Pierre-Louis Prieur

French First Republic state institutions Jacobins and French revolutionary radicals 1756–1827 → Died in exile

Member of the Committee of Public Safety who established the Terror in Brittany as representative on mission

Born at Sommesous in the Marne in 1756, he practised law at Châlons-sur-Marne and in 1789 was elected to the Estates-General, becoming a secretary of the National Constituent Assembly. He presided over the Jacobin Club from May to June 1791. As a deputy to the National Convention he was sent to Normandy to repress the Federalists, and he voted for the death of Louis XVI. He entered the Committee of Public Safety in July 1793 and from that autumn was sent with Jeanbon Saint-André to Brest and Brittany, where he reorganised the navy and established the Terror. He was president of the Convention in May 1794. After Thermidor he went into hiding in 1795 until the amnesty and held no further office; banished as a regicide in 1816, he died in Brussels in 1827.

Also known as: Prieur de la Marne