Victor Fialin, duc de Persigny

Photograph by Jean-Gilbert-Victor Fialin, duc de Persigny, taken by Pierre-Louis Pierson in the 1850s

Jean-Gilbert-Victor Fialin, duc de Persigny (born January 11, 1808 in Saint-Germain-Lespinasse , Loire department , † January 12, 1872 in Nice ) was a French diplomat and statesman of the Second Empire .

Life

Lineage and Early Career

Jean-Gilbert-Victor Fialin was a son of Antoine Henri Louis Marie Fialin (1777-1810) and Anne Marie Girard de Charbonniéres (1771-1843). His father left his wife and two children, took part in Napoleon's armies in the invasion of Spain and died on December 12, 1810 of a severe fever. As an orphan as a toddler, Fialin was raised by his maternal uncle, Claude Marie de Girard de Charbonnières (1772–1849), a staunch monarchist. He attended the Royal College of Limoges on a scholarship . He then entered the military school in Saumur in 1826 and in 1828 as quartermaster in the 4th French hussar regiment . Originally influenced by royalism, he was won over to republican ideas and took part in the Pontivy military movement in favor of the July Revolution of 1830 . But although the cause of the demonstration won, he accused himself of insubordination and received his farewell. In Paris he turned to journalism, worked for the Temps and since then has called himself Vicomte de Persigny , which name and title had once been in his family. By reading the Mémorial de Sainte-Hélène he became enthusiastic about the Napoleonic ideas, which he immediately tried to disseminate in 1834 in a new journal, L'occident français , of which only one number appeared.

In 1835 Persigny went to Switzerland , got admission to Louis Napoleon , who was then living in Arenenberg , and became his loyal lifelong friend. He traveled through France and Germany to organize an imperialist party, and at the end of October 1836 started the military uprising in Strasbourg . After its failure he escaped from pre-trial detention to Germany, wandered through the Black Forest for a while , followed the course of the Rhine and finally went to London , where he justified the putsch ( Relation de l'entreprise du prince Louis Napoléon , London 1837) published. Since 1838 he was again part of Louis Napoleon's immediate environment. Then he accompanied the prince back to Arenenberg and, in July 1840, took part in his failed enterprise in Boulogne . He was captured and sentenced by the Pairshof to 20 years imprisonment, which he took up in the Doullens citadel . During his time in arrest he wrote the treatise De la destination et de l'utilité permanente des Pyramides (1845), in which he hypothesized that the Egyptian pyramids were not only used as a burial place for the pharaohs, but above all as a defense against intrusion Desert dust would have served in the Nile Valley .

Political career under Napoleon III.

When the February Revolution broke out in 1848 , Persigny was in a military hospital in Versailles due to illness and was then released again. He immediately rushed to Paris, collected the Bonapartists, promoted the publication of several popular papers, toured the interior of France and contributed as much as he could to the election of Louis Napoleon as President of the Republic (December 10, 1848). As a reward, he appointed him his adjutant. Persigny was also accepted into the general staff of the Paris National Guard.

Member of the National Assembly since May 1849 as a representative of the North Départements , Persigny was one of the most important defenders of the President's policy, who used him for important diplomatic missions, from December 1849 to April 1850 to Berlin . On the day of Napoleon III's coup. (December 2, 1851), in which Persigny was one of the first to be inaugurated, he occupied the Palais Bourbon , the seat of the National Assembly, together with General Espinasse at the head of the 42nd Line Regiment . Then he became a member of the Consultative Commission. Returned from a mission to Brussels , he became Minister of the Interior in place of Morny's on January 22, 1852 . He signed the resolution to confiscate the Orléans family property and presided over the first legislative body elections. From January 25, 1852 to June 23, 1853 he also held the office of Minister of Commerce and Agriculture. On May 27, 1852, he married Albine Marie Napoléone Aglaé Ney, Princess de la Moskowa (1832-1890), only daughter of Napoléon Joseph Ney and granddaughter of Marshal Ney . On this occasion he received 500,000 francs and the title of count. On December 31, 1852, he was appointed senator .

After Persigny had resigned his office as minister of the interior for health reasons in April 1854, he went to London as French ambassador in May 1855; where he remained as a supporter of the Anglo-French alliance until March 1858 and was then succeeded in Aimable Pélissier . But on May 18, 1859, he returned to his legation post in London. On June 16, 1856, he had already been appointed Grand Cross of the Legion of Honor . From November 24, 1860 to June 23, 1863 he was again Minister of the Interior and represented the strictly absolutist system of repression with energy and skill. The outcome of the Paris elections in 1863, in which all opposition candidates won, caused Persigny to resign. On September 13, 1863 he was appointed Duke by the Emperor. Since then he has only been politically active as a senator and as a member of the Privy Council. He resisted the constitutional turn of the empire as best he could in speeches and letters. After the fall of Napoleon III. (September 4, 1870) he went to London, refused a candidacy for the National Assembly in the Loire department in February 1871 and traveled to Nice to restore his health, where he died the next year on January 12, 1872 at the age of 64 . His memoirs were only published in Paris in 1896 by Henri de Laire, Count of Espagny.

literature

• Victor Fialin, duc de Persigny . In: Meyers Konversations-Lexikon . 4th edition. Volume 12, Verlag des Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig / Vienna 1885–1892, p. 874.

Web links

• Biography of Jean-Gilbert-Victor Fialin, duc de Persigny on the website of the Assemblée nationale (French)