670 



PERSIGNY, DUC DE. 



as the ablest living statesmen of Persia. The 

 great efforts of the Mohammedan priests to 

 neutralize the influence of the liberal advisers 

 of the Shah proved a complete failure, and the 

 new Minister of Foreign Affairs received per- 

 mission officially to announce that the Shah in 

 the course of the year 1873 would make a 

 tour through the great countries of Europe. 



PERSIGNY, JEAN GILBERT VICTOR FIALIN, 

 Due de, a French Bonapartist, statesman, and 

 diplomatist, born at St. -Germain 1'Espinasse, 

 department of the Loire, January 11, 1808; 

 died at Nice, January 12, 1872. His father, 

 after losing the remainder of his patrimony, 

 joined Napoleon's grand army, and was killed, 

 in 1812, at the battle of Salamanca. Victor, 

 having received assistance from one of his un- 

 cles, entered the College of Limoges at the 

 age of seventeen, thence passed to the cavalry 

 school at Saumur, which he left after two 

 years' training, with the rank of quartermaster 

 in the Fourth Hussars. He was at this time a 

 royalist, but under his captain's influence he 

 changed his opinions and aided the revolution- 

 ary movement of 1830, which drove King 

 Charles X. into exile. The young soldier, how- 

 ever, did not profit by the success of the revo- 

 lutionists, for his conduct was deemed insub- 

 ordinate, and he was dismissed from the army. 

 He went to Paris in the hope of improving 

 his fortunes, and was engaged on the staff of 

 Le Temps. Having read about this time Las 

 Casas's "Memoirs of St. Helena," young Fia- 

 lin became at once an ardent Bonapartist, and 

 renouncing his name of Fialin he assumed the 

 name and title of Vicomte de Persigny, which 

 had been hereditary in his family, but for two 

 or three generations had not been in use. His 

 claim to it as a younger son was, to say the 

 least, doubtful. The young adventurer now 

 published La Francais Occident, in the inter- 

 est of the Bonapartes ; but, from want of 

 funds, was only able to issue one number. 

 His zeal, however, won him the favor of ex- 

 King Joseph Bonaparte, who gave him a letter 

 of introduction to Louis Bonaparte, then re- 

 siding at Arenenberg. Thus began that re- 

 markable intimacy which had so much to do 

 with the fortunes of both the aspiring French- 

 man and the heir to the great Napoleon. En- 

 couraged by the warm reception he had re- 

 ceived, M. de Persigny began with ardent ear- 

 nestness to reconstruct the Bonapartist party, 

 by travelling through Germany and France, 

 enlisting adherents, and inspiring hopes among 

 the French people of seeing the proscribed 

 Napoleons once more in power. He took a 

 leading part in the descent made* by Louis 

 Bonaparte and his followers on Strasbourg, 

 but, more fortunate than his companions and 

 leader, escaped through the aid of Madame 

 Gordon, the devoted woman who shared in 

 the enterprise. After lingering some time in 

 the Black Forest, M. de Persigny gained the 

 Rhine, whence he repaired to England, and 

 there published an account of the enterprise, 



the failure of which he conveniently ascribed 

 to fatality. Four years later he joined Louis 

 Bonaparte in attempting to cause a revolt at 

 Boulogne, and being made prisoner was ar- 

 raigned before the Court of Peers, and sen- 

 tenced to twenty years' detention. In the 

 warrant for his trial he is described as Victor 

 Fialin, calling himself de Persigny, and is 

 spoken of as a dangerous man, a man of 

 skill, intelligence, and resolution, and possess- 

 ing remarkable talents for leading a conspir- 

 acy. The Government was, however, indul- 

 gent^ and, after detaining him in the military 

 hospital at Versailles, allowed him before lonj 

 to go where he liked in France. During In 

 imprisonment he wrote a treatise asserting that 

 the Pyramids of Egypt were built to preserve 

 the valley of the Nile from the shifting sands. 

 As soon as Persigny learned of the Revolu- 

 tion of 1848, he hastened to Paris to promot 

 the interests of Prince Louis Napoleon .Bona- 

 parte. He rallied the Bonapartists, organized 

 them into a society, of which he was presi- 

 dent, contributed to the publication of popular 

 circulars and broad-sheets in his favor, trav- 

 ersed the departments, obtained admission to 

 the committee of the Rue des Poitiers, 

 more than any and all other men, brougl 

 about that state of popular feeling which 

 suited in the election of the prince as pr 

 dent of the French Republic by an overwheh 

 ing majority. After his election Prince Louis 

 Napoleon made de Persigny his aide-de-camj , 

 and gave him a high position on the staff of 

 the National Guard. He was elected in 1849 

 to the Legislative Assembly, and therein zeal- 

 ously sustained his master, who soon assumed 

 the title of Prince-President. He was one of 

 the few conspirators treated with implicit con- 

 fidence by Prince Bonaparte when planning 

 the overthrow of the republic by the coup 

 d'etat of December, 1851. At the head of 

 the Forty-second Regiment of the Line he 

 took possession of the Hall of the National 

 Assembly, and was named one of the Consul- 

 tative Commission. When the prince, soon 

 after this event, became Emperor, he made M. 

 de Persigny Minister of the Interior, who, in 

 that capacity, proved a willing instrument in 

 carrying out the acts of his imperial master. 

 He was advanced to the rank of count, and re- 

 ceived a wedding-present of 500,000 francs from 

 the Emperor on the occasion of his marriage 

 in 1852. He became a Senator in December 

 of that year. He resigned in 1854, and was ap- 

 pointed ambassador to England, and held that 

 position, with the exception of a brief interval, 

 until 1860, when he was appointed Minister 

 of the Interior. He aimed at giving his ad- 

 ministration a liberal character, but, when the 

 elections of 1863 demonstrated the failure of 

 his policy, he resigned, and received the title 

 of duke from the Emperor. It is due to him 

 to say that, in his subsequent position as Sen- 

 ator and duke, he invariably counselled a lib- 

 eral policy, and the Ollivier Ministry of 1870 



