![Lucien Millevoye 1914](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/93/Lucien_Millevoye_1914.jpg)
Lucien Millevoye (1 August 1850 – 25 March 1918) was a French journalist and right-wing politician, now best known for his relationship with the Irish revolutionary and muse of
W.B. Yeats,
Maud Gonne
Maud Gonne MacBride ( ga, Maud Nic Ghoinn Bean Mhic Giolla Bhríghde; 21 December 1866 – 27 April 1953) was an English-born Irish republican revolutionary, suffragette and actress. Of Anglo-Irish descent, she was won over to Irish nationalism ...
.
Millevoye was born in
Grenoble
lat, Gratianopolis
, commune status = Prefecture and commune
, image = Panorama grenoble.png
, image size =
, caption = From upper left: Panorama of the city, Grenoble’s cable cars, place Saint- ...
in 1850, the grandson of the poet
Charles Hubert Millevoye
Charles Hubert Millevoye (24 December 1782 in Abbeville – 12 August 1816 in Paris) was a French poet several times honored by the Académie française. He was a transitional figure between the eighteenth and the nineteenth centuries as reve ...
. He was the editor of ''
La Patrie'' and a supporter of
General Boulanger
Georges Ernest Jean-Marie Boulanger (29 April 1837 – 30 September 1891), nicknamed Général Revanche ("General Revenge"), was a French general and politician. An enormously popular public figure during the second decade of the Third Repub ...
. He served as
Boulangist
Georges Ernest Jean-Marie Boulanger (29 April 1837 – 30 September 1891), nicknamed Général Revanche ("General Revenge"), was a French general and politician. An enormously popular public figure during the second decade of the Third Repub ...
member for the
Amiens
Amiens (English: or ; ; pcd, Anmien, or ) is a city and commune in northern France, located north of Paris and south-west of Lille. It is the capital of the Somme department in the region of Hauts-de-France. In 2021, the population of ...
in the French
Chamber of Deputies from 1889 to 1893.
He was elected a Nationalist deputy from Paris in 1898 and 1902.
In the late 1880s he went to Russia to further the cause of a
Franco-Russian alliance
The Franco-Russian Alliance (french: Alliance Franco-Russe, russian: Франко-Русский Альянс, translit=Franko-Russkiy Al'yans), or Russo-French Rapprochement (''Rapprochement Russo-Français'', Русско-Французско ...
.
He claimed to be Boulanger's emissary to the
Russian Emperor
The emperor or empress of all the Russias or All Russia, ''Imperator Vserossiyskiy'', ''Imperatritsa Vserossiyskaya'' (often titled Tsar or Tsarina/Tsaritsa) was the monarch of the Russian Empire.
The title originated in connection with Russia' ...
in
St Petersburg, a claim Boulanger himself apparently denied.
He also supported the
Entente Cordiale
The Entente Cordiale (; ) comprised a series of agreements signed on 8 April 1904 between the United Kingdom and the French Republic which saw a significant improvement in Anglo-French relations. Beyond the immediate concerns of colonial de ...
.
During the late 1880s and throughout the 1890s, following his separation from his wife Adrienne, he had a relationship with the Irish activist
Maud Gonne
Maud Gonne MacBride ( ga, Maud Nic Ghoinn Bean Mhic Giolla Bhríghde; 21 December 1866 – 27 April 1953) was an English-born Irish republican revolutionary, suffragette and actress. Of Anglo-Irish descent, she was won over to Irish nationalism ...
which produced two children, Georges Silvère (1890–1891) who died of
meningitis, and
Iseult Lucille Germaine (1894–1954).
Gonne was deeply involved in the
Irish independence movement, editing the French language nationalist newspaper ''L'Irlande Libre'' in the run-up to the centennial of the
1798 Rebellion
The Irish Rebellion of 1798 ( ga, Éirí Amach 1798; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ''The Hurries'') was a major uprising against British rule in Ireland. The main organising force was the Society of United Irishmen, a Irish republicanism, ...
. Gonne left Millevoye in the summer of 1900 and returned to Ireland with Iseult.
From 1898 until his death in 1918 Millevoye served as the deputy for Paris, where he died on 25 March 1918.
References
1850 births
1915 deaths
Politicians of the French Third Republic
Politicians from Paris
Writers from Grenoble
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