Henriette Caillaux - Biography

Biography

Henriette Caillaux was born Henriette Raynouard, at Rueil-Malmaison on 5 December, 1874. At the age of 19, she married Léo Claretie, a writer twelve years her senior. They had two children. In 1907 she began having an affair with Joseph Caillaux while both he and she were still married. In 1908, she divorced Léo; Caillaux had more difficulties in divorcing his wife, but he eventually did so and they married in October 1911. Their joint assets were worth around 1.5 million francs, placing them amongst France's wealthiest couples.

While serving as Minister of Finance in the government of France, Caillaux came under bitter attack from his political foes. At a time when newspapers took political sides, the editor of the Le Figaro newspaper, Gaston Calmette, had been a severe critic. Calmette received a letter belonging to Caillaux that journalistic etiquette at the time dictated should not be published. The letter seemed to suggest that improprieties had been committed by Caillaux; in it he appeared to admit having orchestrated the rejection of a tax bill while publicly pretending to support its passage. Calmette proceeded to publish the letter at a time when Joseph Caillaux, in his capacity as Minister of Finance, was trying to get a progressive taxation law passed by the French Senate. The publication of his letter severely tarnished Caillaux's reputation and caused a great political upheaval.

Madame Caillaux believed that the only way for her husband to defend his reputation would be to challenge Calmette to a duel, which, one way or another, would destroy her and her husband's life. Madame Caillaux made the decision to protect her beloved husband by sacrificing herself.

At 5pm on 16 March 1914, she entered offices of Le Figaro, wearing a fur coat and with her hands in a fur muff., and asked to see Gaston Calmette. When told he was away but would return within an hour, she sat to wait. Calmette returned at 6pm with his friend, the novelist Paul Bourget and agreed to briefly see Madame Caillaux, to Bourget's surprise.

After being shown into Calmette's office, Madame Caillaux exchanged a few words with him, then pulled out a .32 Browning automatic pistol> she had been concealing within the muff and shot him six times. Calmette was hit four times and was critically wounded, dying six hours later. Caillaux made no attempt to escape and newspaper workers in adjoining offices quickly summoned a doctor and the police. She refused to be transported to the police headquarters in a police van, insisting on being driven there by her chauffeur in her own car, which was still parked outside. The police agreed to this and she was formerly charged upon reaching the headquarters.

Henriette Caillaux's trial dominated French public life. It featured a deposition from the president of the Republic, an unheard-of occurrence at a criminal proceeding almost anywhere, along with the fact that many of the participants were among the most powerful members of French society. At a time when feminism was still beginning to impact French society, most republican and socialist men paid no more than lip service to the feminist cause. However, it was this male chauvinism that actually proved Henriette Caillaux's best friend during the proceedings. She was defended by the prominent attorney Fernand Labori who convinced the jury that her crime, which she did not deny, was not a premeditated act but that her uncontrollable female emotions resulted in a crime of passion. With male beliefs that women were not as strong emotionally as men, on 28 July 1914, Madame Caillaux was acquitted.

In the early 1930s she got the diploma of the École du Louvre with a thesis on the sculptor Jules Dalou. She published a reference book in 1935 in which she established an inventory of the work of this artist.

She died in 1943.