Fireworks in the Gévaudan

A display of pyrotechnics in 17th-century Germany

August 1765 brought with it another pivotal episode in the chronicle of the Beast: An ill-fated encounter between two royal gamekeepers whose mission was to assist King Louis XV’s gunbearer, François Antoine, in finding and destroying the Beast, and members of an enigmatic local family, the Chastels—father Jean Chastel and his two sons, Pierre and Antoine.

On August 16 at the forest of Mont Chauvet, the gamekeepers of princes asked the boys from La Besseyre-Saint-Mary if the area before them could be navigated safely on horseback.

The Chastels said yes, likely knowing the area referred to was actually a bog.

The first royal horseman’s mount became mired in the morass, panicked, and jettisoned its rider, much to the amusement of the Chastels.

The incident ended badly, at gunpoint, and with the Chastels thrown in jail until François Antoine’s departure in November.

Despite the misadventure, other locals were impressed with François Antoine if not the other envoys from court. During his stay, the gentleman requested that Catholic masses be said in support of the communities and he contributed personally to church charities. 

Touched by the poverty and hard lot of the peasants of the Gévaudan, François Antoine proposed a fireworks display to celebrate the feast day of Saint Louis, which occurs on August 25. (Louis IX [1214–1270], reformer and Crusader, was the only king of France to become a saint.)

At first worried they might be taxed for this event, the peasants relaxed after assurances this would not be so. Some brought forth foodstuffs and even wine they kept hidden from tax collectors to share with the man sent to help them by a far-away king.

Using fireworks he’d set aside to use in flushing the Beast from the forest, François Antoine and his assistants presented a grand spectacle. The loud and colorful pyrotechnics (which until the Revolution evinced the power of the crown) awed the countryfolk.

As a subject and servant of Louis XV himself, here on a mission he knew he was expected to wrap up very, very soon, François Antoine felt an affinity for these souls.

“We will soon destroy this Beast!” he shouted at the end of the show.

Most of the paysans could not understand his French, but smiled and nodded, the kaleidoscope of fleeting lighting effects lingering in their minds and thunder of explosions echoing in their ears.

The cause of the show, the Beast, had also observed it from not-so-far away, more curious than frightened.

Days later, a big wolf was killed at the end of August,  and, as nearly one year ago, when a similar wolf was killed on September 20, 1764, the question was on everyone’s mind: Had the Beast been destroyed at last?

Illustration: "Furttenbach Feuerwerk" by Joseph Furttenbach (1591-1667). Licensed under Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons - https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Furttenbach_Feuerwerk.jpg#/media/File:Furttenbach_Feuerwerk.jpg

Marie-Jeanne Valet, “Maid of the Gévaudan”

A sculpture of Marie-Jeanne Valet battling the Beast

Two hundred fifty years ago today, in the mid- to late morning of August 11, 1765, a young woman named Marie-Jeanne Valet, 19 or 20 years old, and her sister Thérèse, 16 or 17, were attacked by the Beast. 

Marie-Jeanne was a servant of the curate, or clergyman, of the parish of Paulhac. She and Thérèse were crossing the river Desges on their way to the community’s tithe farm. (Local peasants contributed a tithe, or one-tenth, of their output for the support of the local church and cleric; the crops, etc., were kept separately in a tithe barn.)

The Beast, lurking in the underbrush along the river banks, spotted the girls, and flung itself at Marie-Jeanne. 

Luckily, the sensible young woman had brought along a spear, “a pole with a blade, about six inches long and an inch wide, at the end of it,” per Beast chronicler Abbé Pierre Pourcher.

She used it.

Marie-Jeanne in action; she was called an "Amazon" and compared to Joan of Arc, the Maid of Orleans.

Marie-Jeanne Valet impaled the Beast with her weapon, actually pushing it over, all the while shouting for help, along with her sister. According to the accounts and letters presented by the Abbé, the creature retreated, “cried out very loudly and held her paw in front of the wound,” then “threw herself in the river, where she rolled over several times” before disappearing.

Later, when questioned by authorities, the girls described the Beast as being the size of a large farm dog. It was gray with a white chest and black back, they said. Its front was bigger than its rear. It had a big flat head and big teeth.

The authorities examined Marie-Jeanne’s spear and noted that the shaft of the weapon was coated in two to three inches of blood. The intrepid Marie-Jeanne was an “Amazon,” according to the press. Royal gunbearer François Antoine, impressed with her bravery and composure, called her as a second Joan of Arc, the Maid of Orleans. The girls, meanwhile, being uneducated, could not sign the statements documenting their experience.  

Today one may view a sculpture (pictured in this post) commemorating the valor of Marie-Jeanne Valet in a windswept churchyard in Auvers, France.