Marie Alexandrine d'Agon de la Contrie
was the daughter of François
Guillaume, and Louise Marie Fanélie Couppé du
Portblanc.
Her mother was born at Petit Canal de la Grande Terre (Guadeloupe) in
an old Breton family who had settled in Martinique and Guadeloupe at the end
of the XVII century.
Her father born in
1804 at Spire in the kingdom of Bavaria joined the Army as a volunteer in
1822 and ended his military career as Chef de Bataillon. He met his
wife during his posting in Guadeloupe (1837-1842). They married
in Petit Canal the
1st October 1839. In 1842 D'Agon returned to France settling with his family
in Brest where he died in 1853. Chevalier de la Legion d'Honneur in 1845.
His
father Louis Bernard Antoine was a lawyer and jurist. author of the classic
Ancien statuaire d'Alsace ou Recueil des actes de notoriété fournis
en 1738 et 1739 à M. de Corberon... sur les statuts, us et coutumes
locales de cette province, suivi d'une notice sur les emphytéoses, les
colonges, les locatairies perpétuelles Colmar : impr. de J. H. Decker,
1825.
Marie, had at least one older brother, Edmond
Joseph, born in 1842, died in July 1901. He joined the Navy aged 19 and became
a Navy administrative officer. In 1877-1879 he was in Sénégal
as aide-commissaire de la Marine at the same time as the explorer Louis-Parfait
Monteil and (as he was then) lieutenant Joseph Gallieni with whom he became close
friend. In 1881 he was posted, like his
father, to Guadeloupe where
he met and married Aline Paul Dubois de la Saussais d'Estreban (d. 1903) descendant
from a French Creole family. They had a daughter Jehanne
At a tender age Marie Alexandrine was sent to La
Maison d'Education de la Legion d'Honneur de Saint-Denis, a boarding institution
founded by Napoleon to educate the female relatives of Légionnaires.
The pupils entered the school between the age of six and twelve and
left at eighteen; they were
taught arithmetic, reading, writing, grammar, history, geography, cosmography,
botany, dance (as a form of physical activity) some domestic skills and
according to their talent they could receive design and music
lessons. Intensive religious education, prayers and daily masses were de
rigueur.
After completing
her education, in 1868, without any relatives in France to whom
she could return, (her mother was also dead) she remained at La Maison to become
part of the staff, which was organized in dames
postulantes au noviciat, dames novices, dames de 2me classe, dames de
1re classe, dignitaires,
under the direction of the Superintendante. The dames performed
the task of teachers, supervisors, pharmacists, proctors, concierges, nurses.
By 1871 Marie had reached the grade of dame
novice with a stipend of 400fr/year.
By all accounts she would have remained all her life at
St Denis, where no man was allowed to enter (with a few grand exceptions) but
in 1872 she was asked in marriage by Commandant Brunot. The Ministry of War
deemed her
credentials impeccable (daughter of a Légionnaire, grandaughter of an
eminent jurist) and though her dowry was too modest for the future wife of a
Navy officer it was considered sufficient to grant permission to marry. It was
a marriage arranged in the close-knit milieu of the creole families, maybe with
the input of her brother Edmond, but it proved to
be a happy one.
Thanks to l'Abbé Bethleem, who
so described her in the first edition of
"Romans à lire et à proscrire",
Marie D'Agon has been known
for years as "M.me
Brunot, femme du Commandant Brunot de l'Infanterie de Marine"
The elusive "commandant Brunot de l'infanterie
de Marine" is Colonel-Lieutenant
Napoléon François Ernest, born Fort-de-France, Martinique, in 1839.
son of Jacques, Commandeur de la Legion d'Honneur, Military Commander-Governor
of Martinique in 1853 and Marie Colombe Aglaé Goy.After un-promising beginnings
in the Army owing to his insubordination which earned him various disciplinary
actions, Brunot performed a distinguished military service with the 2e Régiment
d'Infanterie de Marine (RIMa). He took part to: two campaigns in Sénégal
(1858-1862)
with the Bataillon de Tiralleurs Sénégalais, two in Cochinchine (1863-1865)
the Prussian War 1870 with l'Armée
du Rhin, (he fought valiantly
at the battle of Bazeilles). He was made prisoner
in September 1870 at Sedan returning from captivity in 1871. Promoted Lieutenant-Colonel
in 1876. Chevalier Legion
d'Honneur in 1874
The Brunots married in Saint-Denis on the 12th of Nov. 1872.
They had four children Georges Léon Jacques (b.
1874) who became a colonial civil servant, Jacques
Edmond Paul Henri (b June 1876) who
died aged two months, Marie
Madeleine Juliette Fanélie, (b. Brest 1878 -
d. Saint-Germain-en-Laye 1976) who in 1901 married Auguste Cornet, Paul (b.1881), Richard
Edmond Maurice Edouard (b.
9 April 1883 Saint Ciers du Taillon
- d.Aix les Bains 1958).
After their marriage they settled in Brest,
20. rue Dalgesiras. In 1879 Brunot was again in Indochina in Saigon
returning to Brest in January 1880.
Commandant Brunot retired
in 1881. After a spell in Marseille (July 1881), the family moved to 8, Place
du Commerce Paris-Grenelle (1882) then to Saint Ciers du
Taillon Charente Inferieure (1882-1886) then to Le Bouscat nr. Bordeaux (1886-1891)
returning to Brest in 1891, rue du Chateau. Eventually they
moved to Versailles rue de la Bonne Aventure 24bis. Their
next-door neighbours were the Petitjeans de la Rosière, whose daughter
Marie Jeanne Henriette became known in literature as Delly. It is probable that
d'Agon knew of Marie Petitjean's literary ambitions and may have introduced
her to Henri Gautier, the publisher of Delly's Dans les
ruines in 1903.
D'Agon divided her time between the social
obligations of a military wife and the care of her family (which during their
time in Marseille included her father-in-law who died aged 84 in 1883) with the
help of just one maid who in 1901 was one Reine Le Sergeant. Though
she had been for many years a very popular writer, one of Blériot
flagships, she appears as "sans profession" in the 1901 census,
a clear indication of how in her time female writers, receiving little recognition,
did not consider their activity to be a profession.
Owing to her family commitments d'Agon
started writing late in life. after her chidren began their secondary education.
She immediately established herself as a successful writer: she won
the prize of the Société d'Encouragement au Bien for
Les Colères du bouillant Achille. Her first books Reconnaissance ed.
Société française
d'éditions d'art. and Marjolaine, ed. May & Mantoux. were
published in 1890.
She dedicated some of her books to grandaugthers,
nieces and children of family friends
- Marjolaine: (ca 1890) "... à ma
nièce,
Jehanne D'Agon de la Contrie .."
- Miss Bengali: "A
ma petite-fille, Jeanne Cornet. Ce livre a été terminé le
jour même de ta naissance ! Quand tu seras assez grande pour le lire, tu
ne seras pas plus chérie que tu ne l'es à cette première
heure de ta vie par ta grand'mère" M. D'Agon de la Contrie à Versailles
, le 22 Novembre 1901 "
- Le fils du cordier: 9 Éd.
Imp. 37, rue Gandon, Paris, 1902 "A Marie
la Prairie, Je t'offre ce livre, ma chère petite fille, parce qu'on y
parle de ton pays natal ; parce que tu y verras que les enfants de "marsouins" sont
bons et généreux ; et puis, surtout, parce que je t'aime très
maternellement", Versailles, le 6 Janvier 1902" (Gabrielle Sophie
Marie la Prairie, born in Brest 1888, was the daughter of Brunot fellow officer
Paul La Prairie, Lt Colonel 2e RIMa. She died in 1976.)
- Fraternité,
Société française d'éditions d'Art, 1900 : "A Marie-Louise Accary"
(Born in Versailles in 1885, Marie Louise Charlotte was the daughter of Léon
Accary Controleur Générale de l'Armée)
Contributions: Mon Journal,
Les Veillées des Chaumieres (es. La
Dette de Noëlle, 1907), L'Ouvrier, Semaine de Suzette, Le Journal
de la Jeunesse
She wrote also under the name Mme Brunot: La
Revanche de François Talence,
1905 and Les Victoires de mademoiselle Laurence, 1904 both published
by Librairie nationale d'éducation et de récréation.
D'Agon shared with Roger Dombre the honour
of launching La Semaine. The first episode of her novel Pauvre
Charlotte — which takes place in Guadeloupe — inaugurated
La Semaine de Suzette no1,
feb. 1905.
The author was thus introduced by the publisher: "... cet écrivain
qui depuis des longues années,
exploite au profit de la jeunesse les trésors d'une imagination féconde
et colorée et qui mieux que personne, sait glisser le bon précepte
sous les attraits de l'action captivante."
The Brunots moved once more, this time to Dordogne
at Périgueux where the Commandant died on
29 July 1908. Mme d'Agon died probably the same year.
The family connection with the colonies continued
with the next generations: Richard Brunot, a Law graduate, entered the colonial
administration and became Gouverneur général des Colonies,
Senator for Mauritania at the Assemblée Nationale, Conseiller de la
République de Mauritanie 1946-1948.
As late as the Fifties the Cornets were in
West Africa; in 1976 two male descendants Jean-Luc, Marie, Léon Cornet,
b. 15 Aug. 1954 at Kaya (Haute-Volta ), and Jean- Michel, Georges, Marie Cornet,
b. 12 sept. 1956 at Versailles applied to have the surname d'Agon de la Contrie
added to Cornet.
(sources: Abbé Bethléem,
1928 & Mnémosyne, & SedeSu & La
guerre de 1870-71, L'armée de Chalons and Philippe Castel ENTRAIDE FDA78, & Base
Leonore, with thanks to Jean Luc Buard for kindly supplying Brunot's military
dossier)
