Jean Prosper Guivier
Ill health forced him to reduce his musical engagements during the 1850s and he supplemented his income by dealing and consulting on the design of brass instruments.
Etienne's wife was a cantinière, officially engaged by the army as a seller of goods or as a launderess for his company and while no records of her employment have been found, the fact is known by their right to bring up their sons within the regiment.
A possible contributory factor in his decision to leave formal musical education may have been his interest in the ophicleide, a large, keyed, brass instrument, a precursor to the tuba, and which replaced the serpent in romantic orchestras.
A former bandmaster in the French navy and then briefly a soldier in the 54e régiment d'infanterie de ligne,[16] he attended the Conservatoire after Jean Prosper from 26 October 1833 to 1 May 1836,[17] but he too was expelled, apparently due to his preference for lighter forms of music.
[5] Returning to Paris, they lived at 3, Rue Capron, Batignolles Monceau in the Parisian arrondissement of Saint-Denis where their first child, Hyacinthe Palmire Hélène, was born on 30 December 1838.
[20] In the autumn of 1840, Prospère arrived in London for a season of Concerts d'Hiver at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, beginning on 8 October and conducted by Philippe Musard.
[21] Playbills advertising the forthcoming season state that this is Musard's first public appearance in England, and lists several musicians, including Prospère, who are making their English debut.
Perhaps in an appeal to aficionados of more purely classical music, Prospère undertook engagements with some of London's leading orchestras including that of the Philharmonic Society in between his regular seasons with Jullien as early as Spring 1846.
A newspaper journalist's analysis of a lacklustre cricket match between St John's, Westminster and Kingston, is disparaging of the last-minute rearranging of the fielders.
"[37] On Jullien's return to England from America, preparations were made for a month of promenade concerts at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane beginning in October 1854.
[43] He moved back to France with his wife and Henrietta, his youngest daughter, while Hyacinthe Helen remained in London where she married James Franklin Fuller.
At the third and final of three Subscription Concerts at St George's Hall, West Bromwich in 1863, the Orchestral Union played, with a Mr. Samuel Prince conducting.
[51] Both resumed work in 1875 as sole traders [52] but whereas Villin's venture closed within 10 years, Joseph Prosper's has continued to this day and has become one of the foremost violin dealers in the UK.
In 1860, Jean Prosper's eldest daughter, Hyacinthe Palmire Hélène (known as Helen), a working-class woman, married James Franklin Fuller, an architect from a respectable Irish family.
One book claims that he was a Corsican baron who died in the retreat from Moscow,[53] while the second attempts to link the Guiviers with Marshall Gouvion St-Cyr by blending the two surnames together.
The army pension records for Prospère's widowed mother[55] makes it clear that Etienne Simon had been a rank-and-file soldier, and Jean Prosper's wedding contract describes his father as a fusilier.
