Louise de Maisonblanche

Louise Mary-Antoinette Josèphe Jane de Bourbon-Maisonblanche, Baroness of La Queue (Paris, 17 June 1676 – La Queue-les-Yvelines, 12 September 1718), was an illegitimate daughter of Louis XIV of France and Claude de Vin des Œillets, the called Mademoiselle des Œillets, who was the lady-in-waiting to Madame de Montespan, Louis' long term mistress.

Born in Paris in 1676, she was one of many illegitimate children that Louis XIV had. She was officially declared daughter of Philippe de Maisonblanche, old Captain of the Guards, and of Lady Gabrielle de La Tour, his spouse. Brought up in Paris by her mother, she did not receive the same attention that the daughters of Madame de Montespan and Louise de La Vallière did. She lived for a while at the château de Suisnes where her mother died in 1687 aged 50. Louise was then put in the care of François Le Signerre and her sister Catherine Le Signerre in Mulcent.

Louise remained confined at Mulcent with the Le Signerre sisters till the age of 20 in 1696. On 17 April that year, she married Bernard de Prez, Baron of La Queue. He was the lieutenant to the regiment of Burgundy. The Abbé de Brisacier undertook the service which was overseen by Alexandre Bontemps, the first gentleman of the chamber of Louise's father, Louis XIV. It was Bontemps who secured the small dowry of 40,000 Livres along with silver and jewels for the bride. This dowry was nothing compared to the dowries of her other half sisters; the Dowager Princess of Conti (1666–1739) who married Louis Armand de Bourbon in 1680 was given 1 Million Livres as did the Duchess of Bourbon who married in 1685 to Louis de Bourbon. In 1692 another sister the Françoise-Marie de Bourbon married Philippe d'Orléans and had been given 2 Million Livres as well as the Palais-Royal in Paris.