LEFEBVRE (François-Joseph). - Lot 174

LEFEBVRE (François-Joseph). Born in Rouffach (Haut-Rhin). 1755–1820. A prominent general during the First Republic who rallied to Napoleon Bonaparte. Appointed Marshal of the Empire in 1804 and made Duke of Danzig in 1807. Married to Catherine Hübscher, a laundress who went down in history as Madame Sans-Gêne. Autograph letter signed “the Evil Duke of Dantzig” to Lieutenant General Ecrouff. No place, no date [circa 1820?]. 1 page, in-4. Address. …If you were a little more agreeable, you would come to dinner with us. You must be convinced that our feelings of affection for you are sincere and will never wane. I spoke of you yesterday to His Royal Highness the Duke of Angoulême*, and I asked him to grant you a governorship of a castle or a province. He replied, with his usual kindness, that he would renew the request to His Majesty. [...]. He added that he would do so with all the more pleasure given that you had conducted yourself perfectly well during the Hundred Days…*Louis-Antoine d’Artois, Duke of Angoulême (1775–1824), son of Charles X, the last Dauphin of France. He was a short-lived king: during the events of the July Revolution of 1830, he was proclaimed King of France for about twenty minutes, under the name “Louis XIX,” between his father King Charles X’s abdication and his own abdication in favor of his nephew (Henri d’Artois). He went into exile with the courtesy title of “Count of Marnes” and became the eldest of the Capetians and “head of the House of France” upon his father’s death.