Biographies : 101
-
BiographyMOUTON Georges, comte and général
The 9th of Joseph Mouton’s 14 children Georges Mouton was born in Phalsbourg (in the Moselle département of France) on 21 June, 1770, and was the ninth of fourteen children born to Joseph Mouton and Catherine Charpentier. In 1790, his father obtained for him work as an accounts clerk at an iron merchants in Lunéville, […]
-
BiographyMURAT, Joachim'Le roi de Naples était vraiment sublime au feu, le meilleur officier de cavalerie du monde. Au combat c'était "un césar", mais hors de là, "presque une femme"... Murat avait un très grand courage et fort peu d'esprit. La trop grande différence entre ces deux…
-
BiographyNansouty, Etienne-Marie-Antoine Champion
Born in 1768, Etienne-Marie-Antoine Champion Nansouty was a brilliant horseman and like Napoleon, attended military school in Brienne and Paris. He served in the Ancien Régime army but did not leave France following the Revolution and went on to serve in the Armée du Rhin, becoming a général de brigade in August 1799. Serving under […]
-
BiographyNELSON, Horatio
Nelson was born on 29 September, 1758, in Burnham Thorpe, Norfolk, England, the sixth of eleven children. His father, Edmund Nelson, was parish priest and his mother, Catherine Nelson, was a grandniece of Robert Walpole, 1st Earl of Oxford. His mother died when Nelson was nine. Nelson joined the Royal Navy aged 12 on January […]
-
BiographyNEY, Michel
Distiguished by his red hair, fiery temper and combat bravery, Ney was fellow Gascon Murat's only serious rival as the most dashing of Napoleon's marshals. He joined the royal French hussars in 1787, and was an NCO in Flanders during the opening actions against the First Coalition in 1792. Commissioned in October of that year, […]
-
BiographyNIEL, Adolphe
Adolphe Niel was born on 4 October, 1802 in Muret, in the Haute-Garonne. A bourgeois family for generations, the Niels were originally from Goyrans, in the Haute-Garonne, and not, as some have suggested, Ireland. Niel is a traditional 'Midi' name. Niel graduated from the Ecole polytechnique in 1823 with the rank of sous-lieutenant and enrolled in […]
-
BiographyOSTEN-SACKEN, Prince Fabian Gottlieb von
Fabian Gottlieb von Osten-Sacken, a Baltic German notable for his performance in the campaigns of 1812 and 1813, was born on 31 October 1752. He took part in the Russo-Turkish War in 1769-1770, where he participated in the Blockade of Khotin and other engagements, while being promoted to the rank of ensign in 1769 in […]
-
BiographyOudinot, Nicolas-Charles
Nicolas-Charles Oudinot was born in Bar-le-Duc on 25 April, 1767, into a family from the petite-bourgeoisie. At the age of seventeen, after completing his studies in his hometown as well as in Toul and unwilling to follow in his father's professional footsteps, he signed up for the Médoc Infantry regiment, in 1784. Returning to the […]
-
BiographyPFÜHL, Karl Ludwig August
Karl Ludwig August Pfühl was born in 1757 into Württemberg nobility and entered the Württemberg army in 1774 before subsequently joining the Prussian army in 1777. By 1781, he was a member of the general staff under Frederick the Great and in 1793, he participated in the Rhine campaign as part of the First Coalition […]
-
BiographyPirch I, Generalmajor Georg Dubislav Ludwig von (1763-1838)Generalmajor Georg Dubislav Ludwig von Pirch I (1763-1838)