Hard by Pall Mall lives a wench call’d Nell
King Charles the Second he kept her
She hath got a trick to handle his prick
But never lays hands on his scepter.
—1670S RHYME
IT WAS OFTEN ASSUMED THAT THE KING WAS MOST SUSCEPTIBLE to political suggestions when lying down, that the royal mistress, having purchased power through sex, hopped out of bed, smoothed down her rumpled skirts, and victoriously wielded her omnipotence over court and country alike. This perception is generally incorrect. With a few notable exceptions, most mistresses exerted political influence, the influence of a loved one persuading the monarch to look at a problem from a different angle, to consider different solutions. Some mistresses worked in concert with the king’s ministers by informing them of the royal mood and the best times to present proposals. They calmed the king down when he was angry and buoyed him up when he was despondent, thereby oiling the wheels of state.
Many mistresses were either too stupid or too self-absorbed to be interested in politics and limited themselves to appointing their friends and relatives to government positions. Most kings, prickly with pride in their God-given authority, were repelled at the thought of a woman’s meddling. After hours of discussing politics with his ministers, the king visited his mistress for a cozy dinner, light conversation, and good sex.
In the 1570s and 1580s, Archduke Francesco de Medici (1541–1587) fumed that he would brook no interference in politics by women. His mistress Bianca Cappello tactfully made Francesco believe her ideas had originated in his own brilliant mind. The archduke sank so frequently into irretrievable pits of depression that Bianca effectively ran Tuscany with her friend Secretary of State Serguidi. Together they made most of the political decisions and appointments to important posts. Even after the archduke married his mistress in 1578, Bianca, now the archduchess of Tuscany, still remained seemingly in her woman’s role in the background, quietly pulling all the strings.
Some kings, however, cherished the sage political advice of their clever mistresses, many of whom spoke honestly, unlike the royal ministers. The quiet pillow talk in a curtained four-poster bed often had greater effect than the bobbing and angling of ambitious ministers pushing one self-aggrandizing plan or another. “Ah, and who is left now to tell one the truth?” lamented Louis XV upon hearing of the death of his mistress Madame de Châteauroux.1
The first mistress to wield true royal power in her own right was, naturally, French. In the 1550s Diane de Poitiers, the older, wiser mistress of Henri II, signed official documents; appointed ministers; bestowed honors, pensions, and titles; and bequeathed and revoked great estates. She became a member of the privy council and exerted great influence over the other members.
To help fill the empty royal treasury Diane imposed taxes—most notably on salt and church bells. She signed her name simply as Diane—as royalty did—not bothering with the string of ungainly titles most nobles proudly trailed behind their names. Sometimes both Diane and the king signed a document, their signatures running together as “HenriDiane.” When a group of cardinals protested her influence, she sent thirteen of them to Rome, ostensibly to represent French interests, but really to get them out of her way at court.
In the 1590s, Henri IV of France issued a royal decree that all foreign ambassadors be presented to his mistress Gabrielle d’Estrées, stipulating that all French nobility, clerics, and officials visiting the court wait on her immediately after speaking to the king himself.
Gabrielle possessed a great gift for using women’s weapons—persuasion, conciliation, and charm—rather than men’s—battle axes, cannonballs, and swords—to iron out the turbulent conflicts besetting France. Born Catholic, Gabrielle convinced Protestant Henri to convert to Catholicism to end the religious civil war, prompting him to maintain, “Paris is well worth a Mass.”2
Although the king made Gabrielle the marquise de Monceaux and later the duchesse de Beaufort, she had no official position at court to match her diplomatic duties. No-nonsense Henri, adept at calling a spade a spade, appointed her “Titulary Mistress of His Majesty, the King of France.”3 Armed with her new title, Gabrielle communicated directly with the pope. The Vatican had been supporting the Catholic League led by Spain against Henri and had not stopped supporting it after what they considered to be his fraudulent and politically motivated conversion to Catholicism. Philip II of Spain made routine incursions into the south of France, draining Henri’s resources.
Gabrielle, sending the pope copies of her letters patent naming her “titulary mistress,” politely requested that His Holiness stop supporting a useless war now that Henri had become a true son of the church. She reminded him that it was she who had convinced Henri to become Catholic, and hinted darkly at the possibility of France breaking with the church completely, as England had sixty years earlier, if the Vatican continued to support the kingdom’s enemies. Two weeks later, the pope instructed all religious houses in France to pray for the health of King Henri IV. When Henri was informed of the pope’s acceptance of his conversion he was heard to say, “Gabrielle has succeeded where others have failed.”4
Gabrielle then set to work settling the differences between Henri and the duc de Mayenne, head of the powerful de Guise family. Mayenne had been the leader of the Catholic League; he still held a large body of troops and refused to make peace with the king. Mayenne’s female relatives were close to Gabrielle; a scheme was hatched among the women to force the men to make peace. Gabrielle persuaded Henri to be more conciliatory to his adversary, and the de Guise women set to work on Mayenne to give up a lost cause. Finally, Gabrielle conferred with Mayenne himself for two days in a small château, ironing out the details of his surrender. Henri made many concessions—including a large sum in gold and three châteaus—to pacify his enemy.
Gabrielle had become Henri’s most important diplomat but had no official seat in the council, where national policy was made. Yet there was a precedent—only forty years earlier Diane de Poitiers had served on the council. In March 1596, bypassing with royal aplomb the customary steps, Henri bestowed on Gabrielle the set of gold keys which gave her the right to join the council. To deflect criticism, at the same time he wisely gave an identical set to his sister, the devout Catherine. And so he appointed two female council members in one fell swoop, Gabrielle known for her diplomatic skill, and Catherine for her saintliness. On many public occasions after this it was observed that Gabrielle, instead of flaunting her magnificent diamonds, proudly wore her little gold keys on a chain about her neck.
In 1597 the duc de Mercoeur, virtual ruler of the state of Brittany, led the last pocket of rebellion. When war looked inevitable and the two armies faced each other across the battlefield, Gabrielle invited Mercoeur’s wife to a tête-à-tête with her in a carriage. The two women arranged Mercoeur’s surrender under honorable terms and a marriage between their children. They then set to work persuading their men to agree to their decision. And so Henri’s last victory was achieved without shedding a drop of blood. It was a woman’s victory.
The civil war having been finally quelled, Henri looked toward preventing another one. Tensions between Catholics and Protestants ran deep, and Henri looked for a way to reconcile the two groups. Henri’s Huguenot sister and Catholic mistress set to work. The duc de Montmorency, constable of France, wrote, “Madame [Catherine] and the Duchess de Beaufort have begun their formidable task of reconciling the unreconcilable. They will need to exercise their command of the arts of persuasion to the utmost and to utilize the natural charms with which they are endowed, for surely no two women have ever undertaken a more difficult task.”5
Some Catholics resented being lectured on the subject of religion by the king’s mistress. These were reminded that it was Gabrielle who had convinced the pope himself to accept Henri into the church. Henri was thrilled at Gabrielle’s success in convincing powerful Catholics, one by one, to accept his decree of religious toleration. He wrote, “My mistress has become an orator of unequaled excellence, so fiercely does she argue the cause of the new Edict.”6 Through a combination of warm charm and cold threats Gabrielle pushed her point home. In 1598 the Edict of Nantes was signed granting Huguenots certain rights while deferring to Catholics. The sure sign of the edict’s justice was the fact that both sides went away grumbling. But Henri was thrilled and knew he could not have issued the edict without Gabrielle’s diplomatic skill.
Henri’s grandson Louis XIV did not permit his mistresses any great exercise of political power. Louis himself in his memoirs, which were intended to help his heir rule after him, wrote, “Time given up to love affairs must never be allowed to prejudice affairs of state…. And if we yield our heart, we must never yield our mind or will…. We must maintain a rigorous distinction between a lover’s tenderness and a sovereign’s resolution…and we must make sure that the beauty who is the source of our delight never takes the liberty of interfering in political affairs.”7
Louis’s Madame de Montespan had little interest in politics, but she demanded that her views be heard in the realms of art, architecture, literature, and music. Her protégés included Molière, Racine, Boileau-Despréaux, and La Fontaine. Her only success in the political domain was in getting her candidates appointed to high-level positions—and even then, she usually promised much and delivered little.
One courtier, the marquis de Puyguilhem, tired of waiting for her to procure for him a coveted position at the king’s disposal, actually hid beneath her bed while she was out having lunch with Louis, knowing they would return to her room for sex afterward. Silent as the grave, the marquis listened to the royal lovemaking and their postcoital conversation. He was furious to hear Madame de Montespan argue against his appointment, despite her glittering promises.
Later, as Madame de Montespan and her ladies started walking toward the palace theater, the marquis accosted her, calling her a dog’s whore and a liar and repeating word for word what she had said to the king. Shaking with fear—certain that the devil himself was in league with Puyguilhem against her—the royal mistress stumbled to the theater, where she promptly fainted and was revived only with great difficulty.
While Louis XIV did not allow his mistresses political influence, he knew his cousin Charles II was far more susceptible to their blandishments. In 1670 Charles first spotted Louise de Kéroualle among the retinue of his sister Princess Henrietta, who had married Louis XIV’s brother, during her visit to England. Thunderstruck with admiration, Charles asked to keep the girl at his court. Knowing her brother’s debauchery, Henrietta firmly refused and took Louise back to France. Within weeks Henriette was dead, and the French king, hoping Louise could help France more than Charles’s mistress Lady Castlemaine had, agreed that Louise should be sent to England.
The ambassador of Savoy informed his monarch of Louise’s arrival at the English court. “Mademoiselle de Kéroualle…is a beautiful girl,” he related, “and it is thought the plan is to make her mistress to the King of Great Britain. He [Louis XIV] would like to dethrone Lady Castlemaine, who is his enemy, and…his Most Christian Majesty would not be sorry to see the position filled by one of his subjects, for it is said the ladies have a great influence over the mind of the King of England.”8
Louise was in no rush to give her virginity to the English king. She wanted to make sure he appreciated the great gift she was about to bestow on him, and thought that his gratitude would be proportionate to the amount of time he was required to wait. As the months went by, and Charles’s admiration for Louise remained encouraged but unsated, the French ambassador began to stir uneasily—Louise was taking so long that she risked losing the king’s interest entirely.
A full year after her arrival in England, the envoys were happy to inform the French minister that Louise had been nauseated. The dispatch reported, “The affection of the King of England for Mademoiselle de Kéroualle increases every day, and the little attack of nausea which she had yesterday when dining with me makes me hope that her good fortune will continue.”9
The French foreign minister replied eagerly, “The King was surprised at what you wrote me concerning Mademoiselle de Kéroualle, whose conduct while she was here, and since she has been in England, did not inspire much expectation that she would succeed in achieving such good fortune. His Majesty is anxious to be informed of the result of the connection which you believe exists between the King and her.”10
But these royal hopes were inspired, after all, by only a fit of indigestion. There had been no sex between Charles and Louise. Disappointed, the French envoys felt that Louise didnot understand the importance of her position and was not doing her duty for her country. They were afraid that another pretty face—one less prudish than Louise—would steal the English king away, and Louise would irrevocably lose her chance. But after applying pressure to her from all sides—including the threat of sending her to a strict convent—the French ambassador wrote, “I believe that I can assure you that if she has made sufficient progress in the King’s affection to be of use in some way to his Majesty, she will do her duty.”11
Louise finally did her duty in late October 1671. It is reported that she lounged around in a state of undress—petticoats and shift, but no stays—and after a mock marriage ceremony, finally bedded the king. The proof was in the pudding—nine months later she gave birth to a son, whom she named Charles.
The French ambassador—and Louis XIV—were ecstatic at their success. Now they finally had King Charles under their thumb. Ambassador Colbert wrote to Minister Louvois, “I have made Mademoiselle de Kéroualle very joyful by assuring her that his Majesty would be very pleased that she maintains herself in the good graces of the King. There is every appearance that she will possess them for a long time, to the exclusion of everyone else.”12
The ambassador was correct. Louise initially took over the official duties of the queen, and finally, some offices of the worn-out king. By the early 1680s, Charles had passed his fiftieth birthday and was aging rapidly. A lifetime of hard living, combined with the long-term effects of venereal disease, was gently pushing him toward the grave. He often left London to frolic at Windsor with Nell Gwynn, leaving affairs of state in the capable hands of Louise, who, though she had no official power, worked assiduously behind the scenes in elections, appointments, arrests, and foreign policy. Charles, who twenty years earlier had vowed never to allow a woman to hold the reins of power, gratefully handed them to Louise.
It was a wise choice, for Louise had political talents unlike any of the king’s other mistresses. Lady Castlemaine was solely concerned with stuffing honors, titles, jewels, and subsidies into her pockets and then howling for more. The fiery Hortense Mancini was too busy conducting love affairs with men and women at court to meddle in affairs of state. Nell Gwynn preferred practical jokes to politics, calling herself “a sleeping partner in the ship of state.”13
More powerful even than Louise de Kéroualle, Madame de Pompadour wielded the greatest power of any royal mistress ever. Initially she was interested only in her romance with Louis XV. But once she found herself clawing for survival in the snake pit of Versailles, she was clever enough to know she needed friends in high places. The new mistress started—tentatively at first—sounding out which courtiers were her friends and which were her enemies. She used her influence with Louis to dismiss high-level officials who stood resolutely against her and replace them with her friends. One of her first steps was to replace the comptroller, who had remonstrated against her extravagance, with a friend of hers who immediately paid all her bills without question.
Soon, Madame de Pompadour controlled the plum prizes of pensions, titles, honors, and positions at court. The king, relieved that he did not have to make all the decisions himself, gratefully relied on his mistress to take care of them. The great majority of courtiers, ministers, government officials, and even struggling artists decided to befriend her. In the morning, they were allowed to crowd into her rooms to watch in awestruck admiration as she applied her makeup. A young writer named Marmontel handed her a manuscript he was working on and asked for her comments. Several days later, he wrote, “I presented myself one morning at her toilette when the room was crowded by an assemblage of courtiers.” To his surprise, Madame de Pompadour took the young man into her private office to return his manuscript marked with corrections and suggestions. When they returned to the pool of humanity swimming in her drawing room, “All eyes were turned on me,” Marmontel relates, “on every side I was greeted by little nods and friendly smiles, and before I left the room I had received enough dinner invitations to last the whole week.”14
As the sexual relationship between Madame de Pompadour and the king waned, her political power increased. Messages designed for the king’s eyes alone first had to pass through the mistress’s hands, and it was she who decided if they were important enough to bother Louis. Ambassadors found they could see the king only in the company of the maîtresse-en-titre, who carefully observed to see if Louis was turning yellow, a clear indication that the conversation was upsetting him. When Monsieur de Maurepas, minister of Paris as well as secretary of state and secretary of the navy, involved the king in a long, boring discourse, Madame de Pompadour dismissed him smartly by saying, “Monsieur de Maurepas, you are turning the King yellow. Good day to you, Monsieur de Maurepas.”15 The minister waited in vain for the king to countermand his mistress’s order. When this did not come he withdrew, seething with anger that a middle-class female nobody should throw him out.
After five years as the king’s mistress, Madame de Pompadour moved from her cozy apartments under the eaves of Versailles, directly above the king’s chambers, to palatial apartments on the ground floor, directly below them. Again, her suite was connected to the king’s with a secret staircase. In these grand rooms, she worked for thirteen years as the unofficial prime minister of France. Indeed, she had far more power than any of Louis’s ministers, as it was she who appointed them. In 1753 the marquis d’Argenson wrote, “The mistress is Prime Minister, and is becoming more and more despotic, such as a favorite has never been in France.”16
Hearing of Madame de Pompadour’s power, the renowned misogynist King Frederick the Great of Prussia was so offended he named his dog—a bitch—after her. According to Countess Lichtenau, the mistress of Frederick’s nephew and heir, the king “thought that it did not become the destined ruler of a great and powerful nation to be governed and duped by women and a set of idle parasites. Such creatures were generally connected with a gang of adventurers who had no other aim but that of creeping into favor of the ruling prince, under the protection of a clever courtesan, and as soon as they had obtained that favor they would interfere with the most serious and momentous concerns of the State.”17
Perhaps it was a self-fulfilling prophecy for Frederick when Madame de Pompadour used her power to spurn Prussia—France’s traditional ally—and side with Empress Maria Theresa of Austria during the Seven Years’ War (1757–1763). France’s support in this territorial catfight between Prussia and Austria was likely to tip the scales in favor of whichever side France weighed in on. And Frederick’s caustic comments about Madame de Pompadour convinced her to side with two other powerful women, Maria Theresa and Empress Elizabeth of Russia, after both of whom Frederick had named dogs as well. He sometimes called his brood of powerfully named bitches Petticoats I, II, and III. Frederick was delighted that when he snapped his fingers, Madame de Pompadour, Empress Maria Theresa, and Empress Elizabeth came running, and when they misbehaved he could beat them. But that was only the dogs. The women, claws unsheathed, pounced on him in concert.
The Austrian alliance was not popular among the French people, who until quite recently had lost sons and fathers to Austrian guns and bayonets. But Madame de Pompadour convinced the king that Prussia had become too powerful under Frederick and that an alliance with Austria would create a better balance of European power.
Madame de Pompadour became the unofficial minister of war, personally choosing the generals. Her choices were extremely limited. Generals had to be selected from the nobility, and many of the best French generals were either too old or too ill to participate. Some competent men were available, but these were not admirers of Madame de Pompadour, who insisted on appointing her friends.
The French believed that good breeding and noble blood, rather than military genius, could win a war. Undisciplined French armies were encumbered by chefs, hairdressers, valets, and courtesans and became a kind of mobile court. Warhorses dragged barrels of hair powder, pomade, and perfume. One evening, after a brilliant Prussian victory, a captured French officer found himself eating a jovial dinner with Frederick the Great. The officer asked the king how he had won such a triumph against the odds. “It is easy,” replied Frederick. “The Prince de Soubise,” he said, referring to the French general, “has 20 cooks and not a single spy; while I, on my part, have 20 spies and but one cook.”18
After seven years, both sides were exhausted. The French treasury was empty and, worse, France had lost some two hundred thousand men. In signing the truce, France agreed to give up numerous possessions, including Canada and parts of India. The one case of a royal mistress holding true power in her smooth white hands ended disastrously.
Perhaps it was fortunate that Madame de Pompadour’s successor, Madame du Barry, was less interested in politics. It was often remarked that when courtiers discussed political matters with her, hoping to win her influence, she smiled vaguely as if she had not understood a word. Madame du Barry was more successful as a patron of arts and letters, generously doling out the king’s money to young artists and writers who sought her assistance. Each morning, as she lay in her perfume-scented bath, her waiting women would read to her petitions and letters begging for help.
The favor seekers waited patiently in her drawing room until the royal mistress emerged wrapped in a beribboned morning gown. As her hairdressers were putting the finishing touches on her coiffure, tradesmen jostled with each other, eager to show her jewelry, porcelain, and bolts of fine fabric. Most important politicians attended her levee, as well as bankers, artists, and philosophers. Many brought proposals with them, seeking her advice or support. Others were armed only with amusing gossip. Even if Madame du Barry had no political influence, visiting the favorite’s toilette was the best way of running into the king, who often stopped by to visit his mistress on his way to Mass.
Frederick the Great, who died satisfied that he had trumped Madame de Pompadour during the war and probably hastened her death, would have turned over in his grave if he could have seen his Prussia being ruled by an American courtesan barely a century later. Mary, Countess von Waldersee, was the Bible-thumping daughter of a wealthy New York grocer who married Colonel Alfred von Waldersee, the quartermaster general of the German army. In Berlin, silver-haired Mary created a salon and entertained the right people lavishly, including Prince William, the heir to the throne.
The older, wiser woman had a great calming effect on the nervous young prince, who took great pains to follow her advice. Soon secret diplomatic dispatches sent from Berlin to the corners of Europe contained suspicions as to the nature of the relationship, even though pious Mary was two years older than the prince’s mother. Ministers and ambassadors suddenly became quite respectful to her. When the French called her a Pompadour, it was the greatest compliment. When the Germans called her a Pompadour, it was the deadliest insult.
In 1888 Prince Willy became Kaiser Wilhelm II and soon referred all political matters to Mary before he announced his opinion. American newspapers went wild. The New York Tribune proclaimed, “Former New York Woman Dominates New Emperor.”19 The New York Transcript announced, “American Princess Sways the Haughty Kaiser—Romantic Story of Merchant’s Daughter Who Is Power Behind the German Throne.”20 A Boston paper declared, “Every step undertaken by the Kaiser is the outcome of her influence and intrigue.”21
The New York Tribune stated, “The Countess von Waldersee is so much Commander-in-Chief that she can toss out general officers filling the highest posts.”22 The New York Times reported, “Fortunate indeed is the incoming Ambassador who succeeds in winning the prestige of her personal interest. To him opens as by magic the door to the charmed inner circle, which otherwise is only to be approached after countless struggles with the all-pervading redtapeism of German official life.”23
Mary angled for the speedy demise of the all-powerful Chancellor Bismarck. She told the kaiser that he could never truly rule with the popular Bismarck in the way. While this was true, Mary’s main objective in removing the Iron Chancellor was to clear the path for her husband to succeed him. Using all her persuasion on the kaiser, Mary worked long and hard to topple the giant.
In March 1890, Bismarck fell. Mary and Alfred waited confidently for the fruit of their seventeen years of joint effort—Alfred’s appointment as chancellor. But instead of immediately replacing Bismarck with Count von Waldersee, the kaiser chose another man for the job. Egged on by his new set of debauched friends, Willy decided that with Bismarck gone, Mary was the one standing in the way of his exercising complete power. He bristled as he read the newspapers referring to Mary as the power behind the throne.
Instead of promoting Count von Waldersee, the kaiser publicly demoted him from the highest post in the army to commander of a corps in a suburb of Hamburg, making his disgrace the talk of Berlin. Mary and Alfred lived out their lives in dignified exile. Without Mary’s calming influence, Willy gradually degenerated into a paranoid megalomaniac, setting the wheels in motion for World War I.
The one royal mistress who never had even a taste of power during a twenty-year tenure was Henrietta Howard, the mistress of George II of Great Britain. Though Henrietta had no political interests, she would have liked to procure positions for her friends and family, the time-honored perk of a royal mistress. “Upon my word,” she bemoaned to an old friend, “I have not had one place to dispose of, or you should not be without one.”24
Henrietta’s friend Lord Hervey wrote that she was keenly aware “that some degree of contempt would attend the not having what in her situation the world would expect her to have, though she had never pretended to be possessed of it, and that a mistress who could not get power was not a much more agreeable or respectable character than a minister who could not keep it.”25
After gentle Henrietta’s retirement, George II’s next mistress, Lady Deloraine, unsettled the queen and court. The new favorite was a mincing, scheming little jade who boasted every time the king made love to her. One day Lord Walpole remarked how much he regretted that Lady Deloraine was the king’s choice. But Lord Hervey replied, “If she got the ear of anyone in power, it might be of very bad consequence, but since ’tis only the King, I think it of no great signification.”26
After the queen’s death, George assuaged his grief by sending now and then for Lady Deloraine, even though she had taken to drinking strong Spanish wine and offended the king with the stink of it. Afraid of Lady Deloraine’s political meddling, the prime minister decided it would be best to bring over from Hanover the king’s German mistress, Madame Walmoden, who seemed politically innocuous. In the meantime, he shrugged off the king’s sporadic encounters with that little minx Deloraine. “People must wear old gloves until they can get new,” he sighed.27
To the king’s delight, Madame Walmoden came over. To her delight, she was created the duchess of Yarmouth. To the ministers’ delight, she did not interfere with politics. Gradually, however, Lady Yarmouth became a conduit of political influence between the king and his ministers, and a wholly beneficial one. She informed the ministers of the right time to approach the king with important matters and how to broach them. She prevented the more irritating politicians from upsetting George.
The French, studying the influence of the English king’s mistress, found she suffered in comparison to their own Madame de Pompadour. A French nobleman in London wrote to Paris sneeringly, “Whereas Madame de Pompadour shares the absolute power of Louis XV, Lady Yarmouth shares the absolute impotence of George II.”28
Unlike Louis XV, who encouraged his mistress to make political appointments, George was outraged when he learned that then secretary of state William Pitt had requested an interview with Lady Yarmouth to discuss his candidates for various positions. “Mr. Pitt shall not go to that channel anymore,” the king thundered. “She does not meddle and shall not meddle.”29
But if the king remained stubbornly oblivious of his mistress’s political influence, his courtiers did not. As the wit Lord Chesterfield noted, Lady Yarmouth must be seen as the keystone of His Majesty’s opinion, “for even the wisest man, like the chameleon, takes…the hue of what he is often upon.”30