A French diplomat in the Russian Service. Missions of the Count d'Antraigues in Venice (1795–1797)

Abstract

The article deals with the history of secret diplomacy of the time of the French Revolution. It aims to show unknown aspects of the French émigré сount d'Antraigue's activities as a councillor to the Russian embassy in Venice and as a personal representative of Louis XVIII in 1795–1797. Unpublished documents from the Archives of Foreign Policy of the Russian Empire and the memoirs of contemporaries form the source base of the research. The practice of appointing French royalists “under Russian protection” as employees of Russian diplomatic missions was proposed by the Russian court in 1794. The case of d’Antraigues, therefore, was not unique. D'Antraigues' duties in this post were related to the search for information on revolutionary France, the French army in Italy, the politics of the Italian states. His contacts with Swedish agents, French royalists, and French army officers were the most fruitful. At the same time, he was associated with British diplomats. Bonaparte used the errors of the diplomat to his advantage: сount d'Antraigues’s notes served as a pretext for the coup d'état of 18 Fructidor, Year V. Although he сount lost credibility in the eyes of the royalists yet, thanks to the support of A.K. Razumovsky, he continued his service as correspondent and honorary “pensionnaire” of the Russian court. It was after 1797 that a “black legend” developed around the name of the count, thanks, in particular, to former secret agents of the Directory and Napoleon Bonaparte, depicting him as an opportunist.