Juliette Drouet

Juliette Drouet, born Julienne Josephine Gauvain (10 April 1806 – 11 May 1883), was a French actress. She abandoned her career on the stage after becoming the mistress of Victor Hugo, to whom she acted as a secretary and travelling companion. Juliette accompanied Hugo in his exile to the Channel Islands, and wrote thousands of letters to him throughout her life. 2Childhood and early years She was born Julienne Josephine Gauvain on 10 April 1806 in Fougères, Ille-et-Vilaine, the daughter of Julien Gauvain, a tailor, and Marie Marchandet, who was employed as a housemaid. She had two older sisters, Renee and Thérèse, and a brother Armand. Orphaned from her mother a few months after her birth, and her father the following year, Gauvain was raised by her uncle, René Drouet. She was educated in Paris at a religious boarding school and considered a precocious child, having learned to read and write at the age of five. At the age of ten, Gauvain was already proficient in literature and poetry. Around 1825, she became the mistress of sculptor James Pradier, who represented her in a statue symbolizing Strasbourg, at the Place de la Concorde in Paris. They had a daughter together, Clair