Charles de Prunelé, Baron d'Esneval (died 1624) was a French diplomat and ambassador in Scotland in 1586. The Château d'Esneval is at Pavilly, Seine-Maritime. He is known by his title, as "D'Esneval", or "D'Aisneval", or "D'Anneval".
Mission to Scotland
D'Esneval seems to have gained prominence at the French court and an appointment as a diplomat following his marriage in 1583 to Madeleine Pinart, a daughter of the French Secretary of State, Claude Pinart. There were suggestions in August 1584 that he, or his brother-in-law, might go to Scotland as a diplomat. In 1586 he was sent to Scotland and welcomed by David Beaton of Melgund, a Master of Household to James VI. His wife, Madeleine Pinart, remained at the French court.
Henry III of France and his mother Catherine de' Medici wrote to James VI in November 1585, introducing the new resident ambassador charged with promoting the Auld alliance. Henry III intended that D'Esneval would present a gold ring worth 500 Écu to Claude Hamilton, and gave Hamilton a letter for James also introducing D'Esneval as a resident diplomat. The appointment of a resident ambassdor was a recognition by the Valois court that James VI, rather than his mother, the exiled Mary, Queen of Scots, was ruler of Scotland.
Mary, Queen of Scots, hoped D'Esneval would be able keep open her communications with her son James VI and further the Auld Alliance. She wrote to D'Esneval asking him to send updates on James's health and affairs. She also thought he was inexperienced and unlikely to have much knowledge of Scottish affairs. Mary had a better opinion of his time-served companion, the Monsieur de Courcelles, a secretary of the French ambassador in London, Guillaume de l'Aubespine de Châteauneuf.
David Moysie wrote that D'Esneval was 24 years old and arrived in Leith on 13 January He identified D'Esneval by another of his titles, as "de Gazeran" or "Gofferon". The Master of Gray wrote about the arrival of D'Esneval to Francis Walsingham, saying he was very young. He noted that Courcelles, formerly a secretary to Michel de Castelnau, was his advisor, and was now known as "De Preau". Meanwhile, William Cecil wrote to the Earl of Leicester with news that James VI had sent his envoy William Keith of Delny to London to conclude their league. Cecil described the situation of the rival diplomats in Scotland in his letter:Mr Randolph is to go to the Scottish king, and so the treaty, as I think, shall go forward. Time must try these things, for we find that the French king hath sent, by sea, a baron of France, the son-in-law of Pinart's, a man of great living but of little understanding, and therfore he hath a shrewd instrument with him, called Courcelles, whom your lordship did, I think, know here with Mauvissière (Castelnau), a notable servitor to the Scottish queen and the house of Guise, and, adding to this, that we understand how Lethington, the secretary in Scotland, and Robert Melville, who both remain in good credit with the king, are devoted to the king's mother and to France, we may doubt of the events.
D'Esneval had an audience with James VI in February. When the English diplomat Thomas Randolph arrived in Edinburgh, James VI told him D'Esneval was younger than him, and had no experience of Scotland. Randolph reminded James that the ambassador's intention was the important matter.
Randolph noted that D'Esneval had an audience with James VI at Holyroodhouse on 7 May. Walsingham was convinced that D'Esneval had brought a significant sum of money to Scotland, possibly originating in Spain, while Randolph only had words to counter the effect of this gold. D'Esneval and Monsieur de Courcelles tried to form opposition in the Scottish court to the Treaty of Berwick (1586) with England. Their efforts were unsuccessful, due in part to the banishment of their ally at court, James Stewart, Earl of Arran, and offers of an English subsidy. On 3 July, D'Esneval wrote to Henry III about the English treaty, and a conversation he had with James about personal letters from his mother since the mission of Albert Fontenay.
D'Esneval made representations to James VI that Scottish soldiers ought not to be recruited for the Protestant King of Navarre. His letters were interecepted in England, and Francis Walsingham passed them to Thomas Phelippes for decipher and comment.