#vendee

The death of Charette

29 March 1796, 230 years ago today, François-Athanase Charette de la Contrie was shot by firing squad in Nantes. His death, coming soon after the execution of Jean-Nicolas Stofflet in February, marked the definitive end of the Vendée War that had begun in 1793 and brought its main military phase to a close (1).

After the destruction of the main “Grand Army” during the Virée de Galerne (2) in late 1793, Charette and Stofflet had kept the rebellion going by carving out near-untouchable fiefdoms from which they launched continual ambushes. Their executions removed the last irreconcilable bands that had fought to defend the region, and to avenge it, against the Republic’s repression.

For all their complete military defeat, the near-simultaneous deaths of Charette and Stofflet bound them together in a common tragic fate that counter-revolutionaries would memorialize at length. In later “white” (royalist) historiography, their legends were fixed in place, with Charette especially recast as a flamboyant dandy and peerless master of guerrilla war, set against Stofflet’s reputation (3) as a harsh, brutal soldier.

Suffice it to say, as actual human beings, in life, both were more than those stereotypes.

More information about Charette and Stofflet's executions and what happed to their bodies here:

Notes:

(1) The war would continue in other forms until 1832, though increasingly in ways, and for reasons, only loosely connected to 1793.

(2) The ill-fated crossing of the Loire into Brittany and Normandy by the Vendéan army and its dependants followed the crushing defeat at Cholet on 18 October 1793, after which approximately 90,000 people were dead.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Maurice d’Elbée is a bit like the middle child of the Vendéan generals. He is not a peasant leader people half-believe is magical, like Cathelineau, and he is not out there climbing walls with his bare hands like Monsieur de La Rochejaquelein (yes, we know, you are absurdly brave and athletic, Henri). He is not a gruff gamekeeper building his own woodland kingdom like Stofflet, or “the king of the Vendée” like Charette. He does not have Bonchamps’s grand tomb, and he was not married to the woman who would end up shaping the story of the war, like Lescure.

But he was a genuinely remarkable man who had a fair amount of military experience, took command after Cathelineau died, managed to win some of the most striking victories in the Vendée, showed restraint and mercy toward his enemies, and died with dignity while defending an innocent man. And for the past month or so I have been working on an annotated translation of a biography of him by Ferdinand Charpentier.

So today, on the forgotten commander-in-chief’s birthday, I would like to share the first chapter of that book, which, even if it is not 100% historically accurate, does capture the spirit of the man rather well and, more importantly, shows that not everyone in the Vendée was a crazed royalist pining for the Ancien Régime. Some were. D’Elbée was not. He was, in his own way, a democrat.

So, happy birthday to the man known as General Providence!

LETTER FROM M. EDMOND BIRÉ

Nantes, 4 February 1905

Monsieur l’Abbé,

I have just finished reading the advance sheets of your book, and I hasten to tell you the impressions it has left upon me.

D’Elbée, whom you have so justly chosen for your hero, is one of the noblest figures of the Vendéan epic, of that epic greater than the Iliad: nescio quid majus Iliade(1). In History, the Crusades alone may be compared to that war of the Vendée, wherein entire populations, men, children, women, old men, were seen advancing to every immolation, sacrificing their lives and their goods, rushing to death and to tortures, with no motive save devotion to their beliefs, to their Catholic and Royalist faith.

If ever there was a popular movement, it was that one. Far from having drawn the peasants after them, the nobles were drawn by the peasants. It was not the leaders, as commonly happens, who enlisted the soldiers; on the contrary, it was the soldiers who enlisted the leaders. The signal of resistance, of struggle, and of glory did not descend from the château to the cottage; it rose from the cottage to the château.

It was thus for all those gentlemen, former officers, who distinguished themselves in the war of the Vendée, and in particular for Bonchamps(2) and for Henri de La Rochejaquelein(3) for Lescure(4) and for Charette(5). I knew, in my childhood, at Luçon, one of the bravest officers of the Army of the Centre(6), the Chevalier de Chantreau: he was in the courtyard of his modest country house, playing a game of bowls(7) when the peasants of the surrounding district came to beg him to place himself at their head. He did everything in his power to dissuade them from taking up arms, and yielded to their entreaties only after having convinced himself that their resolution was unshakable.

Likewise, when, on 13 March 1793, the young men of Beaupréau and of the neighbouring parishes came to implore d’Elbée to be their leader, he replied:

“My friends, as an officer of the King, I know what is required of me. I shall die in his defence; but I will lead no man into my devotion. My duties are not yours. Believe me: remain in your farms and in your homes.”

It was only on the following day, when the peasants returned in even greater numbers than the day before, that he consented to depart with them.

Far from being a fiery champion of the ancien régime(8), d’Elbée, like so many gentlemen of the old monarchy, had at the outset embarked with ardour in the reforming movement, and went so far as to approve the Civil Constitution of the Clergy(9). He was not long, however, in recognising his error; he immediately resigned the municipal functions with which the confidence of the inhabitants had invested him, and, withdrawn to his house of La Loge, he gave shelter there to the non-juring priests. Thankfully, religion reclaimed him from the Revolution, which was henceforth to have no braver adversary.

Companion and friend of Cathelineau, d’Elbée was called upon to succeed him, on 19 July 1793, as Generalissimo(10) of the Catholic and Royal Armies. He was to command them for no more than three months, from 19 July to 17 October 1793. Yet those three months were enough to win him immortal renown, to secure, against the ablest generals of the Republic, Marceau(11), Kléber(12), Aubert-Dubayet(13), the resounding victories of Chantonnay, Coron, and Torfou. On 17 October he was defeated at Cholet; but his conqueror, Kléber, paid him tribute in his Mémoires in these terms: “The enemy has lost his best leaders; d’Elbée and Bonchamps are mortally wounded; never have they delivered a battle so obstinate, so well ordered.”

On that day d’Elbée had received fourteen wounds, one of them through the chest. Unfit to take the field for many months, and conscious that he could now serve only as a burden to the army, he determined to withdraw until the day when he might again bear arms.

Charette had just taken the island of Noirmoutier and it was here that the Generalissimo was taken. On 4 January 1794, while he was still far from healed of his wounds, the island fell into the power of the Republicans. On 8 January, borne in his armchair to the place of execution, clad in the green uniform of the Vendéan chiefs and wearing his white-plumed hat, he was executed by firing squad, together with his brother-in-law M. Duhoux d’Hauterive, his friend M. de Boisy, and a Republican officer, M. Wieland, whom the Representatives of the People(14), Bourbotte(15) and Prieur(16), had added to the group “that the reckoning might be even.” on both his sides(17). The death of the Generalissimo was that of a hero and of a saint.

By your complete and exact narration of the facts you have clearly demonstrated, Monsieur l’Abbé, that d’Elbée, as a soldier and as a commander, was worthy of the rank and of the charge to which his comrades in arms had raised him. Even his adversaries, those whose testimony carries weight, have acknowledged his lofty and exceptional merit. It is General Hoche(18) who declares, in the celebrated proclamation by which he calls the inhabitants of the countryside to peace: “Who are your leaders? Have they the talents of d’Elbée, the gentleness of Bonchamps, the courage of Stofflet, the energy, the resource, and the local knowledge of Charette?”(19)

After Kléber, it is General Turreau(20) who writes in his Mémoires: “A consummate soldier, he had trained the Vendéans in the mode of warfare best adapted to the country and to the character of that people.” It is Jomini(21), the great military historian, who, in his Guerres de la Révolution, singles out “the most remarkable expeditions directed by the Generalissimo d’Elbée.”

His humanity equaled his courage and his talents. Faced with adversaries who multiplied massacres, pillage, and arson everywhere, he refused all reprisals. You show him more than once calming the fury of his own men. Take Chemillé, for example, on 11 April 1793: before soldiers thirsting for vengeance and shouting for death, he rose and commanded, “Soldiers, on your knees. Let us recite the Pater.(22)”

When he reached the words, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us,” he turned to the still-kneeling men and said, “You ask God for forgiveness, yet you will not forgive. Who will take vengeance now?” And they all, weeping with remorse, fell at the feet of the Christian hero and begged his pardon.

What men they were. What a war, to have witnessed such scenes. And how well inspired you were, Monsieur l’Abbé, to make them live again with such communicative emotion.

In the end, D’Elbée was a modest man, and it is above all for that reason that it was good, necessary, and just to restore him, as you have done, to full light, in a setting worthy of him. Was it not Bossuet(23) who said: “There is nothing greater than a great man who is modest?”

Once again, I cannot congratulate you enough on having chosen so fine a subject and so noble a hero. As an old and faithful Vendéan, I allow myself to add to my congratulations my heartfelt thanks.

Please accept, Monsieur l’Abbé, the assurance of my profound and devoted respect.

Edmond BIRÉ.

Notes

(1) Latin phrase meaning “I know not what greater than the Iliad,”

(2) Charles de Bonchamps (1760–1793), Vendéan general noted for his clemency, especially his pardon of Republican prisoners after the battle of Cholet.

(3) Henri du Vergier, Comte de La Rochejaquelein (1772–1794), young nobleman and one of the principal commanders of the Vendéan insurgents, who will succeed d’Elbee as Commander in Chief

(4) Louis-Marie de Salgues, Marquis de Lescure (1766–1793), Vendéan general admired for his piety, personal bravery, and moral authority among the insurgent forces.

(5) François-Athanase Charette de La Contrie (1763–1796), Royalist leader particularly active in the coastal and marsh regions of western France.

(6) One of the main divisions of the Catholic and Royal Army during the Vendéan uprising, operating chiefly in the central districts of the insurgent territory in 1793.

(7) Jeu de boules is a traditional French throwing game in which players aim to toss or roll heavy metal balls, called boules, as close as possible to a small wooden target ball, known as the cochonnet.

(8) The political and social order of France before 1789, characterised by absolute monarchy, hereditary privilege, and a hierarchical estate system.

(9) Legislation from 1790 reorganising the Catholic Church in France under state authority. Clergy were required to swear an oath to the Constitution; those who refused were termed prêtres réfractaires (non-juring priests).

(10) Commander-in-chief

(11) François Séverin Marceau (1769–1796) young Republican general distinguished in the Vendée.

(12) Jean-Baptiste Kléber (1753–1800) Republican general, later commander in Egypt under Bonaparte.

(13) Jean-Baptiste Aubert-Dubayet (1759–1797) Republican general active in western France in 1793.

(14) Deputies of the National Convention sent on mission (représentants en mission) with extensive civil and military powers.

(15) Pierre Bourbotte (1763–1795), deputy to the National Convention and Representative on Mission in the Vendée, involved in the repression of the Royalist uprising and later executed after the fall of Robespierre.

(16) Pierre-Louis Prieur, known as Prieur de la Marne (1756–1827), deputy to the National Convention, member of the Committee of Public Safety and Representative on Mission in the western armies

(17) In the original « afin que la partie fût carrée », the implication is that M. Wieland was not guilty of the charges against him and was executed arbitrarily

(18) Lazare Hoche (1768–1797): Republican general who later pacified the Vendée.

(19) The text refers to General Lazare Hoche’s proclamation addressed to the “habitants des campagnes”, dated 19 prairial an III (7 June 1795)

(20) Louis Marie Turreau (1756–1816): Republican general associated with the “infernal columns” sent to devastate the Vendée in 1794.

(21) Antoine-Henri Jomini (1779–1869): Swiss-born military historian and theorist; author of Histoire critique et militaire des guerres de la Révolution.

(22) The Lord’s Prayer, recited in Latin in Catholic liturgy.

“Marat, Marat, who is always presented to us as the worst of the bloodthirsty and shocking brutes: “The measure proposed is the most insane, the most unworthy of a thinking and well-intentioned being for the Republic. It is not the misguided men against whom we must take action, but the leaders."

"...but nobody ever listens to Marat."

I did know about Danton & the levée en masse from the biography I read and of course the Girondins & the war, but there's something about the way this documentary is putting things together that's kind of blowing my mind in the worst way possible.

"They did not rise up with the nobles in April 1791, nor to save the priests in 1791. Yet, with de-Christianization, 25,000 priests had to leave the territory the previous year. The Vendéeans hadn’t lifted a finger. They rose up in March 1793, that is, to protest against conscription. Initially, these are people who don't want their child sent to be killed, and we understand them. It is also a matter of subsistence. They are starving."

I know it is possibly simplified for YouTube, but I wonder if this is a roughly accurate summation. (Can I appeal to the expertise of @amateurvoltaire or anyone else with a better grasp on this niche than me?!) I do know (think?) that the repressive measures in the war became widely supported (though there's a shocking bit about the "bloodthirsty" Marat in a few minutes, but I can't share more than one video...), but the direct role of Danton & the Girondins* seems like one of those massive blind spots in the history** of this period.

---

*There is also a bit about their economic policy, which seems extremely relevant & appalling, but I need to read more to understand it better.

(I read Dumas' The Last Cavalier this January and I have been fascinated/obsessed with Georges ever since. Alas for me, I cannot read French and am well aware that public domain sources and Google Translate can only get me so far....)

Thank you so much!!

Thank you so much for the question!

And second, thank you for calling it the Vendée proper. Not because the other conflicts in the region are somehow “improper,” but because there are real differences in geography, scale, leadership, and motives between the Vendéan war of 1793–1794 and the later conflicts or the chouanneries. Folding them together tends to blur what was actually happening.

Before answering, a small disclaimer. The Chouannerie is not necessarily my main area of expertise. The only relatively recent book I own and have read on Cadoudal is Georges Cadoudal et les Chouans by Patrick Huchet (in my opinion a fairly factual and balanced study), published in the late 1990s. A new book by Morgan Lazartigues is scheduled for release in March 2026, and I am interested in reading it but it’s not out yet. All of which is to say that the material I am drawing on is not especially recent. Now to the answer.

Yes, Georges Cadoudal was involved very early in the western conflicts between 1793 and 1796. While is best known as a leader of the Chouannerie, his military career actually begins in the Vendéan war.

Cadoudal’s entry into the conflict is tied to the Republic’s decree in March 1793 ordering the conscription of 300,000 men, which triggered widespread unrest across western France and beyond. In a region that was both very rural and very religious, and already irritated by the treatment of refractory priests, the decree was received with something less than enthusiasm, to put it mildly.

According to several royalist narratives, later repeated by historians such as Crétineau-Joly and G. Lenotre (both of whom should probably be read with a certain amount of caution, since their sympathies are not exactly hidden), Cadoudal first took part in resistance to the levy around Auray. He was briefly imprisoned and then incorporated into the Republican army as a conscript intended to fight the Vendéan rebels.

He deserted at the first opportunity and crossed over to the insurgents.

The details of this escape are somewhat murky and occasionally drift toward legend. One colourful story claims that Cadoudal smashed down a door and shot two Republican soldiers with a double-barrelled gun while making his escape. Whether this is fact or simply one of the many heroic anecdotes that later gathered around his reputation is very hard to say.

What is better documented is what happened after he reached the royalist forces.

Cadoudal and several companions joined the Catholic and Royal Army at Chalonnes, entering the Breton companies of the 3rd division under the command of the Marquis de Bonchamps. He became an officer and wore the division’s distinctive olive-green coat. Bonchamps’ units were pretty much the only ones that had something resembling a uniform. Possibly because Bonchamps had a taste for fashion, or possibly because he realised that in a civil war it can be useful to recognise your own men from those who may or may not be trying to shoot at you. But I digress.

Cadoudal seems to have shown military ability rather quickly. He rose to the rank of captain within the Breton companies, and his competence caught the attention of the army’s major general, Jean-Nicolas Stofflet, who entrusted him with cavalry command. Stofflet is said to have remarked about him: “If a cannonball does not carry him off, that big head will go far.” (“Si un boulet ne l’emporte pas, cette grosse tête ira loin…”)

Cadoudal fought throughout the brutal campaign of 1793. He took part in the Virée de Galerne, the disastrous expedition north of the Loire that lasted from October to December 1793 after the defeat at Cholet and left tens of thousands dead. During this campaign he fought alongside a close comrade, Pierre Mercier, and the two reportedly served frequently at the vanguard.

Cadoudal fought throughout the brutal campaign of 1793. He took part in the Virée de Galerne, the disastrous expedition north of the Loire that lasted from October to December 1793 after the defeat at Cholet and left tens of thousands dead. During this campaign he fought alongside his close friend, Pierre Mercier, and the two reportedly served frequently at the vanguard.

At the Battle of Pontlieu on 12 December 1793, Cadoudal and Mercier were noted for actions that reportedly “commanded general admiration”. The campaign ended shortly afterwards with the catastrophic Battle of Savenay on 23 December 1793, where the Vendéan army was effectively destroyed.

Cadoudal survived the massacre in the marshes around Savenay and returned to his native Morbihan with Mercier. With the main Vendéan army destroyed, the conflict in the west shifted in character. Cadoudal went home and began organising guerrilla resistance in Brittany, which became part of the Chouannerie.

He was arrested at the end of June 1794. During his imprisonment he made contact with an agent connected to the exiled royalist princes. He escaped in November 1794 and resumed the fight underground.

In 1795 his abilities as a commander quickly became evident. He became a lieutenant to de Silz, the principal royalist chief in Morbihan. During the disastrous Quiberon expedition in the summer of 1795, Cadoudal deliberately kept his distance from the flawed plans of the arriving émigré forces and withdrew his troops rather than be caught in the collapse.

His reputation for leadership and sound judgement grew quickly. In August 1795, at only twenty-four years old, he was elected major general by the commanders of the Chouan bands in Morbihan.

From that point onward Cadoudal became the principal organiser of the Breton counter-revolution and an important intermediary with the British government, continuing the struggle well beyond 1796 until the general pacification in the early 1800s.

Thank you again for the question. As always I am happy to answer more, so if there is anything else you would like to know about the Vendée or anything related to it, my inbox is open. As mentioned earlier, a new book on Cadoudal should be coming out in about a week, and I will be happy to return with more details once I have read it.

Hi! Thank you for the question. It’s only fitting I answer it today, 28 January, the day Henri died. And it’s a fun one, because if there’s one thing that makes Henri interesting, it’s that his life sometimes reads like an adventure novel, and his escape from the Tuileries is no exception.

The short answer is that Wikipedia is roughly right: Henri de La Rochejaquelein was at the Tuileries on 10 August 1792, on the king’s side, and he survived a day that killed a lot of people in broadly the same position. The “first battle” claim is only half true. He’d already had his “baptism of fire” in a small order-maintenance operation near Lauzun (Agenais) in 1790. That said, 10 August is his first experience of large-scale violence and real casualties.

The Royal Constitutional Guardsman

So first: what was the son of a provincial noble from fuck-nowhere Bas-Poitou doing at the Tuileries in the first place?

The short answer, again, is that in some bizarre way it was his job. As Wikipedia says, by late 1791 he’d agreed to enter the king’s Constitutional Guard as a cavalry sub-lieutenant under d’Hervilly (1). The King’s Constitutional Guard was a strange compromise: it let the king (whom people weren’t exactly fans of after Varennes) have some kind of day-to-day protection, while trying to reduce the risk it turned into a private royal army.

In principle the corps combined infantry and cavalry and was funded through the king’s Civil List (so paid as part of the monarchy’s household finances rather than as a line regiment). A commonly cited structure is 1,200 men on foot and 600 mounted, with the departments presenting candidates for the infantry while the king selected the mounted component. Its intended role was protective and ceremonial: guarding the royal apartments and escorting the royal family.

You don’t need to be a specialist in the French Revolution to see why this went down badly. After Varennes, a guard chosen by the king looked suspicious by definition. The Guard quickly acquired a reputation, fair or not, as an “aristocratic” body. Rumours circulated that it would be used to engineer a counter-revolutionary coup, or to facilitate a(nother) royal escape. It was also very clearly the queen’s project, right down to uniform choices, which tells you what sort of loyalty it demanded, what it was meant to represent, and why people in Paris weren’t thrilled.

So why did Henri actually join? The reason he ended up there is open to speculation, because while he’d been a soldier since thirteen in various units, this wasn’t an obvious career move. On the contrary. Service in the King’s Constitutional Guard didn’t offer the normal route of advancement in the wider army; promotion would largely be confined inside that body. So he plainly wasn’t doing it for some straightforward material purpose.

Whether he wanted it, or whether his father wanted it, is also up for speculation. When notified by the duc de Brissac (2)  on 30 November 1791 that Louis XVI had named him to the corps, what we do know is that he didn’t accept instantly, since the Minister of War had to send a reminder on 16 December asking him to confirm by 1 January 1792 whether he intended to join. He does accept, and someone somewhere really wants him in, because there’s a small administrative detail that has to be fudged: the Guard required men to be between twenty and thirty. Henri was nineteen. His age is quietly adjusted by two years on the rolls so he meets the requirement. So either he, or someone acting for him, really wanted the boy to join.

But if you know anything about the short-lived King’s Constitutional Guard, you’ll look at me and ask: but umm… weren’t they disbanded in late May 1792?

Partially correct. Louis XVI accepted the dismissal of his guard, and the disarmament took place at the Tuileries, after which the former guards were publicly abused. That was the formal end of the corps.

The informal reality is that the guards, and some other nobles seen as loyal, were told to remain in Paris. Former members were effectively kept on standby and were still paid, still expected to respond if the king called on them. They were harassed in public to the point that officers advised them not to appear in uniform, so they continued to mount guard in civilian clothing.

Henri at the Tuileries

So: 10 August. As insurrection becomes imminent, Louis XVI calls in defenders: Swiss Guards, National Guardsmen of uncertain reliability, and former constitutional guardsmen now in plain clothes, plus various gentlemen who rush in because they genuinely believe defending the king is their duty. He calls them, but he doesn’t arm them properly, and he puts an eighty-year-old in charge.

Henri is placed with the group commanded by Vioméni (3)l and d’Hervilly, posted inside the Tuileries in the Galerie des Carrosses. The night is tense and disorganised. The palace isn’t a fortress, the defenders are under-armed compared to what’s coming, and Louis XVI was many things, but decisive and martial he was not. As the situation tightens, Louis XVI chooses to leave the palace and go to the Assembly, believing, or being persuaded, that this will prevent bloodshed.

Various biographies report that Henri wanted to follow the king and was fairly vociferous about it. The king refuses, repeatedly, insisting only the National Guard will escort him. The queen orders the gentlemen to stay.

Once the royal family leaves the palace, the defenders’ position becomes hopeless. The attack begins. The Swiss fire and briefly hold the assailants back, but the king sends an order for the Swiss to cease fire, and they comply. Command then collapses, and different groups improvise exits or attempt to break out.

Henri, like many others, does the same. He reaches the river, detaches a boat, and crosses to the left bank, which is quieter. He briefly returns to his lodging, but decides it’s unsafe to stay: he’s known as a former member of the king’s Constitutional Guard and could be denounced.

The adventure of leaving Paris

By chance he finds a fellow guardsman, friend and future commander in the Vendée War, Charles d’Autichamps, who brings him to the house of another figure familiar to anyone interested in the Vendée, the marquis de Bonchamps, in the rue de Harlay. But Bonchamps is himself worried about being denounced, so this can’t be a stable refuge. Henri and d’Autichamps both know they need to leave Paris, but it’s not like they can just walk out. They need passports.

Enter another familiar figure, and Henri’s cousin: the marquis de Lescure, who is trying to secure passports through the local section. Lescure has the luck to run into Thomassin, his former governor, now a commander in the Paris National Guard and still personally loyal to him. Thomassin has obtained passports for Lescure and his wife, and he’s prepared to do the same for La Rochejaquelein and d’Autichamps, but procedure requires a lodging declaration and two witnesses to attest the applicants are housed where they claim. Lescure makes the declaration and finds a cooperative first witness; Thomassin brings a second.

When they all go to the Section du Roule, they’re delayed in a queue, and during the wait the second witness reads a posted warning that false witnesses will be punished with two years in irons. He panics, goes straight to the secretary, and admits he doesn’t know these men at all. When their turn finally comes, the secretary quietly tells Lescure, “You are lost, get out,” while outwardly fobbing them off with a complaint that he has no time and they must return later. They run, and they’re lucky they escape with their lives.

Lescure and his family manage to leave on 25 August, but Henri and d’Autichamps are still stuck. What saves them is a random guy, a lawyer, called Fleury, who somehow hides Henri and d’Autichamps in his home even though he doesn’t personally know them. To make matters more interesting, Fleury lives in the rue de l’Ancienne-Comédie, close to the Carmelite convent, one of the principal sites of the September Massacres.

Fortunately for the two of them, Paris can’t keep its barriers closed for long. Food shortages force the reopening of the barriers on 8 September. Henri and d’Autichamps leave as soon as it’s possible, reach Orléans, and travel on disguised as Loire boatmen to Sainte-Gemme near Ponts-de-Cé, a property connected to d’Autichamps’s family. After that, he goes back home to La Durbeliere. 

Notes: 

(1) Louis Charles Le Cat, comte d’Hervilly (1756–1795) was a French noble officer who served under the monarchy and then became a counter-revolutionary émigré commander. He fought in the American Revolutionary War as an aide-de-camp to Admiral d’Estaing and was promoted maréchal de camp in 1792. Later, he was one of the leading figures in the failed émigré landing at Quiberon in 1795, after which he died in London from his wounds. 

(2) Louis Hercule Timoléon de Cossé, duc de Brissac (1734–1792) was a senior court figure and military commander under Louis XV and Louis XVI, holding offices including captain-colonel of the Cent-Suisses (Swiss bodyguard company) and Grand Panetier of France. In 1791 he became commander-in-chief of the king’s Constitutional Guard, a post that made him a prominent target once the guard was dissolved in 1792. He was arrested and was killed during the September massacres in 1792.

(3) Antoine-Charles du Houx, baron de Vioménil (1728–1792) was a long-serving French general from Lorraine who fought in several wars, including the American War of Independence, where he served under Rochambeau and took part in the Yorktown campaign. During the Revolution he remained closely attached to Louis XVI and, on 10 August 1792, he was seriously wounded defending the king during the attack on the Tuileries. He died in Paris on 9 November 1792 from those wounds. 

Sources:

Marquise de La Rochejaquelein (Lescure’s widow, she gives a good account of the passport incident), Mémoires, 1814, 1889.

Françoise de Chabot, Henri de La Rochejaquelein, 1889.