French General, Politician. George Boulanger, a 19th century general in the French Army, received his place in history for the failed 1891 aborted coup d'état of the government of France's Third Republic. Born Georges Ernest Jean-Marie Boulanger, he graduated from the Military School of Saint-Cyr before joining the French Army in 1856. When France supported Italy in the Second Italian War of Independence in 1859, he was wounded and received the Legion of Honor. He served in Algeria and Indochina, before the start of the Franco-German War in 1870. In 1871 he was wounded again suppressing the Paris Commune. In May of 1880, he was appointed the rank of brigadier general and in 1882, the director of the infantry. Two years later, he was appointed to command the army in Tunisia but recalled to Paris after differences with the French ambassador to Tunisia. He allied himself politically to Georges Clemenceau, who helped him to secure in January of 1886 the post of Minister of War in the government of Premier Charles-Louis de Saulces de Freycinet. After a few disagreements, he and Clemenceau were no longer close allies. According to critics, he had an alluring personality, yet he lacked decision abilities, trying to please everyone. His political goal was to regain the land that France lost in defeat after the Franco-German War, and had the support of most of France's population. He gained the support of the inner-city of Paris working class, the rural more traditional Catholics, and the royalists, with this group being called Boulangists. In December of 1886, he retained his post as Minister of War with the election of Premier Rene Goblet, but Goblet retired in May of 1887. Under Premier Maurice Rouvier, he was no longer Minister of War, but sent to command the XIII Corps in southern France. The Boulangists were becoming strong with the funding from the royalists. In 1888, he was removed from his command for being absence without leave when he came to Paris three times in a disguise and for visiting Prince Napoleon in Switzerland. Immediately, he was elected deputy for the Nord. In June of 1888, his proposals for revising France's Constitution were rejected by the Chamber, whereupon he resigned with fiery tempers flying. On July 13, 1888 while in the Chambers. a heated altercation on the same subject happened between him and the elderly Charles Floquet. This led to a duel between the two men, and Boulanger was seriously wounded. In January of 1889, he returned to politics as deputy for Paris by an overwhelming majority. His supporters urged him to take over the government, but he declined. This "January 27th procrastination" or missed opportunity may have been his downfall as it gave his adversaries time. The French government attempted to arrest him on the charges of conspiracy and treasonable activities, but he fled the country through Belgium to England. On April 4, 1888, he, along with his followers, a journalist Henri Rochefort and Arthur Comte Dillon, were condemned, after carefully reviewing the laws, by the French Senate of treason and ordered deportation. Since he could not run for any elections, his support declined. The Boulangists were defeated in the general elections of July of 1889. He fled to Jersey, the British isle off the coast of France. In 1865 he married Aglae' Lucie Jean Alice Renouard and the couple had two daughters. In September of 1891, he came the Brussels, where he committed suicide with a gunshot wound to his head, while standing on the Ixelles Cemetery grave of a former mistress, Marguerite Bonnemains. At his request, the couple were buried together.