Jean du Barry was born on August 19, 1743, in the small village of Vaucouleurs in northeastern France. Her mother, Anne, worked as a seamstress and was known for her beauty. The identity of Jean’s father was never confirmed, though it was suspected that he was a local monk known as Brother Angel, who frequently appeared at important moments in her life and whose surname she sometimes used. When Jean was about three years old, a wealthy man named Dumoulin encountered Anne while traveling through the town.
It is possible they had a brief affair. Dumoulin then took both Anne and young Jean back to Paris, where he cared for them. Over the years, Dumoulin grew fond of the child, and his mistress, known around Paris as Madame Frederica, pampered the girl and introduced her to the luxuries of French high society. At around age seven, Jean was sent to be educated at the Convent of Saint-Aure.
The school trained promising girls considered at risk of ruin, and the discipline was intense. Knowing her education was paid for by her benefactors, Jean applied herself seriously. For eight years she studied painting, reading, writing, and music, learning the skills expected of a woman of society. In 1758, at age fifteen, she completed her education and left the convent, having grown into a beautiful young woman with a kind and lively character.
Shortly after, however, Jean and her mother were no longer welcomed at Dumoulin’s residence. The reasons are unclear, though speculation points to Madame Frederica’s jealousy over Jean’s youth and beauty, or possibly a renewed romance between Anne and Dumoulin. Forced to leave, they moved in with Anne’s husband, Nicolas Rançon, a storekeeper she had married in the late 1740s. Rançon was an ordinary working man who could not support his wife and stepdaughter, so Jean had to provide for herself.
She began by selling trinkets around Paris, but soon found more respectable work as an apprentice hairdresser. In the mid-eighteenth century, hairdressing was considered an art form, and wealthy ladies paid handsomely for elaborate styles. Jean’s teacher was a young man named Lamet. After months together, they fell in love.
Lamet showered Jean with luxuries and spent most of his money on her. His worried mother sued Jean but lost the case. Lamet was believed to be the father of Jean’s child, Marie-Josèphe du Barry. Facing financial ruin, Lamet fled with his mother to England, leaving the child in the care of Jean’s uncle.
Left without income, Jean found work caring for a wealthy elderly widow named Madame Delay de la Garde. Within months, problems arose. The widow’s two middle-aged sons were both attracted to Jean, and apparently the wife of one son was also interested in her. As tensions rose, Jean left in 1761.
The following year, she took a job as a salesgirl in a hat shop called Maison Labille. On weekends she wandered Paris, enjoying nightlife and visiting casinos. In 1763, Jean met a man who would change her life forever. The circumstances of their meeting are uncertain—perhaps in a casino, perhaps in her own home, where her stepfather had business with him.
The man was Jean-Baptiste du Barry. Though from the nobility, his family was poor, and he resorted to illegal methods to earn a fortune. Known as “le Roué,” he was witty, frequently conned others, and lived outside the rules. Much of his money came from casinos, and he also worked as a pimp, but his true ambition was to gain influence by providing the King of France with his next chief mistress.
When he met Jean, he believed she could fill that role, and he devoted himself to preparing her. Jean had many qualities admired in eighteenth-century France. She was tall at five foot five, with blue eyes and blonde hair, and was considered remarkably attractive. Although du Barry initially seemed merely kind to her, Jean soon became his mistress.
He spent so much time and money on her that by 1764 people began calling her Comtesse du Barry, despite du Barry’s wife being very much alive. He established Jean as a star among courtesans in the high circles of Parisian society. She became a sensation, and many aristocratic men desired her as a lover. In the summer of 1768, Jean finally caught the attention of King Louis XV.
Du Barry timed her visit to Versailles so the king would see her. He spotted her in a hallway and sent his valet, Dominique Lebel, to find her. After spending time together, the king became strongly attracted to her. He said she gave him enjoyment of a kind altogether new to him, and that she was the only woman in France who made him forget he would soon be sixty.
His friends observed that he seemed more in love, happier, and more rejuvenated than ever. Around this time, the queen consort, Maria Leszczyńska, died on June 24, 1768, at age sixty-five. As the king’s attachment deepened, his valet Lebel grew worried. What he had thought would be a few nights together had become a serious liaison.
He investigated Jean’s past and told the king she was a harlot. Infuriated, the king scolded him harshly and ordered that Jean be married off so she could gain a title and become his official mistress. To become maîtresse en titre, it was required to be married and of noble blood. To bypass court protocol, Jean was married to du Barry’s brother, Guillaume du Barry, on September 1, 1768.
Du Barry then produced false documents claiming Jean came from noble ancestry. The maîtresse en titre held considerable influence, with apartments in royal castles, a place at all court functions, and access while the king spoke with ministers. Jean was now known as the Comtesse du Barry and was installed above the king’s quarters, but since her official court presentation had not yet taken place, she could only see the king in private. Months passed without the presentation, and Jean endured a lonely period.
She had little company and was disliked among the nobility, who resented a woman of peasant background daring to mingle with the aristocracy. The presentation was delayed twice, first when the king sprained his ankle and then when he broke his arm. Finally, on April 22, 1769, the event took place at the Palace of Versailles. Huge crowds gathered outside the gates.
Jean arrived with a spectacular hairdo and wore a dazzling white gown embroidered with diamonds and gold. She executed the three required courtesies perfectly, a feat many women failed, and the occasion was remembered as one of the grandest court events of the century. Jean’s life became filled with luxury. She wore extravagant gowns, covered herself in diamond jewelry, and had a staff to attend to her every need.
Her position offered potential political influence, but she showed little interest in politics, wanting only to be socially accepted. She made friends among the aristocracy, but also bitter enemies, including the Duchess de Gramont, who wanted her position, and later Marie Antoinette. For years, the duchess, aided by her brother the Duke de Choiseul, published pamphlets defaming Jean in an effort to remove her from elite circles. Their threat ended when Choiseul went behind the king’s back, nearly taking France to war by siding with Spain in a dispute over the Falkland Islands, which belonged to England.
Choiseul, his wife, and his sister were exiled to their country estate. Jean’s mother also benefited from her rise, living in an expensive apartment with the title of Marquise de Montgeron. On May 15, 1770, a family meal took place before the grand wedding between Marie Antoinette and the Dauphin, the future Louis XVI. Jean had only been official mistress for over a year, and no one expected her to attend, but she went, much to the disgrace of those present.
It was there she met the spoiled fourteen-year-old Marie Antoinette. A rivalry began immediately. Antoinette was rude to Jean, making remarks and refusing to speak to her, disapproving of her peasant background and offended by a joke Jean had laughed at about her mother. This defied court protocol, and Antoinette only adjusted her behavior after King Louis was informed and she was told to ease her attitude.
At a New Year’s ball, she finally said a few words to Jean, stating simply that there were many people at Versailles that day. As the years passed, the king’s age began to catch up with him. He showed the first symptoms of smallpox and was taken to the Palace of Versailles for treatment. Jean and his three daughters remained with him.
The king then ordered Jean to leave the palace so she would not become infected and so he could prepare for the final rites. Louis XV died on May 10, 1774, and his grandson Louis XVI ascended to the throne, with eighteen-year-old Marie Antoinette as queen. The relationship between the king and Jean had been strong throughout. She never spoke ill of him in her lifetime and made his final five years among his happiest.
In 1771, he sold his personal brothel called Deer Park, proving his love for her. Just two days after the king’s death, Jean was exiled to the Abbey du Pont-aux-Dames. As a former royal mistress, she was not warmly welcomed by the nuns, but over time they came to enjoy her company. After two and a half years, her exile ended, and she moved into a castle at Louveciennes, though she was never permitted to return to Versailles.
In the following years, she had two love affairs: first with Henry Seymour, who eventually grew bored and sent her a painting with the words “leave me alone” written at the bottom, and then with Louis Hercule Timoléon de Cossé, the Duke de Brissac, who always held a soft spot for her. Late at night on September 9, 1792, during the French Revolution, a mob of drunken men approached Jean’s residence at Louveciennes. They broke in, woke her, and left a blood-stained cloth on the floor. When she looked at it, she saw the head of her former lover, Brissac.
About a month later, Jean traveled to England to deal with business interests. There she made a grave mistake that would lead to her downfall. Following the revolution, many aristocrats had fled France and plotted to restore the monarchy, becoming known as émigrés. A declaration was issued that any émigré who had not returned to France by 1792 would be considered a traitor.
In London, Jean not only socialized with high-profile émigrés but also gave a significant sum of around 400,000 livres to aid them. Despite her banker urging her to stay in England, she ignored him and returned to Louveciennes. The year before, an Englishman named George Greive had settled in the village and started a Jacobin Club. He harbored a strong hatred for Jean and attempted to bring her down, aided by two informants who would ultimately betray her: one employed as a cook in her house, and her Bengali slave servant, Louis Benoît Zamor.
Zamor had been taken by slave traders as a young boy and given to Jean by the king. Although she treated him well and even paid for his education, he despised her lavish lifestyle. As the Reign of Terror raged, Greive published pamphlets describing crimes allegedly committed by Jean. He secured a warrant for her arrest and transported her to prison in Paris to await trial.
While imprisoned, a disguised priest approached her and offered to help her escape, but said he could only take one person. Confident she would be spared, Jean paid for Brissac’s daughter to be smuggled out of the country instead. On December 8, 1793, she was tried for treason. She remained calm, insisting she was not an émigré since she had stayed in France.
But without thinking, she mentioned that in London she had given money to émigrés. Greive testified against her and produced documents proving the amounts. Combined with Zamor’s confession, this was enough to convict her. The jury found her guilty, and at around midnight she was sentenced to death.
The next morning, she vainly tried to secure her release by revealing where she had hidden every jewel on her grounds at Louveciennes. On December 8, 1793, she was taken to the Place de la Révolution for public execution. Only in that moment did she realize her life was truly at stake. As she was dragged toward the guillotine, she cried out, “You are going to hurt me.
Why? ” Collapsing and begging for mercy before the crowd, she reportedly said, “One more moment, Mr. Executioner, I beg you. ” Her screams were described as animal-like, coming to an abrupt stop when the cold blade cut off her head.
Like many other victims of the Reign of Terror, she was buried in the Madeleine Cemetery.