European Royalty: The Bourbon Orleans Line


Figure 1.--The Duchess de Vendome with her son Prince Charles, photographed in 1912. She was the sister of King Albert I of the Belgians married to Prince Emmanuel of the Orleanist (French) line of the House of Bourbon, great grandson of Louis Philippe, the last King of France who died in 1850).

Conditions in France deteriorated for the common people during the reign of Louis XV. This led during the reign of Louis XVI the outbreak of the French Revolution. Louis XVI was forced to abdicate and was eventually execulted at the guillotine. A brother of Louis XIV, Philip, Duke of Orleans, was the founder of the collateral branch of Bourbons known as the House of Orleans. A grandson of Louis XIV, Philip, Duke of Anjou, became King Philip V of Spain, the founder of the Spanish House of Bourbon.

Philippe II

Louis XV at the age of 5 years became King of France in 1715. He inherited the throne because of the death of his older brother. As his mother had died earlier (1712), until he attained his legal majority in Feb. 1723, France was governed by a regent, Philippe II, duc d'Orleans.

Count Louis Phillipe Joseph d'Orleans

Count Louis Phillipe Joseph d'Orleans: was born in 1747 at Saint-Cloud. He was guillotened during the Terror in 1793, Paris. He was a Bourbon prince who became a supporter of popular democracy during the Revolution of 1789. The cousin of Louis XVI, as well as of the lineage of the old Valois dynasty, he succeeded to his father's title of duc d'Orleans in 1785. Orleans's hostility to Louis XVI's queen, Marie Antoinette, caused him to live away from the royal court of Versailles. In the 1780s, he became leader of the nobles who opposed the King through the Paris parliament, and his Paris residence became a center of popular agitation. During the Revolution, he took a seat in the National Assembly, and after the fall of the monarchy in August 1792, he renounced his nobility and took the name Phillipe-Egalite. He supported the more radical democratic elements, and voted in favor for the execution of Louis. However, he fell under suspicion when his son defected to Austria. Placed under arrest in April 1793, he was sent to the guillotine in November.

Louis Philippe (1830-48)

Louis Phillipe was the only member of the Bourbon Orleans line to reign as King of France. The Revolution against Charles established Louis Phillipe as a constitutional monarch. The event was remembered by Delacroix in his painting Liberty leading the people. Honore Daumier, the famed plitical cartooniost, liked to draw Louis, the Bourguoise Monarch, as a large pear in a top hat. The King was furious about it.

Youthful republicanism

It was not likely that the part which Louis Philippe played in the revolution of 1789, his share in the republican victories of Jemappes and of Valmy, would be forgotten by those who saw in him only a pseudo-republican, a "citizen king" in name only, and who seized eagerly upon the opportunity of mocking at his youthful espousal of republicanism.

Belgium

The Belgian drive for independence was inspired by the July Revolution in France that put Louis Phillipe on the throne. In August, 1830 an uprising began in which a unique coalition of Catholics and liberals proclaimed its independence which was accepted by the Great Powers in the Treaty of London, over Dutch protests.

Family

There were six sons and four daughters by his marriage to Marie Am_lie.
Ferdinand: Ferdinard, Duc D'Orleans, died in an accident in 1842.
Henri: The fifth son was Henri, Duc D'Aumale (1822-1897) and the Club's first President from 1860 to 1897.

I know very little about Louis Fellipe's family and how the children were dressed. One author notes the children, or at least some of them, were sent to public school. This wss at the time quite a symbolic step. The British monarcy at the time was not even sending the children to private schools.

Reign

Louis Phillipe became king of France after the July Revolution drove Charles X from Paris. It was Phillipe's actions as king which put his government out of touch with the need of the changing society and economy of France. Phillipe ignored the principals behind parliamentary government. He appointed first ministers that agreed with his decisions. He also manipulated elections, as well as, gave judiciary favors. Phillipe stubbornly resisted attempts to make government more representative and responsive.

It is one of the many little ironies of Louis Philippe's reign that, after having owed his election to his supposed advocacy of freedom of the press, he should in less than two years take vigorous measures to stifle it. Some of the best known cartoons that appeared in La Caricature deal with this very subject.

Opposition

The adversaries of the government of 1830 were of two kinds. One kind, of which Admiral Carrel was a type, resorted to passionate argument, to indignant eloquence. The other kind resorted to the methods of the Fronde; they made war by pin-pricks, by bursts of laughter, with all the resources of French gayety and wit. In this method the leading spirit was Philipon, who understood clearly the power that would result from the closest alliance between la presse et l'image. Even before La Caricature was founded the features of the last of the Bourbons became a familiar subject in cartoons. Invariably the same features are emphasized; a tall, lank figure, frequently contorted like the "india-rubber man" of the dime museums; a narrow, vacuous countenance, a high, receding forehead, over which sparse locks of hair are straggling; a salient jaw, the lips drawn back in a mirthless grin, revealing huge, ungainly teeth, projecting like the incisors of a horse. In one memorable cartoon he is expending the full crushing power of these teeth upon the famous "charter" of 1830, but is finding it a nut quite too hard to crack.

From the very beginning La Caricature assumed an attitude of hostile suspicion toward Louis Philippe, the pretended champion of the bourgeoisie, whose veneer of expedient republicanism never went deeper than to send his children to the public schools, and to exhibit himself parading the streets of Paris, umbrella in hand. Two cartoons which appeared in the early days of his reign, and are labeled respectively "Ne vous y frottez pas" and "Il va bon train, le Ministère!" admirably illustrate the public lack of confidence. The first of these, an eloquent lithograph by Daumier, represents a powerfully built and resolute young journeyman printer standing with hands clinched, ready to defend the liberty of the press. In the background are two groups. In the one Charles X., already worsted in an encounter, lies prone upon the earth; in the other Louis Philippe, waving his ubiquitous umbrella, is with difficulty restrained from assuming the aggressive. The second of these cartoons is more sweeping in its indictment. It represents the sovereign and his ministers in their "chariot of state," one and all lashing the horses into a mad gallop toward a bottomless abyss. General Soult, the Minister of War, is flourishing and snapping a military flag, in place of a whip. At the back of the chariot a Jesuit has succeeded in securing foothold upon the baggage, and is adding his voice to hasten the forward march, all symbolic of the violent momentum of the reactionary movement.

Revolution

These actions caused discontent among the French people. Banquets were organized to protest government's intransigence. The most significant was planed to take place on February 22, however the government canceled it. This was the straw that broke the camels back, and the revolution had begun. Phillipe found himself without any support. After the National Guard refused to cheer for their king, Louis Phillipe, he abdicated to his grandson. The Second Republic was declared from the Hotel de Ville. The cabinet was confirmed by a crowd outside the hotel. Louis was forced to flee to England, were he spent the rest of his life as the Comte de Neuilly until his death in 1850.

Impact

Louis Phillipe's actions as king clearly sparked the revolution in France, which sparked revolutions in Germany, Austria, and Italy. It comes as no surprise that Phillipe was not a very good king. His only real previous experience in leadership was as an officer in the royal. He was also involved in politics, although not significantly until he became king. The major factor in his becoming king was that he was a member of the Orlean family, a branch of the ruling family, the Bourbons.

Ferdinard, Duc D'Orleans

Ferdinard, Duc D'Orleans, was Louis Philippe's eldest son. He died in an accident in 1842.

Phillipe VII

Ferdinand was succeeded by his eldest son, Phillipe VII, Comte de Paris (1838-1894), The latter's son was, Phillipe VIII, Duc D'Orleans (1869-1899).

Prince Emmanuel

Prince Emmanuel was the great grandson of King Louis Philippe, the last King of France.

Prince Charles

The Duchess de Vendome with her son Prince Charles, photographed in 1912. She was the sister of King Albert I of the Belgians and married to Prince Emmanuel of the Orleanist (French) line of the House of Bourbon. I do not know anything of Prince Charle's childhood. The one available image shows him wearing a kneepants suit. It looks to be white or a very light color. I am not sure what material thde suit is, bit it looks to be satin. He wears it with long white stockings. He has short hair which may be curled on top. I assume that Charles and his parents were living in France at the time.

Henri d'Orleans

The Count of Paris, Henri d'Orleans, pretender to the French throne, was laid to rest in 1999, never having realized his dream of restoring the monarchy.European royalty sent family representatives and elaborate floral wreaths to honor the count, who died at age 90 on June 19 at his home outside the northwestern French city of Dreux. The funeral ceremony in the town's cathedral coincided with an editorial by former French President Valery Giscard d'Estaing describing the count's unfulfilled desire to found a constitutional monarchy.

The count, whose full name was Henri Robert Ferdinand Marie Louis-Philippe d'Orleans, was a direct descendant of Louis-Phillipe, the last king of France who abdicated in 1848. Writing in the conservative Le Figaro, Giscard recalled meeting privately with the count at his home for the last time on April 15. According to Giscard, the count described an aborted plan to run for the presidency in the early 1960s. Giscard said the count had approached then-President Gen. Charles de Gaulle, asking to be appointed president of the French Red Cross--which he said would be the ideal platform from which to promote his royalist views. If elected, the count would have proposed a constitutional reform to set up a monarchy similar to Britain's, Giscard wrote. De Gaulle didn't try to talk the count out of his plan, but said he could not give him the post, Giscard wrote. The count then abandoned the project.







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Created: April 2, 2000
Last updated: February 24, 2003