Édouard François André (1833–1894) was a French banker, politician, soldier and art collector. He was the husband of Nélie Jacquemart-André, the society painter. Their art collection is preserved at the

Musée Jacquemart-André The Musée Jacquemart-André ( en, Jacquemart-André Museum) is a private museum located at 158 Boulevard Haussmann in the 8th arrondissement of Paris. The museum was created from the private home of Édouard André (1833–1894) and Nélie Jacq ...

in Paris.

Biography

Son to Ernest André (1803–1864), Edouard André was born into a family of rich banker Protestants, native to the Southeast of

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

(Nîmes dans le Gard), who flourished during the

Second French Empire The Second French Empire (; officially the French Empire, ), was the 18-year Empire, Imperial Bonapartist regime of Napoleon III from 14 January 1852 to 27 October 1870, between the French Second Republic, Second and the French Third Republic ...

. Edouard André lost his mother at the age of two. In firm support of

Napoleon III Napoleon III (Charles Louis Napoléon Bonaparte; 20 April 18089 January 1873) was the first President of France (as Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte) from 1848 to 1852 and the last monarch of France as Emperor of the French from 1852 to 1870. A nephew ...

and sensitive to the

Saint-Simonian Saint-Simonianism was a French political, religious and social movement of the first half of the 19th century, inspired by the ideas of Claude Henri de Rouvroy, comte de Saint-Simon (1760–1825). Saint-Simon's ideas, expressed largely through a ...

ideas, the Andre family was involved in financing the modernization of France and large companies of the imperial regime. He succeeded his father as MP of

Gard Gard () is a department in Southern France, located in the region of Occitanie. It had a population of 748,437 as of 2019;1869 French legislative election Parliamentary elections were held in France on 24 May and 1 June 1869, with a second round on 6 and 7 June.Dieter Nohlen & Philip Stöver (2010) ''Elections in Europe: A data handbook'', p673 These elections resulted in a victory for the regime ...

; he served until 4 September 1870,Fiche sur le site de l'Assemblée Nationale
/ref> when the Third Republic was established. After the fall of the Second Empire, he joined the

National Guard National Guard is the name used by a wide variety of current and historical uniformed organizations in different countries. The original National Guard was formed during the French Revolution around a cadre of defectors from the French Guards. Nat ...

in 1871. With the

Rothschilds The Rothschild family ( , ) is a wealthy Ashkenazi Jewish family originally from Frankfurt that rose to prominence with Mayer Amschel Rothschild (1744–1812), a court factor to the German Landgraves of Hesse-Kassel in the Free City of F ...

, he negotiated the contribution that France had to pay to Germany after the surrender and brought the necessary amount together in a short time. Disappointed by politics, he decided to devote himself exclusively to his collections of paintings, furniture and art objects. In 1868, he sought the architect

Henri Parent Henri Parent (12 April 1819, Valenciennes - 1895, Paris) was a French architect. Biography His brother Clement was the son in law of Joseph-Antoine Froelicher, Henri Parent restored and transformed several hôtels particuliers in the Faubourg ...

to design mansion of grand proportions on a plot of 5,700 m2 in Paris for 1.5 million francs.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Andre, Edouard Francois French art collectors Art collectors from Paris French bankers French politicians French Protestants 1833 births 1894 deaths