Precautions for the Journey of the Prisoners from Pignerol to Exiles.
Versailles, June 9th, 1681.
I sendyou the necessary grants, as Governor of Exiles, which the King has thought good to have sent to you. The intention of His Majesty is, that as soon as the room at Exiles, which youshall judge the most proper for the secure keeping of the two prisoners in the lower part of the tower, shall be in a state to receive them, you will send them out of the citadel of Pignerol in a litter, and conduct them there under the escort of your troop, for the march of whom the orders are hereunto joined: and immediately after the departure of the aforesaid prisoners, it is His Majesty’s intention that you should go to Exiles, to take possession of the government, and to make it, for the future, your residence.
And because His Majesty does not wish that the remainder of the prisoners at present under your charge, who are to remain in the citadel of Pignerol should be left to the care of a Captain of a Battalion, who may be changed from day to day, I address to you an order from the King to have the Sieur de Villebois recognized as Commandant of the aforesaid citadel of Pignerol, until the return of M. de Rissan, or the arrival of the person whom His Majesty shall entrust with the command of the aforesaid citadel. In case the health of the aforesaid Sieur de Rissan does not permit him to return there, you will, if you please, acquaint the aforesaid Sieur de Villebois with it, towhom the Sieur du Channoy has orders to pay two crowns a day, for the support of those three prisoners.
You will see by the orders of the King hereunto joined, that your company is to be reduced to forty-five men, to commence from the 15th of this month; and by the statement which accompanies them, the footing upon which it is to be paid, as well as what the King has ordered you for the subsistence of the two before-named prisoners, whom His Majesty expects that you will guard with the same exactitude you have made use of hitherto. Therefore, it only remains for me to recommend you to give me, from time to time, intelligence respecting them.
With regard to the effects belonging to the Sieur Matthioli, which are in your possession, you will have them taken to Exiles, in order to be given back to him, if ever His Majesty should order him to be set at liberty.
You will receive the orders I have mentioned by the first occasion.
De Louvois.315
315From the Archives of France.