Paul Barras

French First Republic state institutions 1755–1829 ○ Natural causes

Thermidorian leader who was a Director from the first day of the Directory to its last

Born in 1755 into a noble family of Provence, he entered the army and took part in the defence of Pondicherry in India. At the outbreak of the Revolution he supported the democratic cause and became an administrator of the Var; elected to the National Convention for the Var in 1792, he sat with the Mountain and voted for the death of Louis XVI. On mission in the south-east he met Bonaparte at the siege of Toulon. He rose to prominence by joining the overthrow of Robespierre on 9 Thermidor 1794, and in 1795 he employed Bonaparte to crush the royalist rising of 13 Vendémiaire. He then became a Director and held the post until the coup of 18 Brumaire in 1799, as the Directory's main executive leader. Under Napoleon he was confined and exiled; freed after the fall of the Empire, he died at Chaillot in Paris in 1829.

Also known as: Vicomte de Barras