Guillaume Marie Anne Brune, poet and warrior, was born on May 13, 1763, at Brives-la-Gaillard. His father, who belonged to a legal family, destined his son to follow in his footsteps, and after giving him a good education, sent him to finish his study of law at the College of France at Paris. But the boy's taste did not lie among the dull technicalities of law. Artistic and emotional by temperament, he early threw himself heart and soul into literature. At the age of eighteen he published his first work, half prose, half verse, in which he described a holiday in Poitou and Angoumois. But his father viewed with suspicion his son's literary aspirations, and the breach between them widened when Guillaume married a young burnisher of metal, AngÉlique Nicole Pierre, the orphaned daughter of a miller from Arpajon, who had captivated him by her beauty and then nursed him through a dangerous illness. The young couple were thrown entirely on their own resources, and AngÉlique had to continue her burnishing, while to ensure the publication of his works Brune took to the trade of printer. But in spite of poverty and hard work the marriage was a happy one, for AngÉlique's beauty, and purity of mind and character were the necessary complement to her husband's artistic desires. While engaged in his literary work Brune met the celebrated Mirabeau, who introduced him to his friends, Camille Desmoulins and Danton. Generous by nature, and smarting under the social disgrace which followed his marriage, the poet, turned printer, threw himself heart and soul into the philosophy of the day: when the Revolution broke out he hailed the new era with delight, but, like many another visionary, he failed to see the cruel necessities which the Revolution was bringing in its train. Following the example of his friend Camille Desmoulins, on September 15, 1789, he started a newspaper, the Magazin Historique ou Journal GÉnÉral, and followed up this speculation by editing, in collaboration with Gauthier, the Journal de la Cour; but owing to the violent politics of Gauthier, Brune broke his connection with the paper in August, 1790. As the Revolution grew in violence and blind disorder, and hate took the place of his dream of platonic justice, eager to escape from cruelty and lust, the printer hastened to console himself among those who were hurrying to the frontier to fight the enemy as the only means of getting away from the chaos at home. In August, 1791, he enlisted in the volunteers of the Seine and Oise, and within a few weeks his activity, zeal, and talent for administration caused his comrades to elect him adjutant-major. Early in 1792 he joined the staff of the army as assistant adjutant-general, and, owing to the influence of Danton and his political friends, was recalled from Thionville to Paris in September, 1792, as commissary general, to direct and organise the newly raised battalions of volunteers. But when he arrived in Paris on September 5th, and found the streets swimming in blood and Danton gloating over his work, disgusted with Paris and its savage population, he at once applied for active service, and was back at the camp of Meaux in time to take part in Dumouriez's campaign of Valmy. Though he recoiled from their methods, his friendship with Danton and Camille Desmoulins stood him in good stead; as adjutant-general he served at Neerwinden, and after that battle was one of the five general officers chosen to rally the scattered troops of the Army of the North. In July he was ordered to Calvados to assist in crushing the Girondists. After his success in Normandy his friends offered him a post in the ministry at Paris, but "he loved liberty fair and free, as she existed in the army, but not as she was adored in Paris, to the sound of the tocsin and the beat of the gÉnÉrale, and fierce songs of death trolled out by cannibals." Accordingly he returned to the Army of the North in time to fight under Houchard at HandschÖtten. But he had to pay the penalty for his friendship with the Terrorists, for just as he was setting out full of delight to fight the English at Dunkirk, owing to the exigencies of political strife he was hurriedly recalled to give the Girondists their coup-de-grÂce at Bordeaux.

Brune returned to the capital in 1794 in time to witness the fall of his patron, Danton; but fortunately for him Barras took him under his protection, and in October, thanks to his influence, he became commandant of Paris. For a whole year the General held this post, and on October 5th commanded the second column while Bonaparte with the first column ended the reaction of the Terror with a few rounds of grape shot. Still under the patronage of Barras, Brune spent the year 1796 in pacifying the Midi, and his work there has been admirably portrayed in Alexandre Dumas' "Les Compagnons de JÉhu," where he figures as General Rolland. From this vexatious and wearisome struggle against hostile countrymen he was summoned to Italy at the beginning of 1797, and was present with MassÉna's division at the battle of Rivoli. Under MassÉna, he fought through the campaign which ended at Leoben, and attracted the notice of Bonaparte by his courage and goodwill: in reward for his services he was created general of division. From Italy the general, with his division, was sent in October to join the Army of England; while marching north it was suggested that he should take the post of ambassador at Berlin; but when the troops heard of this offer they asked the adjutant-general to write to their commander, saying, "Listen general: your division charges me to tell you not to give up fighting; the division will bring you honour, and that is much better than an embassy." However, there was to be no question of an embassy, for on February 7, 1798, the Directors sent him to take over the command of the French troops whose duty it was to annex Switzerland to France. This was the general's first independent command; and though the campaign added to his military reputation, unfortunately it left a stain on his honour. The war was entered on merely with the desire of capturing the Swiss treasury at Berne, and thus providing funds for Bonaparte's Egyptian expedition. Brune had learned his lesson in Italy, so the campaign was short, in spite of the difficulty of the country and the patriotism of the Swiss. Writing to Bonaparte, the general explained the cause of his success: "From the moment I found myself in a situation to act, I assembled all my strength to strike like lightning: for Switzerland is a vast barrack, and I had everything to fear from a war of posts. I avoided it by negotiations which I knew were not sincere on the part of the Bernese, and since then I have followed out the plan which I traced to you. I think always I am still under your command." The crushing of the Swiss peasantry and the capture of Berne were followed by the hour of spoliation; no less than one million seven hundred thousand pounds were wrung from the wretched Swiss. Brune himself kept his own hands clean and was, as he wrote, "constantly paring the nails of rascals and taking the public treasure from them"; but the fact that he was officially responsible for the spoliation and that his own share of the plunder was thirty-two thousand pounds caused his name to be loathed throughout the length and breadth of Switzerland, and "to rob like a Brune" became a proverb, which was eagerly seized on by his detractors.

The Directors, pleased with his operations in Switzerland, despatched Brune, on March 31, 1798, to take command of the Army of Italy. His task was a difficult one, for at Rome and Mantua the starving troops had mutinied, while the contractors and agents of the Directors were amassing huge fortunes. To complicate the situation the general was encumbered by a civil Commission, whose duty it was to supervise the governments of the Cisalpine Republic. TrouvÉ, the moving spirit of the Commission, had but one idea, to curb the growing democratic spirit of the Piedmontese. The commander-in-chief, whose love of freedom had not yet been blunted, violently opposed TrouvÉ, and at last forced his views on the Directory, and TrouvÉ was replaced by FouchÉ. But it was too late; the mischief had been done. The Piedmontese would no longer bear the French control: "This then," they cried, "is the faith, the fraternity, and the friendship you have brought us from France!" In spite of Brune's efforts to restore confidence they had lost all faith in French honour, and on December 6th his successor found himself forced to expel, at the point of the bayonet, all senators opposed to the French interest.

Leaving Italy in November, Brune found himself sent at the beginning of 1799 to Holland, where danger was threatening: it was evident that England was going to make an effort to regain for the Prince of Orange his lost possessions. In spite of this knowledge, as late as August the French commander could only concentrate ten thousand men under General Daendals to oppose an equal force of English under Abercromby when they landed on the open beach at Groete Keten. Though as strong as the enemy, General Daendals made the most feeble attempt to oppose the landing. Day by day English and Russian reinforcements poured into Holland, till at last they numbered forty-eight thousand. But the Duke of York, the English commander-in-chief, had a hopeless task. With no means of transport, no staff, and an army composed of hastily enrolled militia recruits and insubordinate drunken Russians, his only chance of success lay in a general rising of the Dutch; for early in September the French forces were numerically as strong as his own. Abercromby's opinion was that defeat would mean utter disaster: "Were we to sustain a severe check I much doubt if the discipline of the troops would be sufficient to prevent a total dissolution of the army": while the English opinion of the Russians was that they were better at plundering than at fighting. As a militiaman wrote, "The Russians is people as has not the fear of God before their eyes, for I saw some of them with cheeses and bitter and all badly wounded, and in particklar one man had an eit day clock on his back, and fiting all the time which made me to conclude and say all his vanity and vexation of spirit." In spite of this the English had some considerable tactical success, and drove the French back towards Amsterdam; but lack of provisions compelled them at the beginning of October to fall back on their entrenched position on the Zype. Fortunately Brune, who had been much impressed by the fighting powers of the enemy, did not understand how difficult it would have been for them to re-embark their forces if he pressed an attack. He allowed some of his staff officers to throw out hints of an armistice and convention, which were eagerly accepted, for on October 20th the English had only three days' provision of bread. With MassÉna's victory at Zurich and the embarkation of the Allies after the convention of Alkmaar, the ring of foes which had so gravely threatened France was snapped asunder, and Brune, although he had shown but little resource or initiative during the fighting in Holland, and had failed to diagnose the extremity of the enemy, was hailed, along with MassÉna, as the saviour of the country, and his tactical defeats were celebrated as the victory of Bergen.

From Holland the conqueror of the English was despatched, early in 1800, by the First Consul to quell the rising in La VendÉe, where his former experience of guerilla warfare in Switzerland stood him in good stead, and he soon brought the rebels to their knees. During the Marengo campaign he commanded the real Army of Reserve at Dijon, but in August, when Bonaparte found it necessary to replace MassÉna, he despatched Brune to take command of the Army of Italy. Unfortunately the future Marshal's genius was more suited to the details of administration and the direction of small columns than to the command of large forces in the field. Though at the head of a hundred thousand men, and supported admirably by Murat, Marmont, Macdonald, Suchet and Dupont, he failed conspicuously as a commander-in-chief. His movements at the crossing of the Mincio were hesitating and slow, and he neglected to seize the opportunity which Dupont's successful movements presented to him. At Treviso, as in Holland, he showed only too clearly his limitations: he held the enemy in the hollow of his hand, but, failing to see his advantage, he once again signed an armistice which permitted the foe to escape out of his net.

On his return to France the First Consul regarded him with suspicion. His well-known republican opinions did not harmonise with Bonaparte's schemes of self-aggrandisement. The First Consul had a very poor estimate of his military ability, but the people at large still hailed him as the saviour of Holland and France. Bonaparte treated him like all those whom he suspected but whom he could not afford to despise, and under the pretext of a diplomatic appointment he practically banished him to Constantinople. Diplomacy was not Brune's forte, and after eighteen months' residence in Turkey he was obliged to quit the Porte, which had fallen entirely under Russian influence.

The general was still abroad when the Emperor created his Marshals: his appointment of Brune, like his appointment of LefÈbvre, was part of his scheme for binding the republican interest to his dynasty, for his opinion of the Marshal's talent was such that he scarcely ever employed him in the field. From 1805 to 1807 Brune was occupied in drilling the troops left at Boulogne. In May, 1807, he was appointed to command the reserve corps of the Grand Army, and when in July the King of Sweden declared war on Napoleon, he was entrusted with the operations round Stralsund, and captured that fortress and the island of RÜgen. During this short campaign the Marshal had an interview with Gustavus of Sweden, and tried to point out to him the folly of fighting against France. A garbled account of this interview, full of unjust insinuations, came to Napoleon's ears. In anger the Emperor sent for Brune and taxed him with the false accusations. The Marshal, furious that his good faith should be suspected, refused any explanation and merely contented himself with repeating: "It is a lie." The Emperor, equally furious at his obstinacy, deprived him of his command. The result of this quarrel was that for the next five years Brune lived at home in disgrace. On the Restoration he made his submission to Louis XVIII., and received the cross of St. Louis. But in 1815, on the return from Elba, he answered the Emperor's summons, for Napoleon could no longer afford the luxury of quarrelling with generous Frenchmen who were willing to serve him. Remembering the Marshal's talent for administration and a war of posts, he offered him the command of the Midi. Brune hesitated; Napoleon had treated him disgracefully, but in his generosity he was ready to overlook all that; still, he knew well that the Empire was not the Republic: yet he preferred Napoleon's rÉgime to that of the Bourbons, and at last he accepted, but set out for his new duties depressed and not at all himself. The difficulties he had to contend with were enormous; the Austrians and Sardinians were massing on the frontiers, the allied fleet commanded the Mediterranean, while Provence was covered by bands of brigands who called themselves royalists. Marseilles, the fickle, which had given France and the Republic the "Marseillaise," was now red-hot Legitimist. So the news of Waterloo and of Napoleon's abdication came as a relief to the harassed Marshal, who was only too glad on July 22nd to hand over Toulon to the English. Thereon, in obedience to the command of the King, he set out for Paris.

Well aware of the disorder in the Midi, the Marshal asked Lord Exmouth, the commander of the British squadron, to take him by sea to Italy, so that he might escape the danger which he knew threatened him from the hatred of the royalists. Unfortunately for the fame of England, Lord Exmouth refused in the rudest terms, calling him "the prince of scamps" and a "blackguard." Accordingly he set off by land, receiving a promise of protection from the royalist commander, but no escort. With his two aides-de-camp he reached Avignon in safety, but there he was set on by the mob, chased into a hotel and shot in cold blood, and his body thrown into the RhÔne; a fisherman by night rescued the corpse, and for many years the body of the Marshal reposed in the humble grave where the kindhearted fisherman had placed it. Meanwhile the Government sanctioned the story that he had committed suicide. But at last the persistence of his widow compelled an inquiry, when the truth was revealed, and it was proved without doubt that the murder had been connived at by the authorities. The inquiry further revealed that the real cause of the Marshal's death was not so much the measures he had taken to stamp out the bands of royalists during his command in the Midi, as his old connection with Camille Desmoulins and Danton. In spite of the fact that he was not in Paris during the September massacres, and that he was constantly employed with the army, rumour said that it was Brune who had carried round Paris the head of the Princess Lamballe on a pike, and the cunning revival of this story by the leaders of the White Terror had roused the mob to commit the outrage. The story was absurd. The archives of the War Office proved beyond doubt that he was not in Paris at the time of the execution of the Princess. Strange to say, the Marshal himself years before seems to have foretold his own death when, writing about the Terrorists, he composed the following lines:—

Though his faithful wife had forced the authorities to remove the stain of suicide from the Marshal's fair fame, it was not till 1839, the year after her death, that at last a fitting monument was raised at Brives-la-Gaillard to the memory of the Marshal, who, whatever his failings as a commander might be, had lived a staunch friend, a true patriot, a courageous soldier; and had twice received the grateful thanks of the Government, and had twice been acclaimed as the saviour of his country.