**The future king Louis-Philippe, incognito as a teacher in Reichenau, points at the globe.** Swiss National Museum

The royal philanderer

Louis-Philippe (1773–1850), Duke of Orléans and the man who would eventually become King of the French, spent some time in Switzerland after fleeing the turmoil that followed the French Revolution. He lived in the cantons of Zurich, Zug, Aargau and Graubünden – and his story continues to inspire Swiss novelists to this day.

Michael van Orsouw

Michael van Orsouw has a PhD in history and is a performance poet and author. He regularly publishes historical books.

Website: geschichte-texte.ch

This is the curious story of a man who was probably one of the worst teachers of all time. He taught a subject in which he was not well-versed, and in a language that none of his pupils understood. On top of which, he got the school cook pregnant. The name of this teacher was Louis Chabos and, early in the morning of 24 October 1793, he arrived on foot at the boarding school in Reichenau in the canton of Graubünden. Chabos was given accommodation in a gloomy room in the side wing of the castle in which the institution was housed. That evening, the school’s director introduced ‘Monsieur Chabos’ to the 15 boarders. The new teacher dressed in elegant shirts and luxurious neckcloths, taught geometry in the mornings and arithmetic or geography in the afternoons. Because he spoke only French, the school administration assigned him just one pupil. But this was no real teacher and his name was not ‘Louis Chabos’. It was Louis-Philippe and he was the Duke of Orléans. He had come to Reichenau after having fled his own country. Despite his blue blood, Louis-Philippe had sympathised with the French Revolution in 1789. Only 16 at the time, he was so fired up by political events that he joined the revolutionary army.

**A dashing fellow and lover: Louis-Philippe as a young man, painted in 1792 by Léon Cogniet.** Château de Versailles

But Louis-Philippe soon found himself caught up in the political turmoil into which France had been thrust. He became implicated in a plot to overthrow the state, but the attempted putsch failed, leaving the ambitious young man with no option other than to flee the country as quickly as possible. Louis-Philippe chose to escape to Switzerland and arrived in Schaffhausen on 26 April 1793, where he was reunited with his sister Adélaïde d’Orléans and her governess Countess Stéphanie-Félicité de Genlis. Together, they made their way to Zurich on 6 May and took up residence at the ‘zum Schwert’ guesthouse, one of the foremost establishments in Zurich during that era (now at Weinplatz 10). Zurich was bustling with French exiles at the time. And they recognised Louis-Philippe and Adélaïde d’Orléans when they saw them on the streets. One of them purposely caught his spur in part of the duchess’s dress, leaving a tear in her gauzy skirt. Frightened to death, especially at the thought that next time more than their clothing could be damaged, Louis-Philippe, Adélaïde and the countess immediately made plans to depart.

A deliberate attack and document forgery

The next place the émigrés sought refuge was the small town of Zug, where they arrived on 14 May 1793. They moved into a grand villa on the slopes of the Zugerberg (named Tschuopis, it would later become the Blumenhof on Zugerbergstrasse 28b). While the townspeople were well aware of the new residents, they mistook them for an Irish family. This suited the French aristocrats just fine, as it meant they were left in peace. With his thirst for action however, Louis-Philippe could not resist dropping into the Hotel Ochsen on Kolinplatz square from time to time for a spot of dinner or an evening tipple. But many French exiles passed through Zug. And so it did not take long before Duke Louis-Philippe was once again recognised by a fellow countryman.

**The royal place of refuge in Zug: today, it is somewhat tucked away on Zugerbergstrasse.** Michael van Orsouw

On 26 June, at 10.15 pm, a stone the size of a fist came flying through the window pane, fortunately only hitting Duchess Adélaïde’s hat. Yet another stone smashed a tile on the heating stove. The next morning, Louis-Philippe discovered that two of his horse harnesses had been cut into tiny pieces, an incident the countess labelled ‘a truly atrocious piece of malevolence’. Louis-Philippe, Adélaïde and the countess immediately moved to Bremgarten on the River Reuss. The prince found a hideaway at Antonigasse 14, while Adélaïde and her governess were taken in at St. Clare’s Convent. But in Bremgarten, as in Zurich and Zug, it was the same story all over again: Duke Louis-Philippe feared for his life. And so he fled once more, to Reichenau in Graubünden, where he went incognito as a ‘teacher’.

**Reichenau Castle on a hand-coloured print by Rudolf Dikenmann.** Swiss National Museum

After the excitement of revolutionary Paris, Louis-Philippe ‒ now finding himself in a village in Graubünden with no real duties to discharge ‒ grew bored and took up with Marianne Banzori, the school’s Italian cook. Shortly thereafter it became plain for all to see that the cook was pregnant. This had serious consequences for the courting couple: Marianne Banzori was sent back to Italy, where she gave birth to her baby in Milan. Given the father’s absence and the mother’s lack of prospects for earning a living, the baby ended up being placed in an orphanage. Louis-Philippe was also forced to leave the school. He moved back to Bremgarten for nine months, living under the pseudonym ‘Adjudant Corby’. But his true identity was discovered yet again. Following the incidents in Zurich, Zug, Reichenau and now also in Bremgarten, Louis-Philippe decided the time had come for him to seek pastures new. To enable the nobleman to travel unmolested, Franz Josef Müller, Zug’s official Secretary, issued him with a fake passport. Unable to think of any other name to enter in the papers, he chose his own. That is how Louis-Philippe came to travel to the Lapland region of Finland as ‘Franz Josef Müller’. There, Louis-Philippe lived in a vicarage, retaining the innocuous alias of ‘Müller’. This time, he embarked on a love affair with the housekeeper, who promptly became pregnant. But Louis-Philippe had already moved on again before the baby was born.

**Louis Philippe as King of the French post-1830: a proud and mighty ruler. Portrait by Franz Xaver Winterhalter, circa 1840.** Château de Versailles

Becoming king and bestowing gifts

Louis-Philippe emerged unscathed from his amorous escapades. In 1830, he acceded to the throne in Paris, where he broke with tradition by calling himself ‘King of the French’ rather than ‘King of France’ like his predecessors. As king, Louis-Philippe’s policies gave no indication that he had spent time in exile in Switzerland. He disbanded the regiments of Swiss soldiers that fought under French colours and established the French Foreign Legion instead. A decision that was to massively curtail what had been a lucrative source of income for many Swiss patrician families. The Citizen King’s government also intervened in Swiss affairs in 1836 during wrangling over the extradition of a French spy named Conseil, who had been gathering information about French refugees in Switzerland. Tensions heightened again two years later. Prince Louis-Napoléon (later Napoleon III) had spent his younger years in Thurgau. But now, the French objected to him residing for any length on time on Swiss soil and threatened to invade over his disregard of their wishes. Some Swiss cantons immediately began to mobilise troops. The situation only de-escalated when Louis-Napoléon left Switzerland of his own accord.

**Policies as soap bubbles that were quick to burst: this was how King Louis-Philippe was caricatured.** Bibliothèque nationale de France

But Louis-Philippe had not forgotten those years he spent in Switzerland. Franz Josef Müller, the official from Zug who had issued the fake passport, was awarded the Cross of the Legion of Honour by the king in 1836 and gifted a gold snuff box encrusted with diamonds and bearing the king’s likeness, filled with French gold coins. Alois Damian Bossard, the landlord of the Hotel Ochsen in Zug, where Louis-Philippe had liked to dine on occasion, was given a splendid dinner service, along with an elegant coffee service from the royal porcelain manufactory. The Citizen King presented Reichenau Castle, from where he had been required to make a swift exit as a young man following the discovery of his lover’s pregnancy, with two paintings: the first shows Louis-Philippe as teacher ‘Monsieur Chabos’ standing in front of a globe in the classroom, the second as king, posing regally in a gala uniform.

**Elegant table service: gifted by the king to a hotelier in Zug.** Museum Burg Zug

Let us finish by recalling Louis-Philippe and Marianne Banzori’s son, who grew up in a Milan orphanage. The famous Swiss author Charles Lewinsky found the boy’s story so touching that he wrote his highly recommended novel ‘Sein Sohn’ (‘His Son’), imagining how it might have continued.

Visiting Royals – From Sisi to Queen Elizabeth

13.06.2025 09.11.2025 / National Museum Zurich

Although Switzerland has no royal tradition, royal families have long held a certain fascination for the Swiss. All royal visits, whether by an emperor, empress, king, queen, prince or princess, and for whatever reason, whether politics, business or personal, had one thing in common: they triggered – both then and now – immense excitement and fascination among the Swiss public. The exhibition demonstrates this through many pictures and exclusive possessions of these bluebloods.

More of: Exhibitions Royals Modern Age Politics

Further posts

The queen of watercolours

Michael van Orsouw 01.05.2025 In her day, Queen Victoria was the most powerful woman in the world. She came to Switzerland in 1868 to rest and recuperate, and made numerous sketches and paintings of the Swiss scenery. Many of these watercolours and drawings survive today.

An original by Queen Victoria: a view of Mount Titlis from Engelberg, painted on 2 September 1868.

Switzerland and the House of Windsor

Michael van Orsouw 01.06.2022 Queen Elizabeth II was at the head of the British Royal Family for 70 years. The House of Windsor maintains a close relationship with Switzerland – not politically, but on a more private level. Here we take a look behind at the scenes at the connection between the Swiss and the Royals.

Queen Elizabeth II’s state visit to Switzerland in 1980. Accompanied by Federal President Georges-André Chevallaz, the monarch inspects the guard of honour at Zurich-Kloten Airport.

Sisi the poetess and her long journey onto the bookshelf

Andrej Abplanalp 08.01.2021 Empress Elisabeth ‘Sisi’ of Austria-Hungary was also a poetess. Why her personal notes are in Switzerland’s Federal Archives, and why they remained unpublished until 1984...

The personal notes of the Austrian Empress have been kept in the Swiss Federal Archives since 1951.