| Surname | Perregaux, veuve Clerc, née Wattenwyl, de | |
| First Name | Catherine-Françoise | |
| Gender | female | |
| Place of birth | Bonmont | |
| Place of death | Valangin (NE) | |
| Year of birth | 1645 | |
| Year of death | 1714 | |
| Profession | ||
| Religion | Protestant | |
| Place(s) of activity | ||
| Century | 17 / 18 | |
| Biographical information | Daughter of Gabriel (Bailiff of Bonmont and Oron) and Barbara, née Wattenwyl. In 1669 she married Abraham Le Clerc, a pastor in Därstetten. After his death she married Samuel Perregaux, a clerk and future Master-Bourgeois of Valangin. Accused of high treason for espionage in the service of Louis XIV, she was tortured and sentenced to death in Bern in 1690. Her family managed to get her sentence commuted to banishment for life. | |
| Title | Memoire de Madame Perregaux née de Watteville (1645-1714) veuve du ministre Clerc | |
| Genre / Art |
|
|
| Additional genre details | Memoirs | |
| Period writen | 1714 | |
| Period covered | 1645-1714 | |
| Format / Language | French, copy made by Angletine Effinguer de Wildegg, born Charrière de Sévery | |
| Physical description | notebook, 16.5 x 20.5 cm, 52 pages |
| Content |
After briefly tracing the story of her family and writing about her childhood — when she was more interested in "seeing swords, and hearing guns" than having fun with "dolls & other toys" (p. 4) — she recounts a first marriage proposal that was outlawed by the Bernese authorities due to her fiancé being of a different denomination. Subsequently, she was "victim" (p.10) of a marriage arranged by her parents, guardian and Monsieur Le Clerc (pastor of the French church in Berne). After four years of marriage she persuaded her husband to move to the countryside, but when he died from plague thirteen years later she was forced to return to the city. It was there she married Monsieur Perregaux, with whom she had her first child. She then writes of her arrest and torture, having been accused of treason for providing her services to the French ambassador in Switzerland. Initially sentenced to death, it was commuted to banishment for life when her parents appealed to the judges. The author concludes with an account of the Neuchâtel political events that accompanied the arrival of Marie de Nemours as head of the Principality. She also evokes her own terrible health brought on by the torture she endured. |
| Place of deposit | ACV |
| Classification | P Charrière de Sévery Ch 2 |
| Document | |
| Transcription | |
| Restrictions | needed |
| Edition(s) |
"Mémoire de Madame Perregaux née de Wattewille, présenté en 1714 à Monsieur le comte du Luc, ambassadeur de France en Suisse", Archiv des Historischen Vereins des Kantons Bern, 1867, p. 71-168. |
| Secondary litterature |
Grellet, Pierre, La vie cavalière de Catherine de Watteville, agente secrète de Louis XIV en Suisse, Lausanne : Spes, 1928 Bichsel, Therese, Catherine von Wattenwyl : Amazone, Pfarrfrau une Spionin, Bern : Zytglogge, 2004. BICHSEL Thérèse, Catherine de Watteville. Du château d'Oron à la cour de Versailles. Editions de l'Aire, 2013. |
| Other sources | |
| Related documents | |
| Author | FF |
