Louis Antoine, Duke of Angoulême
Louis Antoine of France, Duke of Angoulême was the elder son of Charles X and the last Dauphin of France from 1824 to 1830. He is identified by the Guinness World Records as the shortest-reigning monarch, reigning for less than 20 minutes during the July Revolution, but this is not backed up by historical evidence. He never reigned over the country, but after his father's death in 1836, he was the legitimist pretender as Louis XIX.
Louis Antoine, Duke of Angoulême
The young duke with his siblings and mother, the Countess of Artois (by Charles Le Clercq, c. 1780–1782)
Louis-Antoine by Rosalie Filleul, c. 1781
Faience plate celebrating the Duke of Angoulême as Admiral of France. On display at the Musée national de la Marine, Paris.
Charles X was King of France from 16 September 1824 until 2 August 1830. An uncle of the uncrowned Louis XVII and younger brother of reigning kings Louis XVI and Louis XVIII, he supported the latter in exile. After the Bourbon Restoration in 1814, Charles became the leader of the ultra-royalists, a radical monarchist faction within the French court that affirmed absolute monarchy by divine right and opposed the constitutional monarchy concessions towards liberals and the guarantees of civil liberties granted by the Charter of 1814. Charles gained influence within the French court after the assassination of his son Charles Ferdinand, Duke of Berry, in 1820 and succeeded his brother Louis XVIII in 1824.
Portrait c. 1825
Charles Philippe with his younger sister Clotilde on a goat
Charles as Count of Artois in 1798. Portrait by Henri-Pierre Danloux
Portrait of the Count of Artois (future Charles X) in the habit of the Order of the Holy Spirit, by Antoine-François Callet, c. 1775