Servan de Gerbey, Joseph

(1741-1808)

   general

   Born in Romans, Dauphiné, Joseph Servan de Ger-bey was a contributor to the Diderot's Encyclopedia and author of Projet de constitution pour l'armée française (1790). During the revolution of 1789,he was named minister of war in the girondin cabinet formed in March 1792 under the National Legislature, and he proposed the formation of a camp of 20,000 National Guards at Paris. Approved by the Assembly, this decree was not sanctioned by King Louis XVI, who dismissed the Girondin ministry (June 13, 1792). A member of the Executive Pro-visionary Commission, constituted after the Revolutionary day of August 10, 1792, marking the end of the monarchy, Servan de Gerbey commanded the Army of the Western Pyrenees, then was interned, under the terror, at the Abbey prison as a Girondin and released after the fall of maxtmilien robespierre.