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François Racine de Monville 1734-1797Le premier possesseur, m'a-t'on dit, fut Monville Le Rothschild de son temps! 1733-1734 According to his friend Dufort de Cheverny, writing in his memoirs, François Nicolas Henri Racine de Monville was born in 1733 near Alençon, in Normandy, the son of Jean Baptiste Racine de Jonquoy and Marie Marthe Françoise Le Monnier. However, an American author, Diana Ketcham, relying on contemporary records, writes in her well-researched book that he was born on October 4, 1734 in Paris. Monville's mother was the daughter of a wealthy fermier général, a private contractor who collected taxes through a practice known in the history of taxation as farming. He had married his maidservant and received his postion thanks the favors bestowed by his wife on the Duke of Luxembourg. 1750 Monsieur de Monville is living in Paris with his grandfather on the Rue Neuve des Petits Champs, carousing with his bachelor friends. Dufort de Cheverny draws this portrait of Monville. He was "L'un des plus beaux cavaliers de Paris." He stood 5 feet 8 inches tall (the French used feet and inches until the Revolution, when the metric system was created), and "fait comme un modèle...la tête un peu trop petite mais agréable." Monville danced so well that he was invited to all the balls. He was an accomplished horseman, excelled at le jeu de paume (today known as Royal Tennis in Great Britain and Court Tennis in America), played the flute "as well as Amphion," and the harp, and could shoot a bow-and-arrow "as well as an Indian." 1755 Monsieur de Monville marries Aimable Charlotte Félicité Lucas de Boncourt. 1757 Monsieur de Monville is appointed Grand Maître des Eaux et Forêts in Rouen, a position he will hold until 1765. He develops a passionate interest in botany and horticulture. 1761 Monsieur de Monville is widowed. His maternal grandfather soon leaves him a considerable inheritance that will enable him to lead a life of leisure. Madame de Genlis, at the time Mlle. Félicité Ducrest de Saint-Aubin, describes Monville as "un magnifique soupirant, jeune, veuf, riche et très beau, noble et romanesque,"but, alas, "Il n'est pas de la cour." Monville proposes mariage to Mlle. de Saint-Aubin, who declines his proposal. 1761-1764 According to his friend Dufort de Cheverny, Monville goes through a series of mistresses including the actreses Austrady, the opera star Sophie Arnould [2], a certain demoiselle Leclerc, Madame de Saint-Janvier, Madame d'Esparbès...and many others! 1764 Monville meets the twenty-one year old Jeanne Bécu de Beauvarnier, who will receive the title of Contesse du Barry after becoming maîtresse royale of Louis XV. Monville will maintain his friendship with Madame du Barry until her execution in 1793. 1766 Monville resides in his fabulous Paris residences on the Rue d'Anjou, the Grand and Petit Hôtels de Monville, neoclassical houses designed by the famous architect Etienne-Louis Boullée Neither building stands today. They were destroyed in order to construct the Boulevard Malesherbes in the 19th century, although numerous descriptions exist of the fabulous furnishing and and decor of Monville's Paris residences. An engraving of the Grand Hôtel de Monville is preserved in the Cabinet des Estampes of the French National Library along with a hundred of Boullée's fabulous designs, which he bequeathed to the library at his death. Apparently Monville equipped his Grand Hôtel with central heating, the first such installation in France since the times of the Romans, over 1,500 years previously! 1770 Monville publishes a collection of his musical airs and interludes. 1771 Monsieur de Monville defends his reputation as an archer by winning a contest held in the Bois de Boulogne, as described by the chronicler Louis Petit de Beauchamont in his entry of October 30, 1771. The Duke of Chartres wagered that Monville would be unable to kill a pheasant on the wing in ten tries with his bow and arrow. In front of a great throng of spectators, Monville transfixed the first pheasant...but missed the nine others. 1773 Monsieur de Monville befriends Louis Philippe Joseph, Duc d'Orleans. During the French Revolution the Duc d'Orleans will change his name to Philippe-Egalite and vote for the execution of his cousin, King Louis XVI. 1774 Louis XVI takes the throne. Monville, now over forty years old, begins buying property in and near the tiny village of Retz, at the edge of the Forest of Marly, where he will construct his famous Désert de Retz. He continues buying lots in 1776, 1777, 1779 and 1786. Construction begins on the fabriques or follies, which will include the Chinese Pavilion, the Column House, the Pyramid-shaped ice house, the Temple of Repose, a Temple of Pan, and an open-air theater as well as a botanic garden with plants from all over the world, hothouses, a herb garden and a vegetable garden. On December 23, 1774, Monville buys a house on the Rue des Jeûneurs in Neuilly. 1775 Monville constructs the Temple of Pan, the first structure in his garden. Monville, an accomplished harpist, who had played with Christoph Willibald Gluck, his favorite composer, is invited twice a week to accompany Mme. de Genlis. 1776 Benjamin Franklin [2] [3] arrives in France on December 21, 1776, for the third time, after previous brief visits to France in 1767 and 1769. Franklin first served as a representative of the American colonies, along with Silas Dean and Arthur Lee, and entered into secret negotiations with the French government in order to secure financial aid and military supplies for the United States during the war for independence. Subsequently, Franklin was appointed Minister Plenipotentiary in 1779. For a fascinating account of Franklin's stay in Paris, see this profile by historian Harvey Sicherman from the American Diplomacy website. During his stay, it is probable that Franklin met Monsieur de Monville, and he may have visited the Désert de Retz. Regardless of whether Benjamin Franklin visited the Desert de Retz, it is certain that Monsieur de Monville, like many Frenchmen of his time, was an admirer of the nascent United States. Busts of George Washington and Benjamin Franklin were found in the Column House and duly noted on the inventory that was compiled after the Desert de Retz was confiscated during the French Revolution. Franklin returned to America in 1785 and was elected as the first President of Pennsylvania in 1787 1777-1778 The first residence at the Désert, the Chinese House, is built. At the time it was the only private house in the Chinese style in Europe. Monsieur de Monville invites his friends to regular readings in the library of the Chinese House; particularly popular were the
Rêveries du Promeneur Solitaire 1781 The Pyramid Icehouse (Une glacière en forme de pyramide) is constructed at the Desert de Retz. On August 5, 1781, Queen Marie Antoinette [2] makes the first of many visits to the Désert in order to take notes for the construction of the her own folly garden, the Queen's Hamlet at Trianon and for the the Dairy at Rambouillet. 1782 Monville moves into the famous Column House, without doubt one of the most unusual residences in the history of architecture. He receives many visitors, both commoners and aristocrats, who were issued tickets at the entrence to the Désert. The Duke of Orleans was Monville's guest for card games. 1783 In October, 1783, Racine de Monville designs an aerial messaging system to communicate with his employees living in the nearby village of Saint-Nom-la Bretèche. Monville's system could easily have been similar to the acoustic telegraph that utilized metal tubes to communicate by voice over long distances. Invented by a 25-year old monk, Dom Gauthey, in 1782, the system was successfully tested in 1783 in Paris over a distance of 800 leagues [approximately 3,840 meters or 14,560 feet]. Monville's system also might have been a forerunner of the famous aerial telegraph invented by Claude Chappe and his brothers. Their semaphore system was tested in 1791 over a network linking Paris and Lille. Messages could be communicated between the two cities in an hour. 1784 King Gustavus III of Sweden (1746–1792) arrives in France on June 7, 1784 and spends six weeks at the Désert de Retz as Monsieur de Monville's guest. On the evening of Monday, June 21, 1784, Queen Marie Antoinette organizes an elaborate celebration--a fête de nuit--in his honor at the Petit Trianon. Since King Gustavus III was staying at the Desert de Retz, it is a virtual certainty that Monsieur de Monville attended the event. 1785 Monville drafts a map of the Désert de Retz, and George-Louis le Rouge, King's Geographer, publishes a series of 24 engravings of the Désert. 1786 Elisabeth-Louise Vigée-Le Brun [2], famous for her flattering portraits of the royal family, meets Monsieur de Monville at Madame du Barry's château in Louveciennes. She found Monville "aimable et très élégant." The portrait she subsequently painted of Monville is now lost.
Madame Vigée-Le Brun was not only famous for her painting, but she was also a famous salonnière, one of those brilliant and cultivated women who hosted
salons Thomas Jefferson [2], then Minister to France, writes the Dialogue Between My Head and My Heart, describing his visit to the Désert in the company of his friend, the English artist Maria Cosway [2] [3]. Jefferson was particularly taken by the floor plan of the rez-de-chaussée of the Column House which used oval rooms to fill out a round structure. He proposed similar plans for renovations at the Hôtel de Langeac, the first Washington Capitol, and the Rotunda at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. The Pavilion Gardens recreate the love of gardening that Thomas Jefferson expressed in the Academical Village he created at the University of Virginia. 1789 The French Revolution [2] [3] begins on July 14, 1789. 1790 With the Revolution in full force, Monville offers to sell his Paris residences to Pierre Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais, author of Le Mariage de Figaro and Le Barbier de Séville, for 400,000 livres. The offer is refused. 1792 On July 20 and 21, 1792, Monsieur de Monville sells all his real estate to an eccentric Englishman, Lewis Disney ffytche. The price of the Désert: 108,000 livres. There can be no doubt that Monville was able to protect these funds, and that they doubtlessly were the source of his income until his death. Monville moves to the Rue Neuve des Mathurins in Paris with his companion Sarah, a young actress. 1793 Monville moves again, to his house in Neuilly. The Government confiscates the properties that Monville had sold to Disney ffytche. Thanks to the meticulous inventory drawn up at the time and preserved in the Archives of Seine et Oise in Versailles, we know not only how Monville had furnished the Tower but also the names of all the species of plants and trees at the Désert. Many of the confiscated plants were transferred to the Jardin des Plantes, the principal botanical garden in France. On April 6, 1793 Monsieur de Monville is the guest of his friend Philippe d'Orleans at the latter's appartments in the the Palais Royal in Paris. During the dinner Philippe-Antoine Merlin de Douai arrives with the news that the Convention, meeting in the Tuileries Palace across the street, has issued a warrant to arrest the Duc d'Orleans. The arrest follows shortly thereafter. The Duc d'Orleans will be executed on November 6, 1793. His son will become King Louis-Philippe. 1794 In the midst of the Reign of Terror, on May 17, 1794, Monsieur de Monville is arrested at Saint-Nom-la Bretèche at the home of his friend Denis Thiroux de Montsauge. In July, Monville is imprisoned in the Conciergerie then tried before the Revolutionary Tribunal. His "crimes" included "anglomania" and sybaritism! After his trial, Monville is transferred to a maison d'arrêt on the Rue de la Loi. The financier Jean-Joseph Laborde, owner of Méréville, along with the Désert de Retz the finest folly garden in France, was incarcerated here until his execution in April, 1794. While in custody, Monville enjoys his own apartment and food brought in by a caterer. He was reported to be "Le meilleur joueur de volant du lieu." Monville played badminton while awaiting the executioner! Another account, in French, from the Wikipedia, states that Monville was imprisoned in the
Hotel de Talaru Through another stroke of luck, with the death of Robespierre, Monsieur de Monville escapes the guillotine. He is released on August 5, 1794, eight days after Robespierre's execution. 1797 Dufort observed: "Il avait mangé jusqu'à son dernier écu et ne laisse que des dettes. Après avoir sacrifié à toutes les filles dont il changeait à chaque nuit, il vivait depuis six ans avec une jeune personne des petits spectacles." Alexandre de Tilly writes a fitting epitaph: "En traversant la Révolution, Monville trouva cependant le secret de mourir dans son lit et d'obtenir la grâce des Sylla et des Marius français qui n'en faisaient à personne." Two mysteries persist about Monville and will, perhaps, be elucidated in the future: the lack of any portraits and the paucity of his writings. Even though photography would not be invented until the nineteenth century, there were plenty of ways for Frenchmen as wealthy as Monville to commission portraits or sculpted busts. The journal of the famous court portraitist Madame Vigée-Lebrun confirms that she painted Monville's portrait, but at present its whereabouts are unknown. Portrait sculptors such as Jean-Antoine Houdon or Augustin Pajou could certainly have counted Monville as a customer. Monville's circle of acquaintances included many other painters and sculptors.Additionally, in Enlightenment Paris there were scientific methods of producing portraits, some of which would have certainly appealed to a man with as much scientific curiosity as Monville. There was a studio in Paris where a complicated contraption enabled the inventor to produce exact three-dimensional busts. Both Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin were customers. Monville must have been a customer, too, but no busts of Monville have yet been discovered.
In another famous Paris studio, customers sat for silhouette portraits. The device, called a Physionotrace
[2 Jefferson and Morris sat for their portraits on April 23, 1789. Monville, too, was probably a customer, yet nothing has turned up. There are illustrations of the physionotrace and the portraits of Jefferson and Morris in Thomas Jefferson's Paris, by Professor Howard C. Rice, Jr. As for Monville's writings, aside from a couple of letters, all that has surfaced is a songbook and some airs that he published in 1770 and 1771. Yet the inventory conducted at the time the Desert was confiscated details an extensive library, and this was after Monville had sold the Desert, presumably removing much of his collection. Furthermore, Monville frequently presented plays, operas and concerts at the Desert de Retz during the belle saison. Finally, as Robert Darnton's essay amply demonstrates, the eighteenth century was a time of an outpouring of writing, and diaries and journals by many of Monville's acquaintances such as Dufort de Cheverny and Alexandre de Tilly were subsequently published. It is therefore difficult to believe that Monville did not write more than a handful of songs. Perhaps one day, when cleaning out the garret of an old country house or inventorying an estate for auction, someone will discover another trace of François Racine de Monville and shed some light on these mysteries.
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