# Henriette of Cleves

Henriette de La Marck (31 October 1542 – 24 June 1601), also known as Henriette of Cleves, was a French noblewoman and courtier. She was the 4th Duchess of Nevers, suo jure Countess of Rethel, and Princess of Mantua by her marriage with Louis I of Gonzaga-Nevers. A very talented landowner, she was one of France's chief creditors until her death.

## Early life

Henriette was born in La Chapelle-d'Angillon, in the department of Cher, France, on 31 October 1542. She was the eldest daughter and second child of Francis I of Cleves, 1st Duke of Nevers, Count of Rethel, and his wife, Marguerite of Bourbon-La Marche. Dauphin Henry (future King Henry II of France) acted as her godfather at her baptism. She had many siblings, including her brothers Francis and James, her father's heirs as rulers of Nevers and Rethel, Henri (who died young), Catherine, and Marie.
Henriette soon obtained an office at court as the lady-in-waiting of Queen Catherine de' Medici. She became the intimate personal friend and confidant of Princess Marguerite. On 4 March 1565, 22-year-old Henriette married Louis I Gonzaga, Prince of Mantua in Moulins, Bourbonnais.

## Duchess of Nevers and Rethel

After her eldest brother Francis had died in 1562 and brother James in 1564 without leaving heirs, Henriette became the suo jure 4th Duchess of Nevers and Countess of Rethel. She had been left with enormous debts from her late father and brothers, but managed her lands well and brought the financial situation back in order. Her profits were such that she eventually became one of the chief creditors of France's unstable state during the Wars of Religion.
Henriette died at the Hôtel de Nevers in Paris, on 24 June 1601 at the age of 58. She was buried in Nevers Cathedral at the side of her husband, who had preceded her in death in 1595.

## Issue

* Catherine de Nevers (21 January 1568 - 1 December 1629): Married Henry I, Duke of Longueville, by whom she had one son, Henri II d'Orléans, Duke of Longueville.
* Maria Henrietta (3 September 1571 - 3 August 1601): Married Henry of Lorraine, Duke of Mayenne.
* Frederick (11 March 1573 - 22 April 1574): Died in infancy.
* Francis (17 September 1576 - 13 June 1580): Died in childhood.
* Charles (6 May 1580- 20 September 1637): Succeeded his parents as Duke of Nevers, Rethel, Mantua, and Montferrat. Married Catherine Mayenne, daughter of Charles of Lorraine, Duke of Mayenne and Henriette of Savoy, Marquise of Villars, by whom he had six children, including Charles II Gonzaga and Anna Gonzaga.

## Rumours

It was rumoured that Henriette became lovers with Annibal de Coconas [fr], a Piedmontese adventurer who was beheaded in 1574, along with Joseph Boniface de La Môle, for participating in a conspiracy against King Charles IX which was supported by the Duke of Alençon. It was alleged that she and Marguerite (now Queen of Navarre) woke up the middle of the night, removed the heads which had been placed on public display, embalmed them, and buried them in consecrated ground.

## The Nevers Foundation for Sixty Poor Girls, 1573-XVIIIe

In short, the French Wars of Religion were about maintaining the French tradition of “un foi, une loi, un roi”, (one faith, one law, one king). Most importantly, France had one religion and it was Catholicism. During these tumultuous years, one of the ways the nobility and the governing elite publicly proclaimed their Catholicism was through acts of “holy Christian” charity.
“We must henceforth assail our enemies,” chancellor of France, Michel de l’Hôpital pleaded, “with charity, prayer, persuasion and the Word of God, which are the proper weapons for such a conflict.”
Charitable Catholics “will never lose battles because charity holds like a strong lance against our enemy”, wrote Jean Martin, governor of Paris’ Grand Bureau des Pauvres.
As members of the French nobility, the Duc and Duchesse of Nevers, Louis de Gonzaga and Henriette of Cleves, were intimately involved in the religious turmoil, scandalous rumours circulating about their actions and connections. The Duc was believed to have instigated the bloody Saint Bartholomew’s Day Massacre in August 1572, which led to the deaths of Protestant leaders and sparked the “fourth war” of the conflict. The massacre occurred in the early morning hours of 24 August during the week of wedding celebrations of Henri of Navarre, later Henri IV of France, to the sister of the king, Marguerite of Valois. Henriette was a close friend of Marguerite’s and her rumoured affair with Annibale Coconna one of the Malcontents executed for his role in the attempt to assassinate the king, did further damage to the Nevers reputation.
Perhaps to assuage the doubts of their commitment to France and “the Catholic Apostolic and Roman religion”, on 13 November 1573, the Duc and Duchesse proclaimed the establishment of their charity for the poor girls in their rural domain of Nevers.
The administrators of the Nevers Foundation were to ensure they acted with “good and holy intent” to protect the Duc and Duchesse’s “pious and charitable enterprise”. The foundation provided for an annual “election” of 60 poor girls “aged sixteen years and above, born of a subject,… be deemed born in true wedlock, with our knowledge of the Father and Mother, baptised in this parish, [and be] good living, a good girl, and that she be of the Catholic Apostolic and Roman religion”.
The sixty chosen poor girls, in return for promising to live ‘a good Christian life” and pray regularly for the souls of their benefactors, received a dowry of 16 écus 40 sols – as “marriage restrains their soul and spirit and guards against falling into sin” – a silver wedding ring and, if their intended was without employment, a job found so he could support his new wife and family.
Upon the death of the Duchesse in 1601, the Parlement of Paris gave administrative responsibility for the foundation to the governors of Paris’ charity hospital, the Hotel-Dieu, which is outlined in the document at the centre of Elliott’s 2015 paper on the foundation. From the extant documents, the foundation continued into the eighteenth century, over 200 years after it was established and potentially 1,200 poor girls benefitting from the “good and holy intent” of the Duc and Duchesse.

## In fiction

* Henriette of Cleves is a character in the book La Reine Margot by Alexandre Dumas.
* Henriette of Cleves, played by Dominique Blanc, has an important role in the movie La Reine Margot.

## Ancestry

Ancestors of Henriette of Cleves :