The Bishopric of Chartres was a seigneurie, of which the proprietor was the Bishop. It was thus a temporal lordship, of which, in ordinary circumstances, the Lord or Prince would be the civil and criminal judge. Such functions, however, being unsuitable for an ecclesiastical person, his lordship’s courts were held for him by a vice-gerent or vice-lord, called in Latin Vice-Dominus, and in French Le Vidame. In many such bishoprics the Vidame was appointed by the Bishop, and was removable by him; but in some, the office of Vidame was hereditary; the designation of the office was virtually a title of nobility, and thus the Vidames of Chartres were Protestants.
The English were familiar with the title of the Vidame of Chartres. The Vidame Francois Vendôme, was one of the French hostages for the full payment to England of 400,000 crowns of gold (value 6s. 8d. each), being the price of the restitution of Boulogne to France in 1551. He is often mentioned in the diary of King Edward VI. (transcribed by Bishop Burnet into his “History of the English Reformation”). He died on 16th December 1560, and was succeeded by the subject of this memoir.
The Vidame Jean de Ferrieres served in all the civil wars in France under Conde and Coligny. He was renowned for valour and energy, as was his wife Francoise, widow of Charles Chabot, Sieur de Sainte-Fry, daughter of Francois Joubert, Sieur de Launeroy, by Perronnelle Carré. Archbishop Parker, having occasion to address him in Latin, styled him clarissimus heros. At the same time, not knowing what a Vidame could possibly be, he translated Vidame of Chartres into “Vidamius Carnutensis.”[1]
The Vidame of Chartres came in 1562 as an envoy from the Huguenots, and Queen Elizabeth entered into a treaty, giving them 6000 infantry and 100,000 crowns “to prevent Normandy from falling into the hands of the Guises, lest they should seize its ports and carry their exterminating war against Protestants into England.” She had no quarrel with the French King himself, who was a minor; and she refused his ambassador’s request to deliver up the Vidame to him as a traitor. In our State-Paper Office, there is a warrant to the Receiver-General of the Court of Warde, to pay £300 quarterly to the Vidame of Chartres, dated Strand, 11th November 1562.
In 1569 he again came to England as a resident ambassador from the French Protestants. He was reputed to be “a great nobleman of France, and of chief account among the Protestants — a learned and very good man” (Strype). On 3d August 1569, Bishop Grindal wrote to Cecil that he had obtained for the Vidame the use of the Bishop of Ely’s house in Holborn till Michaelmas. On 4th January 1570, the Queen wrote to the Farmers of Customs “to permit the Vidame de Chartres to receive certain wines for his own use, duty free.”
We now come to Paris in the black autumn of 1572. The great Coligny has been wounded by a ruffian in a street, and Charles IX. has paid him a visit of pretended condolence. Two quotations will give information regarding the Vidame. The first quotation is from De Thou’s famous History:—
“The nobles of the Protestant party took counsel together. John de Ferriers, Vidame of Chartres (in the presence of Navarre and Condé), conjecturing what was indeed the matter, and that this tragedy was begun with the wound of Coligny, but would end in the blood of them all — therefore he thought it most safe that without delay they should depart the city. He produced testimonies and tokens for his opinion from the rumours that were spread abroad. For it was heard by many, when upon the marriage day the Protestants went out of the church that they might not engage in worship, the Papists said by way of mirth, that within a few days they should hear mass. Also it was openly spoke in discourse by the chief of the city, that at that marriage should be poured out more blood than wine — that one of the Protestant nobles was advised by the President of the Senate that he should with all his family betake himself for some days into the country; also that John Montluc, Bishop of Valence, before going ambassador into Poland, counselled Rochefoucauld that he should not suffer himself to be intoxicated and turned about by the smoke and unwonted favour of the court, that he should not be too secure to run himself into danger, and that he should timeously withdraw himself, together with other nobles, from the court.”
- ↑ Bishop Grindal wrote of him as “Monsieur Vidame.” French Protestant writers often call him “The Vidame,” as if he had been the only hereditary Vidame.
But Francois d’Ailly, Vidame of Amiens, was a refugee who died in London in 1561. His brother Louis succeeded him. In 1567 Louis, and another brother Charles, were killed at the battle of St Denis. Then Charles’ son, Philibert Emmanuel d’Ailly, succeeded as Seigneur de Pequigny and Vidame d’Amiens. This last-named Vidame relapsed into Romanism, although he did not desert Henri IV. Marguerite d’Ailly, his sister, was married in 1581 to Francois de Coligny, Signeur de Chatillon, fourth son of the martyred Admiral. The Marquis de Ruvigny was connected by marriage with the family of Ailly de La Mairie.
