Anne-Josèphe Théroigne de Méricourt (born Anne-Josèphe Terwagne; 13 August 1762 – 8 June 1817) was a Belgian singer, orator and organizer in the French Revolution. She was born at Marcourt, in Prince-Bishopric of Liège (from which comes the appellation "de Méricourt"), a small town in the modern Belgian province of Luxembourg. She was active in the French Revolution and worked within the Austrian Low Countries to also foster revolution. She was held in an Austrian prison from 1791 to 1792 for being an agent provocateur in Belgium. She was a cofounder of a Parisian revolutionary club and had warrants for her arrest issued in France for her alleged participation in the October Days uprising. She is known both for her portrayal in the French Revolutionary press and for her subsequent mental breakdown and institutionalization. Early life (1767–1789) She was born Anne-Josèphe Terwagne in Marcourt, Rendeux, to Pierre Terwagne (b. 1731) and Anne-Élisabeth Lahaye (1732–1767). Her mother died after giving birth to her third child, leaving Anne-Josèphe alone with her father and two brothers; Pierre-Josèphe (b. 1764) and Josèphe (b. 1767). After her mother died, she was sent to live with her aunt in Liège and was put into a convent school where she learned how to sew. About a year after Anne-Josèphe began school, her aunt married and stopped paying for her school. Anne-Josèphe fled back to her father after he remarried because she was forced to be a house maid and tend to her aunt's children. Life at her father's was no better, her stepmother treated her just as poorly as her aunt did. Her eldest brother went to Germany to stay with relatives by the name of Campinados. At the age of 13, Anne-Josèphe and her younger brother went to Xhoris to stay with some of their father's relatives. While in Xhoris, she constantly was snubbed and overworked to the point where she could not take it any longer. As a result, she went back to her aunt in Liège, but found that she was still mistreated. After realizing the need to start her own life, she learned to herd cows in Sougné, a province in Limburg. A year later, she went back to Liège to work as a seamstress, only to face the same discontent with her life as before. She proceeded to seek refuge with a different aunt, by the name of Clamend, who lived in