,^[118] the second part of de Rasky's claim would appear to be negated by the surgeon Matthew Ball's testimony, presented at the inquest, that the dagger had entered Saint-Huberty's right breast.)

The character Mme de Saint-Huberty appeared in the 1979 television serial Joséphine ou la comédie des ambitions, directed by Robert Mazoyer. The role was played by the actress Gisèle Grimm.^[119]

References

Notes

Sources

(Source from which the first version of this page was translated: fr:Antoinette Saint-Huberty, retrieved 8 September 2013)

• Banham, Martin (1995). The Cambridge Guide to the Theatre (Third Edition). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Reprint with corrections, 2000).
• Beauguitte, Germaine (1962). La chanteuse poignardée: (La Saint-Huberty). Paris: Les éditions du Scorpion (Collection Alternance).
• Blanc, Olivier (1995). Les espions de la Révolution et de l’Empire. Paris: Perrin. ISBN 2-262-01116-8
• Blanc, Olivier (2002). L’amour à Paris au temps de Louis XVI. Paris: Perrin. ISBN 2-262-01716-6
• Campardon, Émile (1884). L'Académie Royale de Musique au XVIIIe siècle. Paris: Berger-Levrault et Cie.
• Carbonnier, Youri (2003). "Le personnel musical de l'Opéra de Paris sous le règne de Louis XVI." In Histoire, économie et societé, 2003, 22e année, No. 2 : L'opéra, à la croisée de l'histoire et de la musicologie, pp. 177–206.
• Chouquet, Gustave (1873). Histoire de la musique dramatique en France depuis ses origines jusqu'à nos jours. Paris: Libraire Firmin Didot frères, fils et Cie.
• Clayton, Ellen Creathorne (1863). Queens of Song - Vol. I. London: Smith, Elder & Co. - Copy at Google Books.
• de Goncourt, Edmond (1882). La Saint-Huberty d'après sa correspondance et ses papiers de famille. Paris: E. Dentu. - Copy at Gallica.
• de Goncourt, Edmond (1885). Madame Saint Huberty d’après sa correspondance et ses papiers de famille. Paris: G. Charpentier et Cie. - Copy at Open Library.
• Dorlan, Alexandre (1932). "Visages d'autrefois: Madame Saint-Huberty." In La Vie en Alsace, (Vol. 10 (?)), No. 2, Février 1932, pp. 25–30.
• Du Bled, Victor (1893). "Comédiens et Comédiennes d'autrefois, dernière partie." In Revue des Deux Mondes, Tome Cent Quinzième, livraison du 15 Janvier 1893, pp. 312–358.
• Duckworth, C. and Osborn, E. (1985). "Clement of Alexandria's Hypotyposeis: a French Eighteenth-Century Sighting." In Journal of Theological Studies, 36, pp. 67–83.
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• Edwards, H. Sutherland (1889). Idols of the French Stage. Volume II. London: Remington & Co. (Second Edition.) - Copy at Internet Archive.
• Fétis, François-Joseph (1829). Revue musicale, Troisième année - Tome V. Paris: Alexandre Mesnier.
• Gaboriau, Émile (1863). Les comédiennes adorées. Paris: E. Dentu. - Copy at HathiTrust.
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• Jullien, Adolphe (1880a). Histoire du costume au théatre, depuis les origins jusq'à nos jours. Paris: G. Charpentier.
• Jullien, Adolphe (1880b). L'Opéra secret au XVIIIe siècle. Paris: Edouard Rouveyre.
• Lajarte, Théodore (1878). Bibliothèque musicale du théatre de l'Opéra: Catalogue historique, chronologique, anecdotique. Tome premier. Paris: Libraire des Bibliophiles. - Copy at Open Library.
• Marmontel, Jean-François (ed. Renwick, John) (1974). Correspondance, Vol II. Clermont-Ferrand: Université de Clermont-Ferrand, Faculté des lettres et sciences humaines.
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• Pitou, Spire (1985). The Paris Opéra. An Encyclopedia of Operas, Ballets, Composers, and Performers – Rococo and Romantic, 1715-1815. Westport CT/London: Greenwood Press, pp. 483–484 (article: Saint-Huberty, Antoinette-Cécile). ISBN 0-313-24394-8.
• Williams, Hugh Noel (1906). Later queens of the French stage. London/New York: Harper.- Copy at Internet Archive.