GENERAL ALEXANDRE DUMAS Soldier of the French Revolution

Gallaher, John G.

ISBN 10: 0809320983 / ISBN 13: 9780809320981

Published by Southern Illinois University Press, Carbondale, IL, 1997

About this Item

183pp, 6 maps, Bibliography. A very nice copy. Seller Inventory # 182791

Bibliographic Details

Title: GENERAL ALEXANDRE DUMAS Soldier of the ...

Publisher: Southern Illinois University Press, Carbondale, IL

Publication Date: 1997

Binding: Hardcover

Condition: As New

Dust Jacket Condition: As New

Edition: First Edition

About this title

Synopsis:

Although General Alexandre Dumas was a fascinating man and a bold, distinguished Napoleonic soldier, he has been overshadowed by the literary successes of his son Alexandre Dumas (The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo) and grandson, the playwright Alexandre Dumas.

Gallaher reveals General Dumas’ extraordinary life in eighteenth-century France, providing the first biography in English of the mulatto soldier who knew both the favor and the wrath of Napoleon Bonaparte.

Born Thomas-Alexandre Davy de Ia Pailleterie in 1762 to an enslaved black woman and a white French nobleman, the young Thomas Alexandre spent his first fourteen years on the island of Saint Domingue. Following his mother’s death, Alexandre joined his father in Normandy in 1776. Later, he moved to Paris alone. In 1786, after losing financial support for his libertine Parisian life, Thomas-Alexandre enlisted as a private in the French army under his mother’s name Dumas. From there began a distinguished military career that saw early rapid advancement, peaked with high favor from Napoleon, and ended after unjust attempts on Dumas’ life.

About the Author:

John G. Gallaher is a professor emeritus of history at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville.