Father Joseph, "gray eminence" of Richelieu (part 2)

At the beginning of the 17th century, Father Joseph helped Richelieu to reconcile King Louis XIII with his mother, Marie de Médicis.

However, the Queen Mother is more and more suspicious of the cardinal, to the point that she will seek to destabilize him during the so-called "dupes" day.

In this new episode of the Europe 1 Studio podcast "At the heart of history", Jean des Cars tells you how the minister, and his shadow adviser, Father Joseph, managed to remain at the top of power despite the pressures from their enemies. 

Supported by Father Joseph, Richelieu will reach the peak of power

Despite the support of Father Joseph, Richelieu will find it difficult to reconcile the king and his mother.

At first, he got the Queen Mother to sign the Peace of Angoulême in 1619, which granted him the government of Anjou.

But Marie de Médicis still refuses to return to Paris.

It was only after the victory at Ponts-de-Cé, on the Loire, and the Treaty of Angers of 1620 confirming the previous agreement, that she agreed to return to Paris.

As a reward for his loyal services, King Louis XIII offered Richelieu the cardinal's hat, with the approval of the Holy See.

Marie de Médicis has returned to the Council but the king is still a little wary of Richelieu, too close to his mother.

There again, Father Joseph will be active.

And on April 28, 1624, the cardinal entered the Council again.

The next day, the king will say to his mother: "I have chosen one of your servants to show that our reconciliation is real and final."

In 1625, Richelieu sent Father Joseph to Rome to be his personal agent.

He becomes her closest friend.

The cardinal then set up his system of remarkable collaborators which made the admiration of foreign ambassadors, especially those of Venice.

From now on, Father Joseph becomes the Gray Eminence.

It was the cardinal who named him so.

But in Italian it is "tenebroso cavernoso".

The Capuchin becomes, in a way, the keeper of secrets ... 

At that time, Richelieu dreamed of taming his opponents, the nobles and the Protestants.

To calm the nobility, he will prohibit duels in 1626. On the front of the Reformed, after many diplomatic efforts, the cardinal obtains that the Valtellina Valley, in Switzerland, in the hands of the Protestant Graubünden, remains under the control of the troops pontificals which occupied it then.

It may seem like a small matter of no importance, but it is, in fact, a success for Catholics in general, and for the party of devotees in France.

The Protestants of France, led by Rohan, feeling threatened, they decide to ask King Charles 1st of England.

This sovereign will then constitute a powerful English base in the triangle La Rochelle-Ile-de-Ré-Ile d'Oléron, which will force Richelieu to a military, land and naval intervention. 

The siege of La Rochelle

In addition to supporting French Protestants, the King of England has another reason to intervene against the King of France, as historian Jean-Christian Petitfils recalls: "It was Richelieu's desire to create a fleet, to to develop monopoly trading companies and to conquer colonial bases. Father Joseph had communicated to him a great deal of information on distant seas and the possibilities of trade with the countries of Africa, America and Asia, thanks to the accounts - made by Capuchin missionaries. "

For Charles I and for England, which wanted to maintain its first place on the seas, this project was unbearable!

On July 20, 1627, the Grand Admiral of the English fleet, the Duke of Buckingham, landed on the Île de Ré and captured it.

On September 10, La Rochelle fell into rebellion.

Richelieu decides to intervene.

Before dealing with La Rochelle, the English had to be freed from Île de Ré.

This was done on the night of October 7 to 8, thanks to the 830 Musketeers and infantrymen of Monsieur de Sourdis.

After that, he landed on the island a body of 6,000 men to defend it. 

Louis XIII decides to go to La Rochelle himself.

He arrived on October 12 in front of the besieged city.

He moved to the Manoir des Réaux, in the village of Aytré, a league south-east of the city.

Richelieu, he moved to the castle of Pont-de-la-Pierre, a little further south.

Father Joseph and his close collaborators occupy one of the pavilions in the garden. 

The cardinal built a dike 16 meters wide and 8 high, a kilometer and a half long, in front of the port of La Rochelle.

In its center, a channel, about sixty meters, lets the tide pass.

In the channel, two hundred vessels were sunk to make the port inaccessible and to prohibit the supply of the insurgents by the English.

The king is tired, he leaves La Rochelle on February 10, 1628, the siege is too long.

However, he will be back in Aytré on April 17.

The following October 26, the members of the Council of La Rochelle, physically and morally exhausted, decided to surrender unconditionally and beg the king's forgiveness. 

What fate reserve for the rebels?

The cardinal recommends clemency because the victory is total and the city on its knees: Louis XIII can be generous.

The Rochelais save their lives, their property and their Protestant worship, but the city loses its ancestral franchises which had been confirmed to it by the Edict of Nantes.

The walls will be destroyed, except for the two superb towers which frame the entrance to the port. 

Of this seat, it is the XIXth century which left the most striking image: the painting is entitled "Richelieu on the dike of La Rochelle".

It is by Henri Motte and dates from 1881. It shows the cardinal, upright in his superb boots, red coat thrown over his sparkling breastplate, observing the fighting.

A little behind, a group of Capuchin monks observes the scene.

Among them, of course, Father Joseph.

The youngest, at the back, holds the cardinal's scarlet hat in his hand.

This victory will convince Louis XIII that he found in Richelieu a devoted and irreplaceable minister.

The challenges of "the day of the dupes"

It is just after the siege of La Rochelle that the episode that I told you takes place: the war in Italy to give Mantua to the Duke of Nevers, the very serious illness of the king, the fear of Richelieu of being disgraced and the only fault of Father Joseph with the signing of the Peace of Regensburg in 1630. Richelieu certainly won the confidence of Louis XIII, but he knows that many around him are jealous of him and dream of his fall.

The Cardinal is very worried, very nervous whose health will begin to deteriorate.

Its main enemies all belong to the Catholic party.

Among them are the turbulent brother of the king, Gaston d'Orléans, still in rebellion, the Keeper of the Seals, Michel de Marillac, the king's own wife, Anne of Austria and Marie de Medici who, for some time, feels threatened by the influence of Richelieu.

This desire to get rid of the cardinal will materialize in an episode that is called either "the day of the dupes", or, sometimes, "the great storm of the court".

Of course, Father Joseph knows about it.

But what to do against the king's wife, brother and mother? 

As far as the brother is concerned, the day before this famous day, Saturday November 9, 1630, everything seems settled with him.

Louis XIII reconciles Gaston with the cardinal.

the latter thinks none the less, but all the same, the cardinal is sure to have the king's confidence. 

The day before, Sunday 10, is Council day.

It deals with military matters.

At the end of the afternoon, the Queen Mother, Marie de Medici, enters into a terrible anger.

She is unleashed, in his presence, against Richelieu.

She calls him "ungrateful, deceitful, perfidious".

She has no confidence in him.

The king looks surprised and shocked.

The cardinal leaves, Louis XIII follows suit, not without having sharply reproached his mother.

On Monday 11 in the morning, he will see her in Luxembourg.

She claims the complete disgrace of Richelieu from him.

The cardinal arrives.

The Queen Mother is even more virulent than the day before, pouring a load of insults on him, she tells her son that she will no longer set foot in the Council as long as the cardinal sits there.

It's her or him!

Deeply upset and moved, Richelieu replies that he just has to leave, and he leaves.

He's going to have the most horrible day of his life.

At the beginning of the afternoon, Louis XIII had to leave for his hunting lodge in Versailles, but before he left, he would have slipped up to the cardinal to follow him.

Richelieu complies.

The king welcomes him very kindly into his study.

The cardinal plays his all-out.

He again proposes his resignation.

The sovereign refuses it, begging him to stay and to continue "to hold the tiller of affairs, because such is [his] irrevocable decision". 

He decided to punish those responsible for this cabal.

The Keeper of the Seals, Michel de Marillac, is requested to return the box containing the Seals of France.

He was imprisoned in the fortress of Châteaudun where he died two years later.

Gaston, the king's brother, moved to Nancy.

The Queen Mother will leave France the following year.

At the invitation of the King of Spain, she will travel to Mons, in the Spanish Netherlands, where she will be lavishly welcomed.

As for Richelieu, he is obviously maintained in his powers and his domains are set up in duchy-peerage.

Richelieu, an all-powerful minister

Now, no one will dare to attack Richelieu.

He is installed in his cardinal palace, today part of the Royal Palace, with his teams.

With him, Father Joseph still directs the letters of instruction to the ambassadors.

He has control over what we would today call the Secret Service.

He is also his friend's political and religious adviser.

The cardinal is at the head of an immense fortune, primarily a land inheritance.

He built, not far from Châtellerault, in the town that bears his name, a castle which has now disappeared.

It contained invaluable collections of paintings, and works of art accumulated by the great minister.

Now it is more time for war, the Thirty Years' War against Spain and against the Emperor.

It will end after his death and that of the king, by the treaties of Westphalia, in 1648.

Ten years earlier, in 1638, Richelieu was happy to obtain from Louis XIII the cardinal's hat for Father Joseph, who had not requested it.

Unfortunately, the Capuchin died before receiving it.

For Richelieu, it is an immense sadness.

He will say: "I am losing my consolation, my only help, my confidant and my friend."

Despite this pain, Richelieu will rejoice, along with the whole of France, at the birth of the Dauphin on September 5, 1638. Louis XIII and Anne of Austria finally have an heir, after twenty-three years of marriage.

A miracle !

It is the future Louis XIV. 

Richelieu died in 1642, a year before the death of Louis XIII.

His tomb is in the chapel of the Sorbonne which he had built.

He had been a student there.

In 1717, the Tsar of Russia, Peter the Great, during his visit to France, will come to meditate there.

He will say, addressing the illustrious deceased: "Great man, I would give half of my kingdom to a minister like you, so that he can teach me to govern the other."

The Tsar forgot Father Joseph without whom, one can imagine, Richelieu would perhaps not have been so great ...

Bibliographical references:

Jean-Christian Petitfils,

(Perrin, 2008)

Arnaud Teyssier,

(Perrin, 2014)

Richelieu, Art and Power

(Catalog of the Exhibition of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, 2003)

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"At the heart of history" is a Europe 1 Studio podcast

Author and presentation: Jean des Cars

Production: Timothée Magot

Director: Jean-François Bussière

Distribution and editing: Clémence Olivier

Graphics: Europe 1 Studio