JEAN

See also:

• ETIENNE, CHARLES GUILLAUME (1778-1845)

ETIENNE

See also:

• JEAN ETIENNE CHAMPIONNET (1762-1800)

CHAMPIONNET (1762-1800)  , French general, enlisted in the army at an early age and served in the great siege of Gibraltar . When the Revolution broke out he took a prominent part in the movement, and was elected by the men of a battalion to command them . In May 1793 he was charged with the suppression of the disturbances in the Jura, which he quelled without bloodshed . Under Pichegru he took part in the Rhine campaign of that year as a brigade commander, and at Weissenburg and in the Palatinate won the warm commendation of Lazare Roche . At Fleurus his stubborn fighting in the centre of the field contributed greatly to Jourdan's victory . In the subsequent campaigns he commanded the left wing of the French armies on the Rhine between Neuwied and Dusseldorf, and took a great part in all the successful and unsuccessful expeditions to the Lahn and the Main . In 1798 Championnet was named commander-in-chief of the " army of Rome " which was protecting the infant Roman republic against the Neapolitan court and the British fleet . Nominally 32,000 strong, the army scarcely numbered 8000 effectives, with a bare fifteen cartridges per man . The Austrian general Mack had a tenfold superiority in numbers, but Championnet so well held his own that he ended by capturing Naples itself and there setting up the Parthenopean Republic . But his intense earnestness and intolerance of opposition soon embroiled him with the civilians, and the general was recalled in disgrace . The following year, however, saw him again in the field as commander-in-chief of the " army of the Alps." This, too, was at first a mere paper force, but after three months' hard work it was able to take the field . The campaign which followed was uniformly unsuccessful, and, worn out by the unequal struggle, Championnet died at Antibes on the 9th of January 1800 .

In 1848 a statue was erected in his

honour at Valence . See A . R . C. de St Albin, Championnet, ou les Campagges de Hollande, de Rome et de Naples (Paris, i86o) .