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Henri II, Prince of Condé

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Henri II de Bourbon
Prince of Condé
Tenure1 September 1588 – 26 December 1646
PredecessorHenri I
SuccessorLouis II
Born1 September 1588
Saint-Jean-d'Angély, Saintonge, France
Died26 December 1646(1646-12-26) (aged 58)
Hôtel de Condé, Paris, France
SpouseCharlotte Marguerite de Montmorency
Issue
Detail		Anne Geneviève, Duchess of Longueville
Louis II, Prince of Condé
Armand, Prince of Conti
Names
Henri de Bourbon
HouseBourbon-Condé
FatherHenri I, Prince of Condé
MotherCharlotte Catherine de La Trémoille
ReligionRoman Catholicism
SignatureHenri II de Bourbon's signature

Henri II de Bourbon, Prince of Condé (1 September 1588 – 26 December 1646) was the head of the senior-most cadet branch of the House of Bourbon for nearly all his life, and heir presumptive to the King of France from the age of 2 until he was 12. Henri was the father of Louis, le Grand Condé, the celebrated French general.

Life

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Henri was born in 1588, the third child and only son of Henri I, Prince of Condé and Charlotte Catherine de La Trémoille, daughter of Louis III de La Trémoille, Duke of Thouars.[1] His mother was imprisoned at Saint-Jean-d'Angély at the time, accused of killing her husband.[2] He had two older sisters: Catherine de Bourbon, his paternal half-sister who died unwed in 1595, and Éléonore de Bourbon, who was married in 1606 at the age of 19 to 51-year-old Philip William, Prince of Orange.

Henri was a posthumous child, his father having died nearly six months before his birth. He became Prince of Condé within weeks of his birth, as soon as he was recognized and confirmed by the King of France.

Henri's mother was imprisoned for six years, accused of poisoning her husband, but she was never given a trial and pleas of help to her family and the authorities went unanswered. She and her children were only released from their captivity after Jacques Auguste de Thou intervened on her behalf with King Henry IV, who was a relative of the young prince.

Henri as a boy ( Workshop of Jacob II de Gheyn) held at the Musée Condé

Henry III of France died in August 1589, when Henri was less than one year old, and was succeeded by Henry IV of France, who was the first cousin of Henri's late father. Less than a year later, the new King's uncle (Henri's great uncle) and initial heir, Cardinal Charles, died. This made Henri the King's closest agnatic kin, and he was First Prince of the blood and heir presumptive to the throne of France for 12 years, until the birth of the future Louis XIII of France in September 1601.[3]

Henri was raised as a Catholic[4] at the insistence of Pope Clement VIII.[5] Henri's father and grandfather had been leaders of the Calvinist Huguenots.

Henri was raised at court but never regarded as a favorite, as he was regarded with suspicion for his potential claims to the throne. Henri grew into what his contemporary Bassompierre described as a "not amiable" young man who was quick to take offense.[6] He much preferred hunting and military life to being at court.[7]

His appearance and personality was described by a contemporary as:

"Small and thin, he has very prominent facial features, as all those of the House of Bourbon usually do; he is blond and has the lively French temperament. I find him witty, but he is frivolous and often imprudent in the choice of his confidants. He speaks Latin and Italian, has Spanish and speaks it a little; he is well versed in sacred and secular letters, having had Nicolas le Febvre as his tutor, and pushes his zeal for the Catholic religion very far."

His position at court was further undermined by his relative poverty, and much damaged by the court intrigues of his mother, which eventually led to her being permanently banished from court.[8] Henri himself was made to deliver the bad news to his mother.

In 1609, his marriage with Charlotte de Montmorency was arranged, allegedly because his uncle the king was infatuated with her and expected his nephew to be compliant with her becoming his mistress. Because both bride and groom were first cousins, a papal dispensation was needed. This was granted and he wedding took place at the bride's father's home of Chantilly.

Instead of bringing his wife to court as the king had expected, Henri instead took Charlotte first to the Chateau de Breteuil and then to the Château de Muret-et-Crouttes, Henri's home in the country, where she remained under the supervision of her mother-in-law.[6] Charlotte wrote letters to her Montmorency relatives calling herself "la pauvre prisonniere" ("the poor prisoner").

The king continued to demand that Henri bring his wife to court, and eventually Henri asked permission to do so, which the king happily granted. However, Henri instead went to Muret-et-Crouttes, where he arranged a carriage and escaped with his wife to Brussels, which was then part of the Spanish Netherlands.[9]

Some months later, in February 1610,[6] he was obliged to continue his exile in Milan, where the Spanish government was more than happy to defy the French king's request to turn over the prince.[10] Henri took up residence in the palace of the Governor of Milan, Pedro Henriquez de Acevedo, Count of Fuentes, who supplied him with a bodyguard.

Meanwhile, in Brussels, Charlotte, encouraged by French diplomats,[6] signed a petition asking for the dissolution of her marriage to the Prince de Condé on the grounds of a disparity of temperament and inclinations. Henri opposed the divorce long enough that matters were subsequently resolved by the assassination of Henry IV.

Finally free to return to France, he returned to Paris in July 1610 after the death of his uncle Henry IV and was greeted by many nobles, the young king Louis XIII and the queen mother Marie de Medicis. Restored to grace, he was reinstated at court.

From 1612 to 1616, Henri was Lieutenant General of New France. He was made governor of Berry.

Imprisonment

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Condé was accused of wanting to become the king through a coup and although there was no concrete evidence to back this up, Richelieu had him arrested and imprisoned in the Bastille. He was joined by his wife who wanted to share her husband's captivity.[11]

Because of his bad health, the couple was transferred to the Chateau de Vincennes. They had a stillborn son during this time, and it was feared Charlotte would die too. The couple had two more children die at birth during their imprisonment, and they were not released until after the birth of their daughter Genevieve.

Later life

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From 1611 to 1638, Henri was second in line to the throne of France behind Gaston, Duke of Orleans. This was the period between the death of Nicolas Henri, Duke of Orleans in November 1611 and the birth of the future Louis XIV of France in September 1638.

Marriage and issue

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A portrait of Henri II, Prince of Condé.
Henri II, Prince of Condé, Grand Veneur de France.

In 1609, Henri married Charlotte Marguerite de Montmorency,[12] daughter of Henri I de Montmorency, Duke of Montmorency by his second wife, Louise de Budos.[13] In 1610, Marie de Médici, wife of King Henry IV, gave the Hôtel de Condé in Paris to Henri as part of a recompense for his agreeing to marry Charlotte. From then on, the Hôtel de Condé became the main residence of the Princes of Condé until 1764. Henri and Charlotte had six children, three of whom survived to adulthood and were all protagonists of the Fronde:

The Condé affair became part of the international conflict known as the War of the Jülich Succession (one of the precursors to the Thirty Years' War).

Ancestry

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References

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  1. ^ Knecht 1989, p. 134.
  2. ^ Collins 2017, p. 122.
  3. ^ Pitts 2009, p. 158.
  4. ^ Williams 1912, p. 149.
  5. ^ Pitts 2009, p. 218.
  6. ^ a b c d Freer, Martha Walker (1863). History of the Reign of Henry IV. King of France and Navarre: From Numerous Unpublished Sources, Including Ms. Documents in the Bibliothèque Impériale and the Archives Du Royaume de France, Etc. ¬Part ¬III, ¬Vol. ¬II ¬The last decade of a glorious reign. Hurst and Blackett.
  7. ^ Freer, Martha Walker (1863). History of the Reign of Henry IV. King of France and Navarre: From Numerous Unpublished Sources, Including Ms. Documents in the Bibliothèque Impériale and the Archives Du Royaume de France, Etc. ¬Part ¬III, ¬Vol. ¬II ¬The last decade of a glorious reign. Hurst and Blackett.
  8. ^ d'), Henri d'Orléans Aumale (duc (1872). History of the Princes de Condé in the XVIth and XVIIth Centuries: Louis de Bourbon, cont., Henri de Bourbon (1569-1588), Henri de Bourbon, (1588-1610). R. Bentley.
  9. ^ McGowan, Margaret M. (2016-04-29). Dynastic Marriages 1612/1615: A Celebration of the Habsburg and Bourbon Unions. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-317-14730-5.
  10. ^ Mortimer, Geoff (2015-08-11). The Origins of the Thirty Years War and the Revolt in Bohemia, 1618. Springer. ISBN 978-1-137-54385-1.
  11. ^ "The Project Gutenberg eBook of Chantilly, by Louise M. Richter". www.gutenberg.org. Retrieved 2024-03-28.
  12. ^ Roche 1967, p. 226.
  13. ^ Ward, Prothero & Leathes 1911, p. vii.

Sources

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  • Collins, James (2017). "Dynastic Instability, the Emergence of the French Monarchical Commonwealth and the Coming of the Rhetoric of "L'etat", 1360s to 1650s". In von Friedeburg, Robert; Morrill, John (eds.). Monarchy Transformed: Princes and their Elites in Early Modern Western Europe. Cambridge University Press.
  • Knecht, R.J. (1989). The French Wars of Religion, 1559-1598. Longman.
  • Pitts, Vincent J. (2009). Henri IV of France, his Reign and Age. The Johns Hopkins University Press.
  • Roche, Daniel (1967). "Aperçus sur la fortune et les revenus des princes de Condé à l'aube du XVIIIe siècle". Revue d'histoire moderne et contemporaine Année (in French). 14 (3).
  • Ward, A.W.; Prothero, G.W.; Leathes, Stanley, eds. (1911). The Cambridge Modern History. Cambridge University Press.
  • Williams, Hugh Noel (1912). The Love-affairs of the Condés: (1530-1740). Charles Scribner's Sons.
Henri II, Prince of Condé
Cadet branch of the House of Bourbon
Born: 11 September 1588 Died: 26 December 1646
French royalty
Preceded by Heir to the Throne
as Heir presumptive
9 May 1590 — 27 September 1601 		Succeeded by
French nobility
Preceded by Prince of Condé
5 March 1588 – 26 December 1646 		Succeeded by
Military offices
Preceded by Lieutenant General of New France
1612 – 8 October 1619 		Succeeded by
Henri II de Montmorency,
admiral of France
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