Handwritten letter from Napoleons doctor (Edit)

150.00

Year: 1832

Tags: Napoleon Bonaparte ALS autograph signed letter Rene Nicholas Dufriche French history France

Manuscript letter written and signed by Baron Desgenettes, 1832. In French. About 8" by 6 1/8", paper lightly browned and foxed, letter written on one side with mailing instructions on reverse, folded into thirds. René-Nicolas Dufriche, Baron Desgenettes (1762-1837) was a French military doctor. In the 1790s, he was involved in the reorganisation of French military hospitals. Reportedly he dazzled Napoleon Bonaparte with his intelligence and his range of cultural awareness. A few years later, Bonaparte remembered him and made him chief doctor to the Egyptian expedition. Later, during the Hundred Days War, he resumed his role and served as chief-doctor of the Imperial Guard and assisted at the Battle of Waterloo. After the war, he was charged by Louis XVIII with teaching hygiene at the Faculté de Médecine in Paris. In 1820, he was received as a member of the Académie Royale de Médecine, though he was expelled in 1822 following student demonstrations, only to be re-admitted in 1830. After the July Revolution, Baron Desgenettes was made mayor of the 10th arrondissement of Paris, a role he filled until the municipal elections of 1834. On 2 March 1832, he was made chief doctor of Les Invalides. His name features on the Arc de Triomphe. Alexandre Dumas described Desgenettes as "old, bawdy, very witty and very cynical".

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