Chevalier d'Eon

Charles-Geneviève-Louis-Auguste-André-Timothée Éon de Beaumont (1728–1810), usually known as the Chevalier d'Eon was a French diplomat, soldier and Freemason who lived the first half of his life as a man and the second half as a woman.

D'Eon Beaumont was born in Tonnere, France in October 5 1728. His father was an attorney Louis d?Eon de Beaumont and her mother a noblewoman Françoise de Chavanson. Most of what we know about d'Eon's early life comes from his later biography and its reliability is questionable. He later claimed that he had been born a girl but that he was raised as a boy because her father could inherit his in-laws only if he would have a son.

D'Eon excelled in school and graduated 1749 from College Mazarin in Paris. He worked as a secretary of the administrator of the fiscal department and as a royal censor.

D'Eon as a spy

In 1756 d'Eon joined the secret network of spies that worked only for the king Louis XV. King sent him on a secret mission to Russia to meet empress Elizabeth I and start secret negotiations about new diplomatic relations. Later tales claim that he disguised himself as a lady Lia de Beaumont to do so.

In 1761 d'Eon returned to France. The next year he became a captain of dragoons under the Marshal Broglie and fought in the latter stages of the Seven Years' War. He was wounded and received a Cross of Saint-Louis, which also gave him a rank of chevalier.

In 1763 d'Eon became plenipotentiary minister in London and spied for the king. He collected information for the potential invasion. He formed connections with English nobility sending them produce of his own wine yards. When he was about to lose the post of the plenipotentiary next October, he complained and eventually decided to disobey orders to return to France. In his letter to the king he claimed that the new ambassador had tried to drug him. In 1764 he published most of the secret diplomatic correspondence about his recall.

In 1766 Louis XV granted him a pension for his services and gave him 12.000-livre annuity. He continued to work as a spy but also collected books but in effect, he lived in political exile in London.

D'Eon as a lady

Despite of the fact that d'Eon used his dragoon's uniform in all times, in 1770 there were rumors that he was actually a woman. Somebody even started a betting pool in London Stock Exchange. In 1771, after the death of Louis XV, d'Eon tried to negotiate about his return and returned various diplomatic documents to France. He also claimed that physically he was not a man, but a woman and demanded that the government would recognize him as a woman. King Louis XVI and his court complied and demanded that he wear women's clothing. D'Eon agreed, especially when the king granted funds for a new wardrobe. In 1777 d'Eon returned to France and afterwards lived as a woman.

When France begun to help the rebels during the American War of Independence, d'Eon asked to be able to join French troops in America. He was jailed below the castle of Dijon for 19 days and spent the following six years with his mother in Tonnerre.

In 1779 Beaumont published his memoirs La Vie Militaire, politique, et privée de Mademoiselle d'Eon. They were ghostwritten by a friend called La Fortelle and are probably embellished.

D'Eon returned to England in 1785. He lost his pension after the French Revolution and had to sell his library. In 1792 he sent a letter to French National Assembly and offered to lead a division of women soldiers against Austria, but the offer was rebuffed. He participated in fencing tournaments until he was seriously wounded in 1796. In 1805 he signed a contract for an autobiography, but the book was never published. He spent his last years with a widow Mrs. Cole.

Chevalier d'Eon died on May 21 1810 in London. Doctors who examined him after death discovered that her/his body was anatomically male.

The term Eonism was coined to refer to similar cases of transgender behavior, but is now little used because of its ambiguity.

Books

• Gary Kates – Monsieur D'Eon Is a Woman : A Tale of Political Intrigue and Sexual Masquerade (2001) ISBN 0–801–86731–2, John Hopkins University Press

External links

• An article on the life of the Chevalier d'Eon