Claude Antoine Gabriel, duc de Choiseul-Stainville (26 August 1760,

Lunéville Lunéville ( ; German, obsolete: ''Lünstadt'' ) is a commune in the northeastern French department of Meurthe-et-Moselle. It is a subprefecture of the department and lies on the river Meurthe at its confluence with the Vezouze. History Lu ...

– 1 December 1838) was a French soldier and ''

émigré An ''émigré'' () is a person who has emigrated, often with a connotation of political or social self-exile. The word is the past participle of the French ''émigrer'', "to emigrate". French Huguenots Many French Huguenots fled France followin ...

Royalist A royalist supports a particular monarch as head of state for a particular kingdom, or of a particular dynastic claim. In the abstract, this position is royalism. It is distinct from monarchism, which advocates a monarchical system of governm ...

Biography

He was brought up at Chanteloup, under the care of his relative, Etienne François, duc de Choiseul, who was childless. In 1778, he married his cousin, Marie Stephanie de Choiseul-Stainville, daughter of Etienne's younger brother

Jacques Philippe de Choiseul, marquis de Choiseul-Stainville Ancient and noble French family names, Jacques, Jacq, or James are believed to originate from the Middle Ages in the historic northwest Brittany region in France, and have since spread around the world over the centuries. To date, there are over ...

. The latter had only daughters, so Claude became heir to the family titles. When the

French Revolution The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in coup of 18 Brumaire, November 1799. Many of its ...

erupted, he was a colonel of Dragoons, and throughout the following period, he remained a

Legitimist The Legitimists (french: Légitimistes) are royalists who adhere to the rights of dynastic succession to the French crown of the descendants of the eldest branch of the Bourbon dynasty, which was overthrown in the 1830 July Revolution. They ...

. Choiseul-Stainville took part in the attempt of

King King is the title given to a male monarch in a variety of contexts. The female equivalent is queen, which title is also given to the consort of a king. *In the context of prehistory, antiquity and contemporary indigenous peoples, the tit ...

Louis XVI Louis XVI (''Louis-Auguste''; ; 23 August 175421 January 1793) was the last King of France before the fall of the monarchy during the French Revolution. He was referred to as ''Citizen Louis Capet'' during the four months just before he was ...

to escape from

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

on 20 June 1791, was arrested with the king, and imprisoned (''see Flight to Varennes''). Liberated in May 1792, he fled France in October, and fought in the émigré army of Louis Joseph de Bourbon, prince de Condé against the French Republic. Captured in 1795, he was confined at Dunkirk, escaped, set sail for

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

, was wrecked on the French coast, and condemned to death by the decree of the French Directory. Nevertheless, he was fortunate enough to escape once more.

Napoleon Bonaparte Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader wh ...

allowed him to return to France in 1801, but he remained in private life until the fall of the

First French Empire The First French Empire, officially the French Republic, then the French Empire (; Latin: ) after 1809, also known as Napoleonic France, was the empire ruled by Napoleon Bonaparte, who established French hegemony over much of continental E ...

in 1815. After the Bourbon Restoration he was called to the new

Chambre des Pairs {{Infobox legislature , name = Chamber of Peers , native_name = Chambre des Pairs , native_name_lang = French , transcription_name = , legislature = , coa_pic = Coat_of_Arms_of_the_July_Monarchy_(183 ...

(House of Peers) by King

Louis XVIII Louis XVIII (Louis Stanislas Xavier; 17 November 1755 – 16 September 1824), known as the Desired (), was King of France from 1814 to 1824, except for a brief interruption during the Hundred Days in 1815. He spent twenty-three years in ...

. During the Revolution of 1830, he was nominated a member of the provisional government. He afterwards received from

Louis-Philippe Louis Philippe (6 October 1773 – 26 August 1850) was King of the French from 1830 to 1848, and the penultimate monarch of France. As Louis Philippe, Duke of Chartres, he distinguished himself commanding troops during the Revolutionary Wa ...

the post of aide-de-camp to the king and governor of the Louvre Palace. He died in Paris eight years later.

Honours

*1833: Grand cordon of the Order of Leopold.RD of 10.03.1833

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Choiseul-Stainville, Claude Antoine Gabriel, duc de 1760 births 1838 deaths People from Lunéville Dukes of Choiseul French Army soldiers French civil servants Royalist insurgents during the French Revolution French counter-revolutionaries Peers created by Louis XVI Members of the Chamber of Peers of the Bourbon Restoration Members of the Chamber of Peers of the July Monarchy 19th-century French civil servants