Jean Victor Marie Moreau
Jean Victor Marie Moreau (14 February 1763 – 2 September 1813) was a French general who helped Napoleon Bonaparte to power, but later became a rival and was banished to the United States.
Biography
Early life
Moreau was born at Morlaix in Brittany. His father was a successful lawyer, and instead of allowing Moreau to enter the army, as he attempted to do, insisted on Moreau studying law at the University of Rennes. Young Moreau showed no inclination for law, but reveled in the freedom of student life. Instead of taking his degree, he continued to live with the students as their hero and leader, and formed them into a sort of army, which he commanded as their provost. When 1789 came, he commanded the students in the daily affrays which took place at Rennes between the young noblesse and the populace.
Early military experience
In 1791, Moreau was elected a lieutenant colonel of the volunteers of Ille-et-Vilaine. With them he served under Charles François Dumouriez, and in 1793 the good order of his battalion, and his own martial character and republican principles, secured his promotion as general of brigade. Lazare Carnot promoted Moreau to be general of division early in 1794, and gave him command of the right wing of the army under Charles Pichegru, in Flanders.
