The Millennial King of the French Louis-Philippe

How does a rich millennial spend his life? Pampered as a child, then passionately engulfed for a cause in his teenage years, then travels the world, before undergoing maturity on or during career, after which perhaps in old age have a more conservative view like all other generations.

Apparently, the last King of France lived the same stages. A guy who stood differently in the royal family and hoped to strike a balance between monarchy and liberty. Only to see tragedy.

Early Life in 1%

Born on October 6, 1773, King Louis-Philippe began his life in Paris as a son of Louis-Philippe Joseph de Bourbon-Orléans, the Duke Chartres, and his wife Adélaïde de Bourbon-Penthièvre. They belonged to the Orléans branch of the ruling Bourbon Dynasty of France. Scions of the top 1% of French society.

Despite being a true elite, Louis-Philippe’s family fantastically embraced the ideas of the Enlightenment. Louis-Philippe’s father later supported the Revolution then shunned his Bourbon name in favor of being Philippe Egalite, who became a member of the National Convention and even voted to execute his own cousin King Louis XVI. Such fervor for the Enlightenment and the Revolution also trickled down to Louis-Philippe.

Besides from his father’s teaching, Louis-Philippe’s education in the hands of the governess Countess de Genlis brought him a touch of a common man. The Countess whom Louis-Philippe took as her truly beloved second mother, filled him with love, joy, curiosity, and also value of labor. Louis-Philippe and his siblings took on common man’s tasks like carpentry. This taught them respect of the common people. Thus, he grew up differently from his peers, the Countess recalled:

“Possessing none of the frivolities of the age, he disdains the puerilities which occupy the thoughts of so many young men of rank - such as fashions, dress, trinkets, follies of all kinds, and the desire for novelties.”

His respect for the common people and influence of his father opened him to the ideals of the Enlightenment. Moreover, he even dedicated his life to the Revolution when it imploded in 1789. He went as far as earning military experience for defending the cause.

Louis-Philippe Joseph de Bourbon-Orléans

Radical Idealist

A Greta Thunberg of the Enlightenment Age, Louis-Philippe found a cause to dedicate his energy and passion. However, disillusionment soon followed that resulted in tragedy. His actions dictated the direction of his life in 20s.

His upbringing made him sympathize to the plight of the people, hence supported their upliftment. In 1789, he alongside his father joined the reformist faction within the nobility. Louis-Philippe himself joined the Jacobin Club in 1790 which he enthusiastically wrote the event:

“I was yesterday admitted as a member of the Jacobins, and much applauded. I returned thanks for the kind reception which they were so good as to give me, and I assured them that I should never deviate from the sacred duties of a good patriot and a good citizen.”

The French Revolution shattered society in the 1790s. Monarchies of Europe trained their guns towards France to nip the bud out of this new radical republicanism. The Revolution led by the National Convention then worked towards the defense of the land of Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity.

Louis-Philippe joined the cause in the frontlines. In April 1792 he enlisted to the Army of the North and fought the armies of the First Coalition. By September 1792, he achieved the position of Lieutenant General under the command of Francois-Christophe Kellermann and fought in the Battle of Valmy. He also engaged in the Battle of Jemappes under the command of Charles Francois Dumouriez on November 6, 1792 followed by the Battle of Neerwinden on March 18, 1793. In short, Louis-Philippe threw himself in the thick of the battle.

Passion for the Revolution, however, began to slide back and then overshadowed by disillusionment. Apparently the influential Maximillien Robespierre distrusted General Dumouriez and saw him as an anti-republican conspirator. News of massacres by sans-culottes spread and made it seem too bloody for the taste of the liberal nobility. Questions on the cause then began to arise within Louis-Philippe.

When spring came in 1793, Louis-Philippe called it quits with the Revolutionary army. He joined General Dumouriez’s decision to abandon their post and defect to Austria. He, and fortunately with her sister Adelaide,  joined the swelling ranks of French emigres across Europe.

His defection, however, brought terrible consequences. First, his father, Philippe Egalite, despite voting to execute his own cousin, found himself arrested then made an appointment with the guillotine’s blade. Next, the French government arrested his 2 brothers putting their lives in at risk of the same. All the while, Louis-Philippe lived in exile and in hiding from their relatives and other nobility.

Charles Dumouriez

Louis-Philippe, the Lonely Traveler

After his defection and news of his father’s execution, Louis-Philippe looked for direction. He shunned his class and relatives for a cause he fought for and sympathized, but it then turned against him and his family. He then worked to survive and wait for the storm to pass.

After fleeing France, Louis-Philippe went to Switzerland. He avoided Zurich where most French emigres settle fearing reprisals for his family’s action supporting the revolution and Philippe Egalite’s vote to execute King Louis XVI. With the help of a certain Madame de Montesquiou, he found his way to Graubunden (Grisons), Switzerland. He took the name Chabaud de la Tour.

At 20, he worked as a teacher at the Reichenau College. He taught children geography, history, French, and English. He earned the respect and admiration of his peers and even the headmaster of the college. While teaching the news of his father’s execution and his brothers’ incarceration reached him.

In 1795, Louis-Philippe received word from his mother to travel to the United States for their safety, but his lack of funds led him to Scandinavia instead. He visited Denmark and then Sweden. He wished to go to Russia but feared Catherine the Great’s wrath for a son of a regicidal prince. Thus, he turned away. By 1797, things looked up better for Louis-Philippe.

Louis Philippe (25 years old)

Louis-Philippe, then called Duke of Orleans after his father’s passing, received the funds and good news from his mother the Princess Adelaide. The Princess successfully negotiated the release of Louis-Philippe’s 2 brothers as long as they all go to the New World and stay there. Thus, in 1797, Louis-Philippe sailed to the United States and upon his arrival in Philadelphia, he finally reunited with his brothers.

They had an exciting excursion in the United States. They visited Mount Vernon and met with George Washington. They also attended the inauguration of the 2nd American President John Adams. They then traveled to different states. But in 1799, news from Europe encouraged them to end their stay in the US.

In that year, Napoleon overthrew the Directory and promised stability. So much so, it gave the Orlean-Bourbon Princes the confidence to finally return to Europe. In 1800, they settled in England. Napoleon may have been more moderate than the Directory, but he remained true to the revolutionary principles. While waiting for better times, Louis-Philippe and his brothers turned their attention to their family’s drama.

Keeping up with the Bourbons

After King Louis XVI’s execution, the royal family split. The cadet branch of the Bourbons, the Orléanist, represented by Louis-Philippe and his brothers and the main line dubbed the Legitimist represented by the future King Louis XVIII and the Count of Artois (the later Charles X). Philippe Egalite’s decision to vote in favor of the execution of King Louis XVI brought bad blood between the Orleans and the main line’s relations.

While they wait and see as Napoleon ruled France throughout the 1800s, the 2 branches of the Bourbon decided for a truce. A united front for a common cause: to return to France. Despite making peace with the main branch, Louis-Philippe refused to fight in the monarchist armies.

In 1807 and 1808, tragedy once again hit Louis-Philippe. His beloved brothers whom he traveled with for years passed away 1 year apart due to the same ailment, tuberculosis. Grief stricken, he decided to leave England and accept the invitation of King Ferdinand IV of Naples.

There, Louis-Philippe ended his bachelor days as he married Marie-Amelie, daughter of the King and Maria Carolina of Austria, sister of the wife of King Louis XVI Marie Antoinette. Thus, the marriage completed the reconciliation of the Orléanist and the main branch as well as reaffirming the union between the Habsburgs and the Bourbons.

Maria Amalia

Mellowed Liberalism

Decades passed and the political landscape of France shifted. During this time, he kept his sympathies with liberal ideas and tended connections and influence. Soon it became apparent that his connection served him well.

In 1814, war shifted tides against Napoleon as the autocrats of Europe once again marched and invaded France. The Corsican General abdicated and the Congress of Vienna brought back the Bourbon monarchy with King Louis XVIII at the helm. Napoleon crashed the party though in 1815 that forced Louis-Philippe to flee to England for a hundred days when Waterloo finally cemented the restoration.

Despite the reconciliation almost a decade ago, mistrust and some animosity remained between the Legitimist and Orleanists. King Louis XVIII refused to give Louis-Philippe the title of royal highness, which back then meant big for honor and status. As a consolation prize, the King did return to Louis-Phliippe the estates of the Duchy of Orleans which Louis-Philippe developed and turned him into a wealthy individual in his own right.

While King Louis XVIII ruled until 1824 and Charles X ascended to the throne, the Duke of Orleans rekindled his support for liberal ideas. Personally he sent his children to public schools giving his family a touch of simplicity and humility. In the Palais Royal he hosted liberal deputies of the Assembly and journalists. He supported newspapers such as the Le Constitutionnel and later the Le National, where a certain historian named Adolphe Thiers contributed articles and later played a role in government. He flexed his liberalism by joining the Paris Philhellenic Committee that called for the independence of Greece from Ottoman rule. As Charles X represented autocracy, Louis-Philippe represented a more liberal and moderate monarchy.

Charles X

Getting the Top Job

As Charles X looked back to turn the clock back, the people pushed back. With the fate of the country hanging between order and chaos like that of the previous Revolution, Louis-Philippe and his connections that he tended for years tipped the scale towards him. Eventually leading for job he never thought of getting decades ago.

In 1830, Charles X issued the 4 Ordinances that stymied liberties and reasserted autocracy. In response, the people of France erected barricades and rose up in revolt, triggering a Revolution 2.0. Louis-Philippe, waiting out who wins, fled Paris for the safety of Neuilly then in Le Raincy.

By the end of July, the people took the upper hand and Louis-Philippe returned to Paris. Draped in the tricolour, the Duke of Orleans marched back in Paris backed by liberals he had supported before. Once they reached the Hotel de Ville, the Marquis de Lafayette, a hero of both American and French Revolutions, who commanded the admiration and respect of the people and earned a reputation of champion of liberty, hugged the Orleanist leader, just like Taylor Swift endorsing Joe Biden back in 2020 effect.

On July 31, the Legislative Assembly elected him as Lieutenant General of the Kingdom, effectively placing him in command of the military, which Charles X, who read the signs on the wall, confirmed the appointment. The King, however, attempted to salvage the Legitimist hold in power by abdicating in favor of Prince Henri, Duke of Bordeux. The plot went in vain as the provisional government ditched Charles X’s chosen successor in favor of their favorite Louis-Philippe, Duke of Orleans.

By August 7, 1830, Louis-Philippe, Duke of Orleans, ascended to the throne not as King of France but King of the French. Charles X went into exile. The era of the July Monarchy thus began.

Ditching Liberalism

Louis-Philippe then had a chance to put his money where his mouth was. He came to power over a country that earned a reputation for instability. His decisions and actions shaped the fate of the monarchy.

The Duke of Orleans painted a people’s king. He took the title King of French to place emphasis on his focus towards the people rather than King of France that gave the impression of being the absolute power over the lands. He became known as the Citizens’ King, a reminiscence of his dedication to the people as well as the time from the past decade where he walked in Paris greeting people he knew like a common person. A people’s man image.

However, Louis-Philippe owed his crown to the new rising bourgeoisie class, the financiers, professionals, and industrialists. Men like the historian Francois Guizot, the journalist-historian Adolphe Thiers, the banker and coal magnate Casimir Perier, and financier Jacques Laffitte, played a role in government. This resulted in favorable policies towards this new money and middle class.

Francois Guizot

The bourgeoisie served as the new oligarchy in France. They dominated the electorate giving the right of vote based on an individual’s income. The government implemented business-friendly policies and supported industrialization, which indeed helped the French economy to grow in the 1830s. Louis-Philippe consented on all of this.

The King needed the bourgeoisie which represented the centrist in the jungle of French politics of the 1830s and 40s. In the far left of the political spectrum that opposed the Orleanist monarchy and the government stood the Bonapartist, Republicans, and Socialist, with the latter representing the working class. In the far right stood the Legitimist, the monarchist party that viewed Louis-Philippe as a usurper. Hence, Louis-Philippe presided over a diverse and polarized French politics.

Amidst this divisions, riots and uprisings rampaged. In November 1831, workers in Lyon rose up against the government, but quashed. In 1832, the famous Republican Uprising of Paris failed, but Victor Hugo immortalized this in his Les Miserables. Then in 1835, Louis-Philippe fortunately evaded a Republican assassination attempt orchestrated by Giuseppe Fieschi. It killed 18 people and ultimately failed to severely harm the royal family. In 1836, Louis Napoleon, nephew of Napoleon, staged a botched Bonapartist coup in Strasbourg.

On the international stage, he presided over a peaceful Europe, though not without controversies. In 1838, Louis-Philippe attacked Mexico in the Pastry War triggered by an attack on a French-owned bakery superficially, but an issue on unpaid debts fundamentally. In the 1840s, France and England stood for different parties regarding a conflict between the Ottoman Empire and its vassal the Khedive of Egypt. Ultimately, France and Great Britain settled.

Louis-Philippe and Queen Victoria

Anglo-French relations improved for a while during Louis-Philippe’s reign. As a Duke, he found shelter in the English Isles. After the issue with Egypt, Louis-Philippe engaged with Queen Victoria resulting in the visit of the British monarch to France in 1843 and 1845. Louis-Philippe reciprocated this with a visit in 1844. Nevertheless, Europe’s monarchies still mistrust the Orleanist monarchy.

Europe’s monarchies dubbed him the King of the Barricades. Even Queen Victoria, despite the visits, soon mistrusted Louis-Philippe’s regime. This grew during the Spanish Marriage Affair in 1846, an attempt by Louis-Philippe to reaffirm the relations between the French and Spanish Bourbons. Old habits of rivalry did not disappear overnight.

The July Monarchy presided over a deep political divide, economic growth in its first decade, and a less tensed if not calmer European affairs. The 1830s and early 1840s went well, but the same cannot be said for the next half of the 1840s.

Downfall

While Louis-Philippe’s government worked in resolving the issues with England regarding Queen Isabella II’s marriage, seeds of the July Monarchy already began to be sowed. The Citizen’s King, faced with difficult choices, consented to policies that turned his back on the same liberal principles he espoused decades ago. Eventually, this resulted to a political explosion that shook Europe.

Around 1845 and 1846, disease struck the potatoes of Europe.This resulted in failed harvests of the root crop bringing famine to much of Europe. So wide the impact the period later came to be known as the Hungry Forties. This caused economic recession throughout Europe.

In France, the economic crisis translated to political action. The people, especially the working class, suffering from the downturn, demanded a say on the governance of the country and their welfare. They asked for the expansion of the franchise, otherwise known as an expansion of the voter base. Louis-Philippe supported the Bourgeoisie government led by Francois Guizot. They refused the demands of enlarging the franchise, thus, a crack down on civil liberties gradually began.

The greatest irritant for the Guizot government came in the form of banquets. Meeting over meals seemed harmless but discussing political matters while dining annoyed the government. By February 1848, Guizot finally had enough of the farce of the banquets and banned them. This erupted into massive protests and barricades.

For Louis-Philippe’s part, in a final act of respect to the people and avoiding further bloodshed and even civil war, decided to abdicate. He and his family fled one last time to England, where in less than 3 years, on August 26, 1850, he passed away in exile. The Revolution eventually spread across Europe toppling down several reactionary governments.

Summing Up

For the initial part of his life, Louis-Philippe lived just like a rich millennial. A part of the 1% who realized the unfairness of the social conditions, he turned into an idealist, progressive and liberal. He became so passionate he offered his life when the French Revolution erupted. Eventually, he became disillusioned and took the opportunity to travel Europe and America.

A little family drama here and there, and the passion of his youth, liberalism and enlightened ideas, stuck with him in a subtle form. Later on, his passion brought him the top job in the country and the opportunity to practice what he preached. The ruled over France, however, divided by different political agendas. He survived as long as good times rolled, but when challenging times came, he failed to unite the country and eventually turned against the ideals he espoused. The Guizot government’s authoritarianism and his consent to it, led to his abdication and his tragic legacy as the last King of France or the French.

King Louis-Philippe gives a relatable life story, but also a tragedy. A one sided love where he loved the people, but the people or most of them do not want to. Either the signs of time or failure of providing a unifying leadership spelled the ultimate end of the French monarchy.

Bibliography:

Websites:

"Louis Philippe ." Encyclopedia of World Biography. . Encyclopedia.com. (May 15, 2024). https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/louis-philippe

Britannica, T. Editors of Encyclopaedia. "Louis-Philippe." Encyclopedia Britannica, March 22, 2024. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Louis-Philippe.

Other Sources:

Rice, Francis (ed.). Life of Louis Philippe, With a History of the Late Revolution in France. Boston, Massachusetts: Hotchkiss & Company, 1848.