Louis Pierre Édouard, Baron Bignon

Louis Pierre Édouard, Baron Bignon (3 January 1771, La Mailleraye-sur-Seine – 6 January 1841) was a French diplomat and historian.

Louis de Bignon was born at La Mailleraye-sur-Seine, Seine-Maritime, the son of a dyer. Although he had received a good education, he served throughout the early part of the French Revolutionary Wars without rising above the rank of private. In 1797, however, the attention of Talleyrand, then minister of foreign affairs, was called to his exceptional abilities by General Huet, and he was attached to the diplomatic service.

After serving in the legations in Switzerland and the Cisalpine Republic, he was appointed in 1799 attach to the French legation at Berlin, of which three years later he became chargé d'affaires. As minister-plenipotentiary at Cassel, between the years 1804 and 1806, he took a prominent share in the formation of the confederation of the Rhine; and after the battle of Jena he returned to Prussia as administrator of the public domains and finances. He filled a similar function in Austria after the battle of Wagram. At the end of 1810 he became French resident at Warsaw and was for a couple of years supreme in the affairs of the grand duchy.

The preparation of a constitution for Poland, on which he was engaged, was, however, interrupted by the events of 1812. Bignon, after a short imprisonment at the hands of the allies, returned to France in time to witness the downfall of Napoleon. During the Hundred Days he once more entered Napoleon's service, and, after the battle of Waterloo, as minister of foreign affairs under the executive commission, it was he who signed the Convention of St. Cloud of the 3rd of July 1815, by which Paris was handed over to the allies.

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