Antoine Claude Nicolas Valdec de Lessart (25 January 1741, Château de Mongenan,

Portets Portets (; oc-gsc, Portèth) is a commune in the Gironde department in Nouvelle-Aquitaine in southwestern France. Portets station has rail connections to Langon and Bordeaux. Population See also * Château de Mongenan, a chateau and botanic ...

, near

Bordeaux Bordeaux ( , ; Gascon oc, Bordèu ; eu, Bordele; it, Bordò; es, Burdeos) is a port city on the river Garonne in the Gironde department, Southwestern France. It is the capital of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, as well as the prefect ...

– 9 September 1792,

Versailles The Palace of Versailles ( ; french: Château de Versailles ) is a former royal residence built by King Louis XIV located in Versailles, about west of Paris, France. The palace is owned by the French Republic and since 1995 has been managed, ...

) was a French politician. He was the illegitimate son of the Baron de Gasq, Président of the Parlement de

Guyenne Guyenne or Guienne (, ; oc, Guiana ) was an old French province which corresponded roughly to the Roman province of '' Aquitania Secunda'' and the archdiocese of Bordeaux. The name "Guyenne" comes from ''Aguyenne'', a popular transformation o ...

Life

Before 1790

A director of the Compagnie des Indes, he became Maître des requêtes in 1767 then in October 1788 one of the three commissaries charged with discussing and examining everything on the financial administration. Claude Antoine Valdec de Lessart was one of the intimates of

Jacques Necker Jacques Necker (; 30 September 1732 – 9 April 1804) was a Genevan banker and statesman who served as finance minister for Louis XVI. He was a reformer, but his innovations sometimes caused great discontent. Necker was a constitutional monarchi ...

Louis XVI of France 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 ...

made him one of the commissaries charged with reconciling the three orders of the Estates General.

Revolution

On 4 December 1790, he was summoned to the Contrôle général des finances, then on 25 January 1791 moved to the Interior Minister, all the while holding onto the finance portfolio. At the Financial ministry,

Étienne Clavière Étienne Clavière (29 January 17358 December 1793) was a Genevan-born French financier and politician of the French Revolution. He was French Minister of Finance between 24 March and 12 June 1792, and between 10 August 1792 and 2 June 1793. ...

and the

Girondin The Girondins ( , ), or Girondists, were members of a loosely knit political faction during the French Revolution. From 1791 to 1793, the Girondins were active in the Legislative Assembly and the National Convention. Together with the Montagnard ...

s preyed on his management of the post, whilst at the interior ministry

Camille Desmoulins Lucie-Simplice-Camille-Benoît Desmoulins (; 2 March 17605 April 1794) was a French journalist and politician who played an important role in the French Revolution. Desmoulins was tried and executed alongside Georges Danton when the Committee ...

Louis-Marie Stanislas Fréron Louis-Marie Stanislas Fréron (17 August 1754 – 15 July 1802) was a French politician, journalist, representative to the National Assembly, and a representative on mission during the French Revolution. Background The son of Elie-Catherine Fr ...

and Jean-Paul Marat reproached his sympathies for the refractory clergy. During the Varennes affair, he revealed himself as a docile executor of the orders of the Legislative Assembly. He was then made interim Naval Minister in September 1791 and interim Minister of Foreign Affairs that October when the main concern was the bellicose activities of the emigres based in Treves and Mayence. The threat to go to war with their hosts, the Rheinish Electors, sufficed to have the émigré armies ordered to disband. However, that December the emperor of Austria announced Austrian troops would support the Rheinish electors and war with Austria became a real possibility. That possibility was welcomed by the Assembly and de Lessart could do little to prevent it (He did send Talleyrand to London in January 1792 to seek English neutrality if not support). The Assembly resented de Lessart's cautious - some said treasonable - approach and on 1 March voted to have him impeached. Unpopular and unable to arrest the march to war desired by

Jacques Pierre Brissot Jacques Pierre Brissot (, 15 January 1754 – 31 October 1793), who assumed the name of de Warville (an English version of "d'Ouarville", a hamlet in the village of Lèves where his father owned property), was a leading member of the Girondins du ...

, he was indicted under Girondin pressure on 10 March 1792. He was transferred to the High Court at

Orléans Orléans (;"Orleans"
(US) and Revolutionary Tribunal The Revolutionary Tribunal (french: Tribunal révolutionnaire; unofficially Popular Tribunal) was a court instituted by the National Convention during the French Revolution for the trial of political offenders. It eventually became one of the ...

of Paris was decided upon. Claude Fournier-L'Héritier was charged with bringing them as far as Paris, but instead stopped at Versailles and massacred 44 of the 52 prisoners entrusted to him, including

Louis Hercule Timoléon de Cossé-Brissac Louis Hercule Timoléon de Cossé-Brissac, Duke of Brissac (14 February 1734, Paris – 9 September 1792, Versailles), was a French military commander and peer of France. He was the second son and eventual heir of Jean Paul Timoléon de Cossé ...

, Claude Antoine de Valdec de Lessart and Charles-Xavier Franqueville d'Abancourt.

External links

Notice biographique de Nicolas de Valdec de Lessart
extract from ''Les ministres des Finances de la Révolution française au Second Empire'', Comité pour l'histoire économique et financière de la France, 2007, 376 p, () {{DEFAULTSORT:Lessart 1741 births 1792 deaths People from Gironde Ministers of Marine and the Colonies People killed in the French Revolution Burials at the Cemetery of Saint-Louis, Versailles French interior ministers French Ministers of Finance