La Loge de Juste

The late Malcolm Davies' The Grand Lodge of Adoption, La Loge de Juste, The Hague, 1751: A short lived experiment in mixed Freemasonry or a victim of elegant exploitation [1] is probably one of the most interesting papers that I've read in the last two years. It shines a beam into the world of Freemasonry and the Baptiste Anselme family which briefly illuminates the machinations of the eighteenth century theatre.

We know that many of the males in the first generation of the d'Egville family which were born in the United Kingdom were Freemasons. Although I've not yet found any references to Pierre Hervey d'Aigueville being a Mason his employer, David Garrick, certainly was a significant figure in Freemasonry.

A Peter Dagueville, dancing master, was was proposed for initiation into the British Union Lodge, Ipswich, on 4th November 1783. He is likely to have been the father of two infants named Peter Harvey Dagueville (1784-1786) (1787-1788) whom were both buried in Ipswich.

I'm tentatively identifying him as the Pierre Hervez d'Aigueville who married Margaret Benton in Portsea in 1774 and suggesting that he is Peter/Pierre d'Aigueville's first son - perhaps from an earlier marriage. He is probably named after his grandfather, as Fanny (Françoise), who is likely to be his first daughter by Sophia, is named after Françoise Gravillon who was her maternal grandmother. 

La Loge de Juste is the earliest mixed lodge for which records survive. Jean Baptiste Anselme and his wife Françoise Gravillon were both members along with other members of the French Theatre in the Hague.

Signatures: Including Baptiste Anselme and Gravillon Baptiste.

[1] Women's agency and rituals in mixed and female Masonic orders (2008) edited by Alexandre Heidle, Jan A.M. Snoek.