Edward Gabe (1814–1865) - The death of general Négrier, Paris

Nicolas Edward GABE
(Paris, 1814 - Paris, 1865)

The death of General Négrier on Place de la Bastille on June 25, 1848

Oil on canvas
Signed and dated lower right
82 x 101 cm
1849

Nicolas Edward Gabé is a 19th century artist who is still little studied to this day and yet seems to have enjoyed, according to the artistic press of the time, a certain notoriety, in particular for his seascapes.
The few bibliographical elements that we have come from the Salon booklets and tell us that the artist was born in Paris in 1814, therefore shortly before the end of the Empire.

No elements on his artistic training are mentioned in the booklets, we just know that Gabé exhibited at the Paris Salon from 1835 to 1864 where he first practiced miniature then then approached easel painting, risking himself as well in still life that the seascapes, the landscape, the portrait or the hunting.
According to press articles, he also took part in various exhibitions in the provinces such as Boulogne-sur-Mer and Marseille.

Notably, Gabé did not exhibit at the Salon his large historical canvases on the revolution of 1848, which today are of obvious documentary and iconographic interest; probably for political reasons which are easily understandable to us today in view of the historical events of then.

Gabé died in Paris at the age of 51 on January 4, 1865 with a mention in the January 7, 1865 edition of L'Union des Arts: “The death of Mr. Gabé, painter, well known in the export trade in paintings as well as to the auctioneers' hotel, whose sales it supplied through its numerous navies. “

"On June 25, 1848, in front of the barricades erected in the Bastille by the insurgents of the Red Republic, General Négrier fell to death, while he was uttering words of order and conciliation". Here are the opening lines of the tribute paid by Colonel Borgarelli d´Ison, friend of General Négrier.
General Négrier belonged to a family from Maine, brought back by Marshal Lannes from emigration. Born in Le Mans on April 27, 1788, François Marie Casimir de Négrier entered, barely 18, as a volunteer in the 2nd Light Infantry Regiment. He began in 1806 with the campaigns of Prussia and Poland, during which he earned, through his bravery, the rank of sergeant and the decoration of the Legion of Honor. He made the following campaigns in Spain and Portugal, and left, with his regiment, only for the campaign of France, in 1814, after having risen successively, by actions of brilliance and by a serious wound, to the ranks of head of battalion and officer of the Legion of Honor, with which he was provided from October 1813. The Restoration retained his rank in his regiment. After having fought and wounded a second time seriously in Waterloo, Négrier was recalled in 1816 under the second Restoration. He was appointed, in 1825, lieutenant-colonel, then colonel in 1830, brigadier general in 1836, and of division in 1841. From March 1837 he participated in the conquest of Algeria.

The Revolution of 1848 found Negrier in possession of the important command of the 16th Military Division in Lille. Quaestor of the Assembly in these times which promised to be troubled, Négrier reviewed the Place de la Concorde on June 23 at around noon various mobile guard battalions. He then took the head of 2,000 men provided by the 10th and 11th legions of the national guard and bivouacked on the Place du Palais until the next day 24. On Sunday 25 at nine o'clock, the Négrier division resumed the fight towards the Saint suburb. -Antoine. The troop gains continual advantages. At around two o'clock the column of Négrier had seized the Pont Marie: it had removed the barricades from the Quai Saint-Paul, the rue de l'Etoile, the rue des Barres and the rue du petit-Musc; she had dislodged the insurgents from the granaries of plenty. It occupied the Austerlitz bridge, it touched the entrance to the Arsenal station. There General Négrier shares his column. He then turns right, along Boulevard Contrescarpe, and goes forward to the corner of Place de la Bastille. The place is then boiling. Barricades bar all access and the red flag flies over the July column. Bullets roam the square and General Négrier advances, followed by a few men, towards the center of the square. Then a gunshot hits him and the general staggers. He died moments later in the arms of a non-commissioned officer of the 69th.

A decree relating to the funeral of General Négrier was taken by the National Assembly on June 29, 1848 and decided, among other things, that his heart be deposited at the Invalides and his body returned to the City of Lille, which claimed it. On July 2, General Négrier was buried in the cemetery of the East in the presence of the Prefect who paid him homage. Two days later, the rue Française de Lille was renamed rue Négrier.