), Ernest Beaux's half-brother by his father's first wife, Adelaide Fiurth (1842–1879), began as a clerk with the Moscow trading house of Muir and Mirrielees.

In 1898, A. Rallet and Company, with approximately 1500 employees and 675 products, was sold to the French perfume house Chiris of La Bocca.

After his obligatory two years of military service in France, he returned to Moscow in 1902, where he started his perfumery training at Rallet under the guidance of their technical director, A. Lemercier.

While serving in the French military, Ernest Beaux's perfumer colleagues at Rallet fled during Russia's October Revolution to La Bocca, France, to continue working with Chiris.

[13] In 1918 he was working as a counter-intelligence officer on the British-French concentration camp of Mudyug island, interrogating Bolsheviks captured by the White Russian and Allied armies.

In 1912, Ernest Beaux married Iraïde de Schoenaich[15] (1881–1961), who gave birth to their son, Edouard[16] (1913–1993), the following year.

They reached France by sea following a dangerous two-month-long voyage, during which time Iraïde fell deeply in love with another man.

In 1920, with the help of the Grand Duke Dmitri Pavlovich of Russia (1891–1941), a companion of Coco Chanel (1883–1971), he arranged a meeting in Cannes late in the summer of 1920, where he presented his current and former works to Mlle.

When Ernest Beaux asked her how she wanted to name that scent, she replied: "I always launch my collection on the 5th day of the 5th months, so the number 5 seems to bring me luck – therefore, I will name it 'Nº 5'".

'"[22] At the time of the interview, Beaux was not working on any new perfumes, according to the head of the Chanel fragrance house, Pierre Wertheimer.

"[23] Since Coco Chanel's breakthrough as couturier only took place in 1925 with her design of the little black dress, she felt taken advantage of by Wertheimer, and, after an attempt in World War II to use Nazi influence to seize control of the company from Jewish Wertheimer, fought against her own perfumes in creating competitive fragrances under her own name, for instance "Mademoiselle Chanel Nº 1" (1946), sold exclusively in her own shops.

In France this was prohibited by judicial action for counterfeiting, but Saks Fifth Avenue in New York and Neiman Marcus in Texas kept distributing, and, when customers reacted with puzzlement, Wertheimer gave in and raised Coco Chanel's share in the company.

[24] "Although she made a fortune on the perfume, throughout her lifetime she was convinced that the deal had been heavily weighted in favor of Wertheimer and that she had been cheated out of a huge sum of money.