Jean-François Parot is a historian and a specialist in eighteenth century Paris. He wrote his thesis using the legal archives of Paris and this enables him to imbue the fictional world of Nicolas Le Floch with a glittering realism. He makes full use of his detailed knowledge of the mysteries and customs of the era.

As in all the books of the series, the historical figure of Antoine de Sartine features prominently in The Nicolas Le Floch Affair. Sartine was Lieutenant General of Police in Paris from 1759 until 1774 and is best known for being the man who imprisoned the Marquis du Sade. He was also known however for his huge collection of wigs of which he was enormously proud. At the start of Parot’s series young Nicolas Le Floch begins his career in the police working for Sartine on special investigations. Over the course of the books Sartine comes to rely on Le Floch as his right-hand man. In The Nicolas Le Floch Affair, Nicolas is accused of murdering his own mistress in a move that is designed to discredit both Le Floch and Sartine.

In real life, as Lieutenant General of Police, Sartine was the de facto administrator of Paris for the fifteen years of his tenure. He greatly improved all aspects of life in Paris and operated the best secret police in Europe. This was generally admired, but Sartine was criticised for using his police service to spy on honest citizens as well as criminals. His service would routinely open private letters and that was how Sartine became aware of various scandals, particularly sexual scandals.

Monsieur de Sartine’s Journal des Inspecteurs of 1863, shows how prostitution flourished in all its forms and across practically all social classes and districts of Paris. The trade of prostitution came with every sort of pimping from the well-appointed brothels, which also offered gaming and theatre, to the procurer or ‘Madame’ operating out of a bedroom. These enterprising souls often also acted as moneylenders.

Young orphaned girls were frequently forced to turn to prostitution as the only possible way of earning money or finding a roof over their heads. Some girls were prostituted by their mothers, if money was tight. The lucky ones were taken up by a rich benefactor, although they were then completely dependent on the whims of that benefactor. A few became adept at playing one suitor off another and in this way were able to life comfortably in some style.

The following short extracts from Sartine’s Journal describe some of these girls.

Anne Lalleand, native of Sedan, twenty years old, orphan.

In life, her father was a sword-cutler in the above-mentioned town. Came to Paris four years ago, brought there by a young artisan, name unknown, of the Dragoon regiment of Apchon, who took her virginity and abandoned her as soon as they arrived in Paris, leaving her with a few louis, that were soon used up.

Not knowing where else to lay her head, she was very happy to be taken in as a boarder by Madame Lefebvre, who maintained a house of ill repute at the Saint-Anne toll-gate. There she spent three years exercising the practices of her newfound trade.

She was rescued from the house by a young man named Dainse, the son of an

advocate and officer in the Picardie Regiment and set up in a furnished room in Rue des Bons-Enfants. As Monsieur Dainse did not have sufficient means to support her however, she was obliged, despite the great love she felt for him, to hire herself out to various brothels.

Mademoiselle Fangor, a native of Zealand, eighteen years of age.

After living in Paris for two years and circulating amongst the houses of ill repute, she made the acquaintance of one Monsieur Pérault, a major general in the Canadian militia. Monsieur Pérault installed her in a clothes merchant’s house in Rue Saint-Honoré, with all her own furniture, and in addition gave her twenty-five louis a month for her food and expenses. But far from the young lady being thankful for her fate, she spent all she had in the company of a certain Monsieur de Belcourt, officer of the Guyenne regiment, known as a brilliant officer but a very bad citizen. He was flung into the prison of For-l‘Évêque for having slaughtered Mademoiselle Maillard at Mademoiselle’s Fangor’s lodgings.

Mademoiselle Thierry, a native of Paris and daughter of a tinsmith of Rue du Roi de Sicile, about twenty-four years old.

Tall with a perfect figure and the most beautiful eyes in the world, she could have been a great beauty had her features not been enlarged by smallpox. It was nevertheless claimed that she had the most beautiful body ever seen. She had been a prostitute since the age of fifteen. It had been one of her father’s workmen who had taken her virginity. But shortly afterwards she was taken up by a policeman who took her to his village where she stayed for a few months. At the end of that period, she returned to Paris starving. In order to sustain herself she was obliged to haunt the brothels, and Brissault made use of her for six months.

She was taken up by a Monsieur Leclerc, who rented a beautiful, fashionably furnished apartment for her on Rue d’Orléans, which must have set him back a huge amount each month. Might one not therefore imagine that the girl would be forever grateful to him for hauling her out of her miserable circumstances and providing her with such luxury? Not a bit of it – women of that type are almost all ungrateful. She rewarded him by sharing her bed with the Prince de Conti.

Source: Extraits de Documents inédits sur le règne de Louis XV. Journal des inspecteurs de M. de Sartines … 1761 – 1764, Paris-Bruxelles, 1863

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