He was born in Queen Street, Mayfair. His father was a German-speaking musician and composer, Nicolas-Joseph Hüllmandel (1756–1823), a native of Strasbourg who became a pupil of C. P. E. Bach and from 1780 spent ten years as a fashionable music teacher in Paris. In 1787 he married Camille-Aurore du Cazan, who was of a noble French family, and in 1789 sent his wife to England, following her in 1790, as the French Revolution unfolded. [ 1 ] [ 2 ]