Henry Essex Edgeworth

It is said that at the moment of the execution, the confessor uttered the celebrated words: "Son of St Louis, ascend to heaven"[2] (although this is disputed; Edgeworth himself, in his memoirs, could neither affirm nor deny them[3]).

In spite of the danger he now ran, Edgeworth refused to leave France so long as he could be of any service to Madame Elizabeth, with whom he still managed to correspond.

At length, in 1795, his mother having meanwhile died in prison, where his sister was also confined, he succeeded in escaping to England, then Scotland, carrying with him Elizabeth's last message to her brother, the future King Charles X whom he found in Edinburgh.

[2] Henry's brother, Ussher, who resided near Edgeworthstown, along with relatives there (including novelist Maria Edgeworth), were keen for him to return to Ireland.

[citation needed] Instead, he went with some papers to Monsieur (Louis XVIII) at Blankenburg in Brunswick, by whom he was induced to accompany him to Mittau, in Russia, where he died of a fever contracted while attending French prisoners in 1807.