Henri de Rothschild

Henri James Nathaniel Charles, Baron de Rothschild (26 July 1872 – 12 October 1947) was a French playwright who wrote under the pen names André Pascal, Charles des Fontaines, and P.-L. Naveau. He was also a licensed physician (although he never actually practiced medicine), a philanthropist, and an entrepreneur.

Early life Rothschild was born on 26 July 1872 in Paris, although he was a scion of the English branch of the Rothschild family. The play is essentially about "a rich man who meets with disillusion everywhere."

Upon the German invasion of France in 1940, Rothschild fled to Brazil. Under the 1942 antisemitic laws of Vichy France, "was to restore to him both his property and his citizenship." at the Grand Synagogue of Paris in the Rue de la Victoire. Together, they had three children:

James-Henri de Rothschild (1896–1984), who married Claude Dupont, a daughter of Capt. Dupont in 1923. After her death in 1964, he married Yvette Choquet in 1966. Nadine de Rothschild (1898–1958), who married Adrien Thierry, then counselor of the French Embassy at London who was a son of Joseph Thierry, the French Minister of Public Works and Minister of Finance, in 1919. Philippe de Rothschild (1902–1988), who married Élisabeth Pelletier de Chambure in 1935. After her death in the Ravensbruck concentration camp in 1945, he married Pauline Fairfax Potter in 1954.

The Baroness de Rothschild, a noted philanthropist, died in 1926. Baron de Rothschild died on 12 October 1947 at his estate, Castel Beau Cèdre in Jouxtens-Mézery, Vaud, Switzerland.

Residences

Hôtel Perrinet de Jars During World War I, he turned over Hôtel Perrinet de Jars (also known as the Hôtel Henri de Rothschild), his hôtel particulier on the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré in Paris, to the French government for its use during the conflict as a club for officers of the Allied armies. In 1920, after the war ended, he sold the hôtel to the Cercle de l'Union interalliée (for the equivalent of today's €1,067,143).

Château de la Muette

Towards the end of the war, Rothschild acquired two large lots in Paris that contained the Château de la Muette. The old château was demolished in the 1920s and Rothschild had a new château built there between 1921 and 1922 as his Paris residence to a 19th-century design by Lucien Hesse.

The château was appropriated by Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine during World War II. During the Liberation of Paris in August 1944, the château was captured after a brief gunfight by the British '30 Assault Unit' keen on gathering vital intelligence. In late 1945 United States Army took over the buildings to organise operations in the aftermath of the war. After Rothschild's death in 1947, his heirs sold it to the Organization for European Economic Co-operation in 1949 for use as their headquarters. The OEEC developed into the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in 1961 and the château remains their headquarters.

The "Rue André Pascal" street on which the cour d'honneur of the château opens is named after one of the pseudonyms under which Henri de Rothschild published his literary works.

Abbaye des Vaux de Cernay

In 1903, Rothschild inherited the Abbaye des Vaux de Cernay in Cernay-la-Ville in the Vallée de Chevreuse from his grandmother Charlotte. She had bought the Abbey in 1878, at the time only a ruins of a Cistercian abbey that had been built in 1118. She undertook extensive restoration work and new construction to make the lakeside property into a country home. Upon Henri inheriting the property, he further updated the residence and used it for his experiments in child nutrition.

In November 1942, Henri and his son 1,800 acre property in Vaux de Cernay was expropriated under the antisemitic laws of Vichy France. The Abbey was sold at auction to the industrialist and aircraft manufacturer Félix Amiot, who moved his private offices there.

Château des Fontaines

Upon his 1895 marriage, Not completed at the time of his father's death in 1881, it was finished by his mother in 1882.

Although he was the owner of the château, Henri rarely visited and it remained his mother's summer residence until her death in 1931. Henri's son, Philippe, however, reportedly spent his summers at the château with his grandmother. It was also occupied by the Nazis during World War II, and was sold to the Jesuits in 1946 who set up a library and research center there. It was acquired by the consulting firm Capgemini in 1998 and remains owned by them to this day.

Castel Beau Cèdre Rothschild also acquired Castel Beau Cèdre (also known as Castel Beau Cidri), an estate in Jouxtens-Mézery, Vaud, Switzerland. Also on the estate was a working farm with buildings constructed between 1872 and 1891 by the agronomist Gustave Auberjonois. Rothschild furnished the house with furniture supplied to Princess Pauline Borghèse for her Paris residence at Hôtel Borghèse and later acquired by the Duke of Wellington as the British Embassy in Paris.