ENGINEER OFFICER AT THE SIEGE OF LANDRECIES - Lot 87

Lot n° 87
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ENGINEER OFFICER AT THE SIEGE OF LANDRECIES - Lot 87
ENGINEER OFFICER AT THE SIEGE OF LANDRECIES AND PRISONER OF WAR IN HUNGARY [DEROUET (François Joseph)]. Autograph manuscript signed with his initial (p. 15, "Le c. d. G. D.", i.e. "le capitaine du Génie Derouet"). Covering the period from 1792 to 1806, it has been edited for the period before January 1796 (up to p. 73) and then written over the days until 1806. In-8, 125 pp, half tan basane with corners, smooth spine mute, cover of the boards stamped in pink with sponge, spotted edges; spine and corners rubbed with small lacks (period binding). 400/500 Diary kept by a young officer from the École du Génie in Mézières (1792-1793), whose father, an architect, frequented the salon of Honoré de Balzac's mother. He was sent on operations in August 1793, in the North of France: he then commanded by interim the fortifications of Landrecies in February 1794, was among those who defended the place against the Austrians and the Dutch in April 1794, under the orders of general Henri-Victor Roulland, who however had to capitulate in a burning city and were sent in captivity in Hungary. After more than a year in Pest, he benefited from a prisoner exchange and was able to return to France where he served as deputy director of fortifications, a position he held in several places including Cherbourg, Bourges, Versailles and Tours. Having left the army after his marriage in 1806, he lived for a time in Rodez before settling in Touraine where he was for a long time mayor of Rochecorbon. A distinguished herbalist, he studied the flora of Tours and built up an important herbarium which, completed by his brother and then his nephew, was given to the city of Tours. François Joseph Derouet notes here all the stages of his journey from Landrecies to Pest, from April 30 (date of the capitulation) to July 1794, with other prisoners (pp. 1-10 and 15-31): he crossed Belgium to Maastricht, then Germany, first on foot from Aachen to Regensburg, then by boat on the Danube, to Austria, via Vienna, then to Moravia and Hungary via Presburg (Bratislava) to Pest. He frequently describes his impressions of the trip and paints a vivid picture of the scenes where French emigrants, having massed on their passage, insulted them with violence. The voyage did not take place however in a too strict discipline, then that he specifies to have had the occasion to herborize. François Joseph Derouet then relates his return to France, from September 2 to November 9, 1795, this time entirely by land, through southern Germany to Strasbourg and finally to his native city of Tours (pp. 56-66 and 71-73). In addition to this travel account, François Joseph Derouet deals with the siege of Landrecies, which was the other major event of his life: he first gives a copy of the report he had to write on order just after the event, while stopping in Tongres in May 1794 on his way to captivity (pp. 10-15). He then wrote a more detailed account of the event at the beginning of his stay in Pest in July-August 1794 (pp. 32-55). He also gives a copy, for comparison, of the account that the future general of the Genie Armand Samuel de Marescot made of the recapture of Landrecies by the French troops in July 1794 (pp. 66-70). The remainder of the manuscript concerns the innumerable journeys that François Joseph Derouet made from January 1796 to May 1806 (pp. 74-125), mainly within the framework of his functions as deputy director of the fortifications, and mentions, among other things, a mission to Clermont-Ferrand, or one in Holland with Louis Bonaparte. Provenance : former collection of Émile Brouwet.
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