Lazare Carnot

Lazare Carnot organised the armies of the French Republic and was called the Organiser of Victory. Born in Burgundy in 1753 to a lawyer, he trained as a military engineer at Mézières, which was the best technical education available in France, and served in the engineers while writing on fortification and on mechanics. He was elected to the Legislative Assembly in 1791 and then the Convention, and voted for the king's death. In August 1793 he joined the Committee of Public Safety with responsibility for the war, and the Republic was then facing invasion on every frontier and revolt inside them. He implemented the levée en masse, which conscripted the entire population's resources and put around three quarters of a million men under arms — a scale no European state had attempted. He reorganised the army around the division as a self-contained formation, amalgamated the volunteer battalions with the regular line so that enthusiasm and training were mixed, promoted officers by ability including Hoche, Jourdan and later Bonaparte, and pushed a doctrine of concentrating force and attacking rather than manoeuvring for position. He worked on maps and orders sixteen hours a day and went to the front at Wattignies. He survived Thermidor when a deputy asked whether they would condemn the man who had organised victory. He served on the Directory, was proscribed in 1797, and returned as Napoleon's war minister in 1800. He voted alone in the Tribunate against the empire in 1804. He was exiled at the Restoration as a regicide and died at Magdeburg in 1823. His son founded thermodynamics.

• Lived: 1753 CE – 1823 CE
• Nationality: French
• Roles: statesman, military_leader