Thérésa Tallien

WOENSDAG 28 OKTOBER 2009

http://kleurrijkhortense.blogspot.com/2009/10/theresa-tallien.html

She was born Juana María Ignazia Teresa de Cabarrús y Galabert in Carabanchel Alto, Madrid, Spain to François Cabarrus, a French financier, and Maria Antonia Galabert, the daughter of a French industrialist based in Spain. Thérésa's father founded and governed the bank of San Carlos, which became the Royal Bank of Spain, and was King Joseph I of Spain's Minister of Finance. In 1789, he was knighted by King Charles IV of Spain with the title of count.

From 1778 to 1783, Thérésa was raised by nuns in France. She was a student of the painter Jean-Baptiste Isabey. She returned home to the family castle briefly in 1785, and then her father sent her back to France at twelve years old to complete her education and get married.

The first of her many love affairs was with Alexandre de Laborde; however, the young couple was forced to separate as de Laborde's powerful father, Jean-Joseph de Laborde, disapproved of her. Cabarrus then arranged for his "very beautiful" daughter to marry a rich, powerful Frenchman in order to strengthen his position in France. On February 21, 1788, Thérésa was married to Jean Jacques Devin Fontenay (1762-1817), the last Marquis de Fontenay, a wealthy aristocrat described as small, red and ugly. The bride was fourteen years old. Even though in the 1780s Thérésa had begun to take an interest in Liberalism and the principles of the Revolution, she was presented at the court of King Louis XVI. The newlyweds visited the royal court of Spain as well. On May 2, 1789, Thérésa had a son, Devin Théodore de Fontenay (1789-1815), whose father was perhaps Felix le Peletier de Saint-Fargeau, brother of Louis-Michel le Peletier de Saint-Fargeau.























When her husband fled at the outbreak of the Revolution in 1789, she resumed her maiden name and obtained a divorce in 1791. She took refuge in Bordeaux, where she was arrested and jailed as the former wife of an émigré aristocrat. She met Jean Lambert Tallien, 
the Commissary of the National Convention, who saved her from the guillotine, and became his mistress; through his influence, Thérésa Tallien obtained the release of many prisoners. She accompanied him when he was recalled to Paris, only to be imprisoned on Maximilien Robespierre's orders first in La Force prison, then in Carmes prison where she met Joséphine de Beauharnais. She married Tallien on 26 December 1794. She and Tallien had a daughter, Thermidor Tallien (1795-1862) who married Count Felix de Narbonne-Pelet in 1815.

Her husband joined the conspiracy to oust Robespierre, and on July 27, 1794 (9 Thermidor), Thérésa was released. Tallien had arranged her liberation, and soon after that of Joséphine de Beauharnais. Thérésa was a moderating influence on her husband: after the outbreak of the Thermidorian Reaction, she earned the moniker Notre-Dame de Thermidor ("Our Lady of Thermidor") as the person who was most likely to intervene in favor of the detained.


Thérésa became one of the leaders of the Parisian social life. Her salon was famous and she was one of the originators of the Neo-Grec women's fashion of the French Directory period. She was a very colorful figure; one story is that she was said to bathe in the juice of strawberries for their healing properties. She once arrived at the Tuileries Palace, the then chief residence of Napoleon Bonaparte, supported by a black page, with six sapphire rings in the feet, eight in the hands, two gold bracelets in the ankles, eighteen in the arms and a forehead band full of rubies. On another occasion she appeared at the Paris Opera wearing a white silk dress without sleeves and not wearing any underwear. Charles Maurice de Talleyrand commented: "Il n'est pas possible de s'exposer plus somptueusement!" ("It is not possible to exhibit oneself more sumptuously!").

Marriage to Riquet
Tallien's power waned and he and Thérésa divorced in 1802. After a brief flirtation with Napoleon, she moved first to the powerful Paul Barras, whose former mistress was Napoleon's first wife Joséphine; then to the millionaire speculator Gabriel-Julien Ouvrard (with whom she had four children); and finally, attempting to regain respectability and to get away from Paris, she married the much younger François-Joseph-Philippe de Riquet, Comte de Caraman, on 22 August 1805 - he had become the sixteenth Prince of Chimay after the death of his childless uncle in 1804. She spent the rest of her life first in Paris, then on the Chimay estates (now in Belgium). After the Battle of Waterloo in 1815, these became part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands.


She had become one of the most famous women of her age, and she resented this role. Once when she appeared at the Louvre accompanied by her children, so many spectators flocked to see her up close, that she had to escape down a staircase to save herself. The marriage to Caraman meant that she returned to the class in which she had been born - and educated.

The couple invited musicians such as Daniel Auber, Rodolphe Kreutzer, Luigi Cherubini, Charles de Bériot and Maria Malibran to Paris and later to Chimay, where Thérésa held a little court. Cherubini composed his Mass in fa at their castle there.

Thérésa died in Chimay, where she was interred with François-Joseph de Riquet under the sacristy of the local church where a memorial stands to her memory. She bore ten children during her various liaisons, including Joseph de Riquet, first son of François-Joseph-Philippe, who became the seventeenth Prince of Chimay in 1843.

Children
Thérésa bore ten children by various husbands and lovers. Her firstborn was her son Antoine François Julien Théodore Denis Ignace de Fontenay (1789-1815), followed by a daughter, Rose Thermidor Thérésa Tallien (1795-1862).

She had one child by Barras, born in 1797, who died at birth.

Ouvrard was allegedly the father of four of her children, born during her marriage to Tallien:

Notre Dame de Thermidor 1794

http://madameguillotine.org.uk/2011/05/23/notre-dame-de-thermidor-1794/

‘This woman would be able to close the gates of hell‘ – William Pitt on Thérésia Cabarrus Tallien.

The ultimate society girl of the late eighteenth century and leader of the dashing and morbidly attired Merveilleuses with their thin muslin gowns, red ribbon chokers and tousled clipped short hair, Juana María Ignazia Teresa de Cabarrús y Galabert (known as Thérésia) was born in a palace in Madrid on the 31st July 1773. She was one of those huge flamboyant, scandalous, intellectual yet tender hearted women that the eighteenth century excelled at producing – a true product of her time in every way.

Heiress to the enormous fortune of her father, a Spanish finance minister, aristocrat and friend of Goya, Thérésia, had no difficulty in attracting suitors and was to marry the Marquis de Fontenay on the 21st of February 1788. Fontenay was an unattractive little man and probably couldn’t believe his luck as he took the enchantingly lovely fourteen year old Thérésia, who had a dowry of over half a million Livres, as his wife. Rich, popular and pretty, the new Marquise de Fontenay was presented to Marie Antoinette at Versailles and placed herself at the heart of fashionable Parisian life on the eve of the Revolution.

Her marriage was a miserable affair though and Thérésia rid herself of her husband, who had dissipated her fortune and then emigrated in order to escape both the fury of the mob, his totally fed up wife and also his creditors. They were divorced in 1791 and Thérésia threw herself with gusto into the liberal political scene of the early 1790s, hosting a salon and having affairs with several prominent men. When the Terror reached its height and even liberal aristocrats who had supported the Revolution found themselves in danger, she escaped to Bordeaux, only to be promptly imprisoned despite her reputation there as a much loved benefactress to the poor of the area. She would have very likely have been guillotined, had she not caught the eye of handsome young Jacobin Tallien who had travelled there as a representative of the Convention and negotiated her release at some risk to himself as he was immediately recalled to Paris to explain himself to the Committee of Public Safety.

The couple returned together to Paris, where Thérésia’s aristocratic pedigree and attempts, via her lover, to secure the release of several state prisoners drew the attention of the Committee of Public Safety who had her re-arrested. Thérésia was firstly imprisoned in the vile La Force and then in the far more salubrious Carmes, where she was to meet Rose de Beauharnais and form a friendship that would last for the rest of their lives. Both women lived in daily fear of execution, especially when Rose’s husband, Alexandre was guillotined.

It is not known for certain how involved Thérésia was in the events of Thermidor. She herself was to tell people that she had had a letter smuggled out to Tallien, telling him that she was due to be brought before the Tribunal the following day and calling him a coward for doing so little to save her life. And lo, she would say, the very next day, he brought about the fall of Robespierre and saved not just her but everyone else then awaiting trial. Their correspondance no longer exists so it is impossible to say if this is the truth, but it makes a good story and Thérésia herself certainly seems to have believed that the Terror was ended for her sake as she gratefully married Tallien on Boxing Day 1794, shortly before giving birth to a daughter who was fancifully christened Thermidor Tallien.

Once the Terror was over, the city of Paris gave itself over to an orgy of fashion, fun and decadence, reminiscent of the lavish joy evidenced by the City of London during the Restoration of Charles II, a century earlier. Beautiful Thérésia, rich, hailed by a grateful populace as Notre Dame des Thermidor who had saved them all from Robespierre was naturally to become the leader of fashionable society and was to be seen out and about every night, dressed in her skimpy muslin gowns, covered in diamonds and, scandalously without any underwear. After watching her arrive at the Opera in a thin white muslin gown with sapphires and rubies flashing on every gold painted finger and toe, Talleyrand is said to have dryly observed: ‘It is not possible to exhibit oneself more sumptuously!’

There was more to Thérésia than these lavish displays though – now that Robespierre had been overthrown and the Terror was at an end, Tallien placed her in charge of the urgent operation to empty the full to bursting Parisian prisons and so she secured the release of countless prisoners as well as securing the penalty free return of many emigrés.

Her marriage to Tallien was to be short lived and finally came to an end in 1795 (although they didn’t formally divorce until the 8th of April 1802) when his callous and underhand treatment of the Royalist Chouan prisoners at Quiberon (he released the women and children as promised but had around 950 soldiers, including the Marquis de Sombreuil shot) turned her against him forever. ‘He has too much blood on his hands,’ Thérésia commented with revulsion.

One of Thérésia’s most ardent admirers at this time was the awkward young Corsican General Bonaparte, but it is said that after gently rebuffing his advances, she introduced him to her best friend Rose de Beauharnais, who was to become his beloved Joséphine. Sadly, Napoleon did not remain grateful for the good turn that she had done him and would later ban Joséphine from seeing her, forbid her to come to his court and rudely pass comment on her morals: ‘She has had two or three husbands and children with all the world’.

After a series of spectacular and high profile affairs with such men as Talleyrand, Paul Barras and Gabriel Ouvrad, she finally married again to the Comte de Caraman, who was later to become Prince de Chimay. It was almost as though Thérésia had gone full circle as she went from aristocratic beauty, who had been presented to Marie Antoinette at Versailles in early 1789 to heroine of the Terror, to leader of one of the most scandalous and louche societies in history to Princesse de Chimay and chatelaine of a château in the country.

Many, many years ago I was taken to the seat of the Chimay family in Belgium, and I remember standing for a long time before the portraits of the Princesse de Chimay who had been a lady in waiting to Marie Antoinette and then of Thérésia. Such a contrast between the two women and yet, they shared the same glamour and spirit that carried so many women of that time through the dark days.

I love this painting by Marguerite Gérard, that is said to depict Madame Tallien and another one of her best friends, Madame Récamier sitting together. I love to imagine Thérésia, Joséphine, Juliette Récamier and Madame de Staël, all great friends despite the tumult of the times and the vagaries of their menfolk, sitting together in their autumn years and reminiscing about the lost days of Marie Antoinette’s court, the excitement of the Revolution and the wild lives that they had all lived.

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