Escape From the Terror - The Journal of Madame de la Tour du Pin

Folio Society, 1979.

Madame de La Tour du Pin was born Henrietta-Lucy Dillon in Paris in 1770. An aristocrat, she spent her youth surrounded by the luxury of the court of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette. Married in her teens to the future Marquis de La Tour du Pin, she seemed destined to a life of pleasure-seeking and extravagance. Then came the Revolution and the world of the French aristocracy fell apart. The guillotine threatened all her class and, after the execution of the king, Madame de La Tour du Pin fled Paris to her properties elsewhere in France. All had been plundered and she was forced into exile, first in Holland, then England and, finally, America. Only as a penniless 'migr' could she return at last to Paris. Written originally for her only child, her Memoirs provide a vivid account of 18th century aristocratic life and the Revolution that destroyed it.