Louise Élisabeth

On this day - 21st July 1719

Death of Louise Élisabeth~Duchess of Berry

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Louise Élisabeth, Duchess of Berry was an 18th-century French princess.

From her six unsuccessful pregnancies, to her extensive list of lovers, including, maybe, her own father, her short and scandalous life enthralled the city of Paris.

Louise Élisabeth was born in August of 1695 to Phillippe II, Regent of France, and Françoise-Marie de Bourdon.

From the time she was born, Louise Élisabeth had the honorary title of Mademoiselle d’Orléans.

Louise was plump as a peach, but was never in good health.

When she was just six years old, she fell terribly ill.

The mysterious illness seemed ready to take her life, but her father nursed her back to health, staying at her bedside all day and all night.

At the age of ten, Louise contracted smallpox and this time it definitely seemed like she wouldn’t make it.

Little Louise was actually presumed dead for six hours, miraculously, she survived.

Having survived not one but two close encounters with death, Louise Élisabeth’s parents were eager to get her married, before it was too late.

They arranged for Louise to marry Charles, Duke of Berry when she was just 14 years old.

The Duke of Berry was ten years older than Louise, at the time.

Louise Élisabeth was a little bit of a rebel, and a party animal, and her wild ways were just getting started.

Louise Élisabeth attended a dinner party with the Duchess of Burgundy in a suburb of Paris.

Much to the horror of the other guests, however, Louise became so intoxicated that she had to be carried back to Versailles.

Her woozy behavior nearly caused a scandal at court, but Marie Anne managed to hush it up before the king could find out.

Louise Élisabeth’s hard and fast lifestyle took its toll before long. One year into her marriage, Louise became pregnant with her first child.

Louise delivered a stillborn girl.

The loss was painful, and she would blame her husband, the Duke of Berry, for the loss of her child.

As Louise approached full term, her doctors advised her to stay either in Versailles or the Palais Royal.

Her husband, however, insisted that she make the voyage to Fontainebleau by barge, for the delivery.

As they made their way to Fontainebleau, Louise Élisabeth’s barge hit a pier and began taking on water.

The barge very nearly sank, taking Louise with it.

When Louise Élisabeth arrived in Fontainebleau and delivered her stillborn daughter, the doctors blamed the journey.

They claimed that the stress of traveling and the accident had all been too much for the near-born child.

In 1712 Louise Élisabeth was pregnant once again, and the following March she delivered a happy, healthy baby boy.

Less than four months after she had given birth, the baby began convulsing uncontrollably.

He passed away in June of that year.

The Duke of Berry, sick and tired of his wife’s inability to successfully give him a child, took one of Louise’s chambermaids as his mistress.

As if that insult wasn’t enough, the affair was public knowledge. Louise Élisabeth took the insult to heart, she had after all, carried two of his children, even if they didn’t make it.

Even though Louise Élisabeth had been carrying on several affairs of her own, when her husband took one of her chambermaids as his mistress, she decided she was going to make the duke very jealous.

And very, very angry.

Louise started an affair with the mysterious, but no doubt dashing, Monsieur La Haye.

Louise had managed to keep her original affairs relatively quiet, but her affair with La Haye was about revenge, and she flaunted it. She couldn’t have predicted the duke’s chilling reaction.

The Duke of Berry was outraged at his wife’s new affair, and threatened to have her shipped off to a convent.

Louise Élisabeth definitely wouldn’t have had a good time at a convent.

She wouldn’t have been able to party, wearing a habit would have been uncomfortable and then, of course, there was that vow of celibacy......

Their broken relationship reached a peak when the Duke viciously kicked her in public for her indiscretions.

She had to get away, no matter the cost.

Louise Élisabeth had had enough of her husband.

He was responsible for the loss of their first child, insulted her honor, and took to physically attacking her in public.

Louise plotted with her lover, the roguish Monsieur La Haye, to make a daring getaway.

The forbidden lovers hatched a scheme to escape France for the Netherlands, where they could live free of her husband’s influence.

Fate, however, had other plans for the Duke of Berry.

Louise Élisabeth wouldn’t have to flee France, or even lift a finger, to get exactly what she wanted.

The Duke of Berry, suffered an accident while on a hunting trip. He sustained severe internal injuries from which he would never recover.

In May of 1714, when the duke drew his last breath, Louise officially became a dowager duchess.

She was finally free to live as she wanted.

Seven weeks after Louise Élisabeth’s husband passed away, she once again gave birth.

She had another baby girl but, sadly, the infant passed away only days later.

Considering the timing of the pregnancy, there were doubts as to who the baby’s father might have been.

But to Louise, it was another terrible tragedy.

Louise Élisabeth moved into Luxembourg Palace, to live out her widowhood.

After the passing of her grandfather King Louis XIV, Louise Élisabeth announced that she would be in mourning for six months.

Of course, her idea of mourning had considerably fewer tears and considerably more cheers than everyone else’s.

She quickly became a merry widow, hosting parties, attending balls, and gambling.

In the middle of her “mourning,” the Duchess Of Berry suddenly stopped partying and shut herself up in her palace.

The official story she gave, was that she was suffering from a cold.

In truth, Louise was experiencing the pains of pregnancy.

Her “clandestine confinement” became the subject of a whole lot of gossip in Paris.

Louise's pregnancy so soon after her husband’s death, could only mean one thing....

Scandal.

The tabloids had found a new target, and Louise Élisabeth would just keep giving them more scandalous news.

Many, many failed pregnancies, and her growing list of lovers.

Louise's frequent pregnancies following her husband’s death were a constant source of entertainment for Parisians.

The Duchess Of Berry’s scandalous life expanded to include her father.

Phillippe II had become the Regent of France following Louis XIV’s passing.

In Christmas of 1717, the tabloids accused Louise of carrying on an intimate relationship with her own father, the Regent of France.

Being constantly pregnant didn’t stop Louise from partying.

As long as she could stand (or waddle), then she figured that she could still go out.

Well into her latest pregnancy, Louise continued attending parties and downing more than her fair share of alcohol.

All of a sudden, her multiple stillbirths are beginning to make sense.

Louise finally went into labor one too many times.

Her last pregnancy ended with a blood-soaked, four-day delivery of a baby girl.

The ordeal nearly claimed Louise's life.

Sadly, this final pregnancy would be no different than any of the others.

The baby girl did not survive.

Louise never fully recovered from her harrowing labor.

That’s understandable; four days sounds like too long to push anything anywhere.

Louise contracted a fever and a chill sometime shortly thereafter and became bedridden.

Her condition was dire, with no miraculous recoveries this time.

Louise Élisabeth, the Duchess of Berry, passed at the tender age of 23, on the 21st July 1719.

Her death was likely from complications arising from her sixth pregnancy.

An autopsy revealed something truly horrifying....

Louise Élisabeth was in the early stages of another pregnancy, at the time of her death!

Louise's heart was interned at the Val-de-Grâce church in Paris alongside her firstborn’s.

The rest of her remains, the family had buried in the Basilica of Saint-Denis in the outskirts of Paris.

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https://www.factinate.com/.../louise-elisabeth.../...

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https://ko-fi.com/thetudorintruders

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Portrait of Louise Élisabeth, Duchess of Berry 1715~granddaughter of Louis XIV of France.

Pierre Gobert.