Emmanuel de Grouchy, marquis de Grouchy

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Marshal

Emmanuel de Grouchy

Marquis de Grouchy
Order of the Iron Crown
Grand Cross of the Military Merit Order of Bavaria[1]

Emmanuel de Grouchy, marquis de Grouchy (French pronunciation: [ɛmanɥɛl də ɡʁuʃi];[2] 23 October 1766 – 29 May 1847) was a French military leader who served during the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars. He was the last Marshal of the Empire to be created by Napoleon, and is best known for his actions during the Waterloo campaign.

Early life

Grouchy was born in Paris on 23 October 1766 into a family of the

Pierre Cabanis.[4]

Destined to a military career from birth, Grouchy attended the Artillery School of

Life Guards.[3]

French Revolutionary Wars

Grouchy as a colonel of the 2nd Dragoon Regiment in 1792, by Georges Rouget (1835)

Despite his aristocratic birth and his connection to the court, Grouchy was a convinced supporter of the

chasseurs à cheval.[3] In 1792 he served during the invasion of Savoy, first as colonel of the 12th Regiment of chasseurs à cheval then of the 2nd Dragoon Regiment.[4] After the campaign of 1793, Grouchy was promoted to brigade general and was made a cavalry commander in the Army of the Alps.[4]

In 1794, Grouchy was sent to the

Quiberon Expedition in July 1795.[4] In late 1796, he took part in the abortive expedition to Ireland as Hoche's second-in-command, and the next year he was assigned to the Army of the North.[4]

Grouchy was deployed to Italy in 1798 under the orders of General

Battle of Novi, Grouchy received fourteen wounds and was taken prisoner.[5]

During his captivity, which lasted nearly a year, Grouchy protested in a letter against Bonaparte's

Peace of Lunéville he was appointed Inspector General of the Cavalry.[4] Following the Cadoudal affair, Grouchy was under Bonaparte's suspicion for some time due to his association with General Jean Moreau, but soon returned to favor, and in 1803 he received the mission of having Charles Louis recognized as King of Etruria.[4]

Napoleonic Wars

Grouchy took part in the

Marshal Moncey's Corps of Observation of the Ocean Coast, and was appointed governor of Madrid.[4][6]

Heraldic achievement of Emmanuel de Grouchy as comte d’Empire

At the time of the

Raab and Wagram.[5][4] As a reward for his services, Grouchy was made Colonel General of the chasseurs à cheval of the Grande Armée, and received the title of comte d’Empire.[4]

During the Russian campaign in 1812, Grouchy was appointed commander of the III Cavalry Corps and led the corps at Smolensk and Borodino.[4] During the retreat from Moscow, Napoleon appointed him to command the Sacred Squadron, a unit composed exclusively of picked officers and responsible for the emperor's personal protection.[4] His almost continuous service with the cavalry led Napoleon to decline in 1813 to place Grouchy at the head of an army corps, and Grouchy thereupon retired to his estates, taking no part in the German campaign of 1813.[5]

When the allies invaded France in early 1814, Grouchy hastened to take part in the defensive campaign and asked to return to service.[4] Napoleon gave him the command of a cavalry division, which Grouchy skillfully lead at the battles of Brienne, La Rothière, Vauchamps, and Craonne, where he was severely wounded.[4] Upon Napoleon's abdication and the Bourbon Restoration, Grouchy lost his rank of Colonel General of the chasseurs à cheval, which was given to the Duke of Berry, and was allowed to retire by King Louis XVIII.[4][5]

Hundred Days

In March 1815, Grouchy rallied to Napoleon on his return to power during the

Peer of France on 2 June.[4]

In the

Marshal Soult, while the Prussian and British-Dutch armies united to crush Napoleon. He won a tactical victory over the Prussian army's rearguard at the Battle of Wavre
on 18–19 June 1815, but the delaying action by III Corps allowed the main Prussian force to join Wellington at Waterloo while preventing Grouchy from doing the same.

So far as resistance was possible after the great disaster, Grouchy made it, gathering up the remnants of Napoleon's army and retiring, swiftly and unbroken, to Paris. After Napoleon's second abdication, he addressed a proclamation to his soldiers in support of Napoleon II.[4] After interposing his reorganized forces between the enemy and the capital, Grouchy resigned his command into the hands of Marshal Davout.[5]

Later life

After the second restoration of the Bourbons, an attempt to have Grouchy condemned to death by a court-martial failed; however, he was proscribed and went into exile in the United States, settling in Philadelphia along with several other French officers of the Hundred Days.[5][7] He was amnestied by King Louis XVIII in November 1819 and departed for France in May 1820.[7] Upon his return Grouchy was reinstated as general, but not as marshal nor as peer of France.[5] For many years thereafter he was equally an object of aversion to the court party, as a member of their own class who had joined the Revolution and Napoleon, and to his comrades of the Grande Armée as the supposed betrayer of Napoleon.[5]

Grouchy returned to favor after the overthrow of the Bourbons in the

Louis Philippe gave him back the marshal's baton in 1831 and restored him to the Chamber of Peers in 1832.[4] Grouchy died in Saint-Étienne while returning from a trip to Italy on 29 May 1847, aged 80.[8] He was buried in the Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.[8]

Family

He was married firstly (1785) to Cécile le Doulcet de Pontécoulant (1767–1827), sister of Louis Gustave le Doulcet, comte de Pontécoulant, by whom he had 4 children:[9]

  • Ernestine (1787–1866)
  • Alphonse (1789–1864)
  • Aimee-Clementine (1791–1826)
  • Victor (1796–1864)

He married secondly, in 1827, Joséphine-Fanny Hua (1802–1889) and had 1 daughter:[8]

  • Noemie (1830–1843)

Works

Grouchy published the following:[5]

  • Observations sur la relation de la campagne de 1815 par le général de Gourgaud (Philadelphia and Paris, 1818)
  • Refutation de quelques articles des mémoires de M. le Duc de Rovigo (Paris,1829)
  • Fragments Historiques Relatifs a la Campagne de 1815 et a la Bataille de Waterloo (Paris, 1829–1830) — in reply to Barthélemy and Méry, and to Marshal Gérard
  • Reclamation du marchal de Grouchy (Paris, 1834)
  • Plainte contre le general Baron Berthezène — Berthezène, formerly a divisional commander under Gérard, stated in reply to this defence that he had no intention of accusing Grouchy of ill faith.

References

  1. ^ Paris, Louis (1869). Dictionnaire des anoblissements (in French). Vol. 1. Paris: Bachelin-Deflorenne.
  2. ^ Warnant, Léon (1968). Dictionnaire de la prononciacion française (in French) (3 ed.). Gembloux: Duculot.
  3. ^
    ISBN 978-1612007625
    .
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac ad ae af ag ah ai Robert, Adolphe; Cougny, Gaston (1891). Dictionnaire des parlementaires français [Dictionary of French Parliamentarians] (in French). Paris. pp. 264–265.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Chisholm 1911, p. 624.
  6. ^ Oman, Charles (1902). A History of the Peninsular War, Vol. I, p. 613. Project Gutenberg. Retrieved 28 April 2023.
  7. ^
    ISBN 978-1633886551
    .
  8. ^ a b c Nouvelle biographie générale (in French). Paris.
  9. ISBN 978-2908298000
    .

Attribution

Bibliography

    • Mémoires du maréchal Marquis de Grouchy, éditeur Édouard Dentu (Paris, 1873–1874);
    • General Marquis de Grouchy, Le Général Grouchy en Irlande (Paris, 1866)
    • Le Maréchal Grouchy du 16 au 18 juin, 1815 (Paris, 1864)
    • Appel à l'histoire sur les faites de l'aile droite de l'armée française (Paris, n.d.)
    • Sévère Justice sur les faits ... du 28 juin au 3 juillet, 1815 (Paris, 1866)
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