Catherine Grand
Noëlle -Catherine Grand, better known as Madame Talleyrand -Périgord, Princesse de Bénévent ( born November 21, 1762 Tharangambadi, India, † December 10, 1834 in Pont -de- Sains in Paris) was a French mistress, salonière and a known beauty of the 19th century.
Life
Noëlle -Catherine Verlée (or Worlee ) was the second daughter of the frigate lieutenant and captain of the port Chandernagore Jean -Pierre Verlée and his wife Laurence Alleigne. 1777 the family moved after Chandernagore. There she was familiar with the Englishman with French origin, George Francis Grand, a lieutenant of the British Civil Service. On April 7, 1778, she married him in the church of Chandernagore and on the same day at St. John 's Church in Calcutta. The couple settled in Calcutta. Some time later came to rumors that she maintained a love affair with the rich Irish army officer and politician Sir Philip Francis. First Grand brought his wife back to Chandernagore, but sent them a few months later on a ship to England.
After a few amorous adventures in England Catherine Grant went in 1783 to France, where she in Paris a famous literary salon in the Rue du Sentier led and rose to become one of the infamous Parisian courtesans. To her lover were the banker Valdec de Lessart and the entomologist Maximilian Spinola.
1792 Palais des Tuileries by the people of Paris and the delegates of the provinces was stormed. Louis XVI. was captured and taken to prison. Catherine Grand escaped from Paris back to England. She returned after the fall of Maximilien Robespierre de back to France and was taken shortly thereafter on charges of espionage in jail. She was accused before the Revolutionary Tribunal for the support of the counter-revolution and contacts with emigrants and sentenced to death. From prison, she asked the foreign minister, Charles Maurice de Talleyrand - Périgord (1754-1838), to intervene. The beauty and grace of the young woman had an influence on the minister, a former bishop of the Roman Catholic Church.
After her release, Madame Grand lived with Talleyrand in the official residence of the Minister in sin. Napoleon Bonaparte demanded by the Concordat of 1801 by Talleyrand to marry his mistress either or abandon it. Madame Grand may in any event not represent as mistress of the Minister for Foreign Affairs the French State. Grands husband was generously resigned and rewarded with a post in the Cape Province, after he had consented to the divorce. The marriage of Talleyrand and Grands took place in the Rue de Verneuil in the presence of Bonaparte and his wife Joséphine de Beauharnais on September 9, 1802. Talleyrand's interest in his wife after the wedding cooled significantly.
Madame Talleyrand traveled on to England. The French ambassador in London, mediated between the couple Talleyrand and she returned to Paris. In the following years, Madame Talleyrand performed her duties as wife of the Minister until the departure of her husband, the Congress of Vienna. On this trip were Talleyrand of his niece, the Countess Dorothea von Biron, accompanied Talleyrand and Madame left Paris again. She moved first to London, then to Brussels and took last north of Paris in Pont -de- Sains resident.