Louis Mandrin
Louis Mandrin
Birth February 11, 1725
Saint-Étienne-de-Saint-Geoirs
Death May 26, 1755 (aged 30)
Valence
Nationality France French
Profession(s) brigand
Louis Mandrin, born February 11, 1725 in Saint-Étienne-de-Saint-Geoirs and died May 26, 1755 in Valence, was a famous Dauphiné "brigand" of the Ancien Régime.
Son of François-Antoine Mandrin, merchant merchant from Saint-Étienne-de-Saint-Geoirs, and eldest of nine children, Louis Mandrin, known as “beautiful mood”[1], became head of the family at the age of 17, on the death of his father. . He comes from a once wealthy but declining established family.
His first contact with the General Farm (except for ordinary and compulsory fiscal relations) was in 1748, a contract to supply with "100 mules less 3" the army of France in Italy. However, he lost most of it in the crossing of the Alps and on his return to Saint-Étienne-de-Saint-Geoirs, he only had 17 animals left in a deplorable state, the General Farm refused to pay him. /P>
On July 27, 1753, following a fatal brawl, Louis Mandrin and his friend Benoît Brissaud were sentenced to death. Mandrin is on the run, but Brissaud is hanged on the Place du Breuil, in Grenoble. The same day Pierre Mandrin, his brother, was hanged for counterfeiting. He then declares war on the tax collectors of the General Farm.
The general farmers are then hated by the population. They levy taxes on goods (the best known is the gabelle, the salt tax, but other goods, such as tobacco, are heavily taxed). The affermage system of tax collection leads to enormous abuses. The Farmers General accumulate incredible wealth by paying the King only the agreed amount, sometimes a quarter of the taxes they collect.
Captain Mandrin, blanket.
Mandrin joins a band of false-sauniers who smuggle, in particular tobacco, between the Swiss cantons, Geneva, France and the States of Savoy, then sovereign. He quickly becomes the leader. He has 300 people under his command and organizes his band like a real military regiment. It was in Savoy (a duchy that was part, at the time, of the Kingdom of Sardinia) that he had his depots of arms and goods, thus thinking himself out of reach of the French. During the year 1754, he organized six campaigns. Attacking only unpopular Farmer Generals, he quickly gained popular support.
He buys goods in Switzerland (fabrics, skins, tobacco, linen and spices), which he sells in French cities without being subject to the taxes of the farmers general. The population is enchanted. Soon a ban is made to buy his contraband products. But in Rodez, he provoked the farmers general by forcing, under the threat of arms, their own employees to buy his goods.
The General Farm, exasperated by this "bandit" who is becoming ever more popular, asks for the help of the King's army to stop him, including Fischer's hunters. But he still manages to take refuge in Savoy near the two towns of Pont-de-Beauvoisin. The Farmers General then decide to illegally enter the territory of the Duchy by disguising 500 men as peasants. They arrest Mandrin at the fortified farm of Rochefort-en-Novalaise thanks to the betrayal of two of his own. When King Charles-Emmanuel III of Sardinia learned of this intrusion on his territory, he demanded the return of the prisoner to Louis XV, who complied. But the Farmers General, in a hurry to put an end to Mandrin, speed up his trial and his execution. He was judged on May 24, 1755, then beaten to death in Valence on May 26, in front of 6,000 onlookers, without the torture tearing a cry out of him. After 8 minutes, he is strangled to end his suffering.
The man is dead, but it is then the beginning of the legend of the bandit vigilante who fought against the iniquity of the taxes of the Old Regime. It is carried throughout the country by a song, La Complainte de Mandrin, whose authors are unknown.
Very popular during his lifetime, Mandrin remains, even today, very famous in Dauphiné, Savoie, and to a lesser extent in the rest of France.
The six campaigns
All of the expeditions to the farm estates of France
La lamente de Mandrin
This song, dating from 1755, comes from Jean-Philippe Rameau's opera which he composed in 1733:Hippolyte et Aricie. It was then taken up anonymously in 1755 under the title we know today. The text was also published as an afterword to the book Précis de la vie by Louis Mandrin.
"We were twenty or thirty,
Brigands in a band,
All dressed in white,
Fashionable...
Can you hear me?
All dressed in white
Merchant style.
»
"The first robbery
What I did in my life
Is to have pinned,
The purse of a...
You Do you hear me?
It's for pinning
A priest's purse. »
“I entered his room
My God, how big it was!
I found a thousand crowns there,
I put my hand...
Can you hear me?
I found a thousand crowns there,
I got my hands on it. »
"I entered another,
My God, how tall she was!
Of dresses and coats
I loaded three...
You Do you hear me?
Of dresses and coats,
I loaded three carts. »
"I wore them to sell
At the fair in Holland.
I sold them cheap,
They had nothing for me...
Do you hear me?
I sold them cheap,
They didn't cost me anything. »
"These Gentlemen of Grenoble
With their long dresses,
And their square caps,
Soon had me...
Can you hear me?
And their square caps
Soon judged me. »
"They judged me to hang,
Ah! It's hard to hear!
To hang and strangle,
In the square of...
You hear me ?
To hang and strangle,
In the Market Square. »
"Mounted on the gallows
I looked at France,
I saw my companions there,
In the shadow of a...
You Can you hear me?
My companions live there,
In the shade of a bush. »
"Comrades in misery,
Go tell my mother,
That she won't see me again,
I'm a child...
You m 'hear?
That she won't see me again,
I'm a lost child! »
The Mandrinade is a popular epitaph singing the praises of Mandrin:
"The Mandrin whose deplorable remnant you see,
who ended his days in a disastrous death,
Dreaded guards, cities terror,
By unheard of facts signaled his value,
Disguising his designs under the name of revenge.
Two years in plain peace he ravaged France,
In his incursions, friend of the inhabitants,
Taxed with authority the cases of contractors.
He alone to justice snatching his victims
He opened the prisons and decided on crimes .
Although in unequal numbers, without being disconcerted,
To the troops of his prince he dared to resist (...)
He was caught without being able to signal his courage.
With a dry and calm eye he saw his sad fate.
Famous for his crimes, he was great for his death. »