Yolande Martine Gabrielle de Polastron, Duchess of Polignac

Yolande Martine Gabrielle de Polastron, Duchess of Polignac was born in 1749 in Paris into an aristocratic family.  Although her family were financially in a poor state.  Gabrielle married Jules François Armand, comte de Polignac, marquis de Mancini in 1767, a few months short of her eighteenth birthday.  She was invited to the Palace of Versailles where she apparently had an instance impact on Marie Antoinette.  The Queen insisted that the Polignacs move to Versailles and she settled their debts.  Gabrielle Polignac became governess to the royal family’s children and was given a thirteen room apartment and a cottage in the Queens faux peasant village of Petit Trianon.  There was increasing resentment at court over the Queen’s favouritism.  This was echoed in Parisian society as a whole where increasingly pornographic portrayals of Polignac were found in pamphlets showing her as the Queen’s lover.  Due to her friendship with comte de Vaudreuil who was seen as boorish Marie Antoinette distance herself from Polignac.  Polignac then moved to London for a time period.

Near the outbreak of the French Revolution the Queen and Polignac once again became close.  She became close to the royalist circles particularly the comte d’Artois who despaired at the treatment of the monarchy.  She became party to discussions aimed at the removal of Necker as minister of finances.  When this led to further unrest in Paris and the attack on the Bastille on the 14th of July 1789 the Polignacs fled France to Switzerland.

Gabrielle Polignac died in Switzerland in 1793 apparently just after hearing about the execution of Marie Antoinette.