Jean-Baptiste Mayer

Jean-Baptiste Maur Ange Montanus Joseph Rodolphe Eugène Meyer de Schauensée (1768–1802) was a Swiss-born officer who entered French service with the Gardes Suisses in 1784 and rose, through the tumults of the Revolution, to the rank of général de brigade. After early service under Lafayette and a politically fraught arrest in 1793, he re-emerged as an energetic staff and field officer in the Pyrenean armies, then moved to Italy, where he was twice wounded—at San Giorgio and Rivoli—and entrusted with both brigade commands and the administration of key northern Italian cities. His final appointment came in 1802, when he sailed with Ganteaume’s squadron for the Saint-Domingue expedition; serving as chief of staff of the French forces there, he succumbed to yellow fever at only thirty-four, one more capable Revolutionary officer claimed by the Caribbean climate.