Jean-Pierre Ramel

Jean-Pierre Ramel (the younger) (born October 16, 1768 in Cahors , † August 15, 1815 in Toulouse ) was a general of the Revolution and the First Empire .

His brother was the parliamentarian Jean-Pierre Ramel (the elder), (* July 1, 1762 in Cahors † under the guillotine on January 1, 1795.)

Life

Ramel was the son of Pierre Ramel, royal prosecutor and notary, and his wife Françoise Guiches. At the age of 15, Jean-Pierre Ramel joined an infantry regiment as a volunteer. In 1791 he became adjudant-major in the "Légion du Lot " and rose in the following year to the captain of the "Legion des Pyrénées ". In 1793 he was promoted to chief de bataillon . In 1794 he was imprisoned with his brother Jean-Pierre Ramel the Elder , a former member of the National Assembly. The latter then fell victim to the Terreur under the guillotine. On the intervention of Général Dugommier , the younger Ramel was released and was used again in military service. In 1796 he became Adjudant-général (General Adjutant) in the "Armée de Rhin-et-Moselle" (Rhine-Moselle Army).

Adjudant-général and deportation to French Guiana

In his capacity as Adjudant-Général he took part in the defense of the Kehl fortress with the "Armée de Rhin-et-Moselle" under the command of Jean-Victor Moreau in 1796 . Here the attacks of Archduke Karl's troops were successfully repulsed. In the same year he was given command of the Legislative Assembly's guards. Although he denounced the organization of royalist activities by Gabriel Brottier on January 30, 1797, he was himself suspected of royalist sympathies, arrested by Charles Pierre François Augereau in the course of the coup d'état of 18 fructidor on V (September 4, 1797) and as a prisoner in the Prison du Temple.

The next day he was exiled by law along with Jean-Charles Pichegru , François Barthélemy, André-Daniel Laffon de Ladebat and Barbé-Marbois. Ramel came to Sinnamary in French Guiana .

Escape to London

In June 1798, together with Pichegru , Murinais, Amédée Willot , François Barthélemy, Barbé-Marbois, Guillaume Alexandre Tronson-Ducoudray and a few others, he managed to escape from the colony to Paramaribo in the Dutch sphere of influence on board a pirogue . From there he went first to Hamburg and then to London . After receiving permission from Napoleon to return, he was re-accepted into the army (army of the consulate ). Here he wrote a report on his stay in the deportation on Cayenne, which was later published and translated into English and German.

Campaigns

He was assigned to the force that carried out an expedition to Santo Domingo under the command of Général Rochambeau . Here a bullet hit him, which led to a prolonged incapacity for work. As the commander of the island of Tortuga , Ramel then received a letter, issued April 5, 1803 and signed by Rochambeau:

“Je vous envoie, mon cher commandant, un détachement de cent cinquante hommes de la garde nationale du Cap. Il est suivi de vingt-huit chiens bouledogues. Ces renforts vous mettront à même de terminer entièrement vos operations. Je ne dois pas vous laisser ignorer qu'il ne vous sera pas passé en compte ni ration, ni dépense pour la nourriture de ces chiens. Vous devez leur thunder à manger des nègres. Je vous salue affectueusement, Donatien Rochambeau. "

(My dear Commander, I am sending you a detachment of 150 men from the National Guard of the Cap. With them come 28 Bulldogs . These reinforcements will enable you to carry out your operations successfully. I cannot help but, you know so that you will receive neither food nor money to buy food for these dogs. Feed them with the negroes. Greetings from you, Donatien Rochambeau)

In 1805 (at XIII) he came to Italy, where he took part in the campaigns of the Third Coalition War . He was under the command of Massena and was appointed in command of the Mediterranean coast.

In 1809 he was assigned to the national gendarmerie and took part in the campaigns of 1810 and 1811 on the occasion of the Spanish War of Independence . He was used in Spain and Portugal and was involved in several military missions, such as the siege of Astorga. With parts of Souham's division he was able to take a bridge that was defended, among other things, by an artillery division with 30 cannons.

Maréchal de camp

After the first restoration of the Bourbon monarchy in France ( First Restoration ), Ramel was from Louis XVIII. promoted to Maréchal de camp and awarded the Orden de Saint-Louis . After the king's second return, he was appointed in command of the Haute-Garonne department.

It was during this period that the so-called reactionary forces made unsuccessful efforts to cause unrest in Toulon and to obtain the release of several people who had made themselves suspicious of their views. This meant that the secret societies that had formed in the Midi under the name "Verdets" as a royal militia had to be disarmed.

Lynch murder in Toulouse

These events made him the enemy of all who felt they belonged to the Terreur blanche and on August 15, 1815 he was lynched as an alleged partisan of Napoleon.

At seven o'clock in the evening an angry crowd gathered in front of his house and chanted in chants: “Down with Ramel”, “Kill Ramel!” The general came out and asked in a loud voice: “What do you want from Ramel?” The steadfastness impressed the crowd for a moment, but when he was about to withdraw the murderers pounced on him and the porter and both were knocked to the ground. The general was then carried into the house until the crowd found out that he was not yet dead, they broke into the house, killed him on his bed and ransacked the building.

The mayor of Toulouse, Joseph de Villèle, did not intervene in this matter and did nothing to arrest the murderers. However, two days later they were tried in the Pau District Court , where two people were sentenced to life imprisonment and the others were acquitted.

After 1815, Joseph-Marie de Combettes de Caumont, Councilor at the Royal Court of Appeal in Toulouse, re-examined the circumstances that had led to the death of Général Ramel. As reparation, Louis XVII awarded him . by royal decree of August 2, 1817 the title " Viscount " - which was noted on November 15, 1817 by the royal court in Toulouse.

publication

• Strange story of Barthelmy's, Pichegru's and other French legislators' torturous journey of deportation to Cayenne. In addition to the description of her stay with Sinamary and her ultimate wonderful rescue. Von Ramel, former commanding officer of the Legislative Councils, one of the deportees. Translated from the French, Friedrich Gottholf Jacobaer, Leipzig 1799.

literature

• Seuls les morts ne reviennent jamais: les pionniers de la guillotine sèche en Guyane française sous le Directoire de Philippe de Ladebat, éd. Amalthée, Nantes, 2008. ISBN 978-2-35027-894-0
• "Les généraux des Cents Jours et du Gouvernement Provisoire, Mars-Juillet 1815 de Labarre de Raillicourt; chez l'auteur, rue Hallé, Paris, 1963.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ top NCO rank
2. ↑ also Tour du Temple. Part of the city fortifications of Paris, demolished in 1808. To the north of the Le Marais district in the 3rd arrondissement.