LOUIS FRANcOIS DE BOURBON, prince de Conti (1717-1776), only son of the preceding, saw his first fighting in Bohemia in 1741. He was appointed to command the army in Italy, where he forced the pass of Villafranca and won the battle of Coni in i744. In 1745 he was sent to check the Imperialists in GermanY, and in 1746 was transferred to the Netherlands, where some jealousy between Marshal Saxe and himself led to his retirement in 1747. In this year a faction among the Polish nobles offered Conti the crown of that country, and was supported by Louis XV. Although Conti did not secure the Polish throne he remained in the confidence of Louis until 1755, when his influence was destroyed by the intrigues of Madame de Pompadour. When the Seven Years' War broke out in 1756 he was refused the com mand of the army of the Rhine, and began the opposition to the administration which caused Louis to refer to him as "my cousin the advocate." In 1771 he was prominent in opposition to the chancellor Maupeou. He supported the parlements against the ministry, was especially active in his hostility to Turgot, and was suspected of aiding a rising which took place at Dijon in 1775. Conti, who died on Aug. 2, 1776, inherited literary tastes from his father, was a brave and skilful general, and a diligent student of military history. His house, over which the comtesse de Boufflers presided, was the resort of many men of letters, and he was a patron of Jean Jacques Rousseau.
Louis FRANcOIS JOSEPH, prince de Conti (1734-1814), son of the preceding, distinguished himself during the Seven Years' War. He took the side of Maupeou in the struggle between the chan cellor and the parlements, and in 1 788 declared that the integrity of the constitution must be maintained. He left France in 1789, but returned in 179o. Arrested by order of the National Conven tion in 1793, he was acquitted, but his estates were confiscated. The Directory banished him from France, but he took no part in royalist intrigues, and lived in retirement at Barcelona till his death in 1814, when the house of Conti became extinct.
See G. Tallemant des Reaux, Historiettes (1854-6o) • R. L. Marquis d'Argenson, Journal et memoires (1859-65) ; E. Boutaric, Corre spondence secrete de Louis XV. sur politique etrangere 0866); L. de R. duc de Saint Simon, Memoires (1873) ; P. Foncin, Essai sur le ministere de Turgot (1877) ; E. Bourgeois, Nachatel et la politique prussienne en Franche-Comte (1877) ; F. de Bassompierre, Memoires (1877) ; F. J. de P. cardinal de Bernis, Memoires et lettres (1878) ; J. V. A. duc de Broglie, Le Secret du roi (1878) ; P. A. Cheruel, Histoire de la Minorite de Louis XIV. et du Ministere de Mazarin (1879) ; C. E. duchesse d'Orleans, Memoires (188o) .