CHANGING IDENTITIES

What happens when a spy becomes the subject of other people's investigations? Nige Tassell delves into the life of the Chevalier d'Éon - the French master of disguise who defied conventional notions of gender

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After decades of speculation, gossip and even gambling on the matter, in 1810 it was an elderly Londoner called Mrs Cole who finally discovered the truth. For the previous 14 years, this widow had shared an apartment with a French spinster, the Chevalière d'Éon. During the last few of those years, the chevalière - the female equivalent of a chevalier, or knight - was largely bedbound. Both women were in their early eighties; both also lived in poverty and suffered poor health. Now, on 21 May 1810, at the age of 81, the Frenchwoman was dead.

Unsurprisingly, it was Mrs Cole who found the body. Mourning the passing of her friend and flatmate, she solemnly began to prepare the corpse to receive visitors, aiming to provide some dignity in death. As she changed the deceased's clothes, Mrs Cole made a startling revelation: the chevalière was very much in possession of male genitalia.

The French flatmate had told a convincing tale: that they had been born female but due to social restrictions of the time had been raised as a boy. As an adult, they had fought as a soldier, and had been free to revert to 'her' biological sex only after retiring from public life. Now it appeared that the opposite had been true. This was the final twist in an action-packed life.

Mrs Cole sought a second opinion a dozen opinions, actually, including those of surgeons and professors of anatomy who visited the property. Yes, her friend had narrow, feminine hips and an unobtrusive Adam's apple, but all of these experts came to the same conclusion: that the chevalière had actually been a chevalier all along.

THE KING'S SECRET