Having borne the title of duke of Montpensier until his grandfather's death in 1752, he became duke of Chartres, and in 1769 married Louise Marie Adelaide de Bourbon-Penthievre, daughter and heiress of the duke of Penthievre, grand admiral of France, and the richest heiress of the time.
As duke of Chartres he opposed the plans of Maupeou in 1771, and was promptly exiled to his country estate of Villers-Cotterets (Aisne).
In the summer of 1792 he was present for a short time with the army of the north, with his two sons, the duke of Chartres and the duke of Montpensier, but had returned to Paris before the 10th of August.
The head of the college, the abbe Antoine Faure, who was from the same part of the country as himself, befriended the lad, and continued to do so for many years after he had finished his course, finding him pupils and ultimately obtaining for him the post of tutor to the young duke of Chartres, afterwards the regent duke of Orleans.
By the 1859 conventions the state railway system obtained an entry into Paris by means of running powers over the Ouest from Chartres, and its position was further improved by the exchange of certain lines with the Orleans company.