Lieutenant-General 'Charles Nicolas Victor Oudinot' (1791–
June 7,
1863), 2nd duc de
Reggio, the eldest son of
Napoleon I's marshal General
Nicolas Oudinot, also made a military career.
He served through the later campaigns of Napoleon, 1809–1814, and was promoted to major in 1814 for gallant conduct. Unlike his father he was a cavalryman, and after retirement during the early years of the
Restauration held command of the cavalry school at
Saumur (1822–1830) and was inspector-general of cavalry (1836–1848).
Oudinot is chiefly known as the commander of the French expedition that besieged and took Rome in 1849, crushing the short-lived revolutionary
Roman Republic and re-establishing the temporal power of
Pope Pius IX, under the protection of French arms. His brief published account presents the French view of the events. After
Louis Napoleon's ''coup d'etat'' of December 2, 1851, when he took a prominent part in the resistance in favour of the
Second Republic, he retired from military and political life, though remaining in Paris.
Beside the brief memoir of his Italian operations in 1849, he wrote several works of more specialized interest, on military ranks and orders, the use of soldiers in constructing public works and cavalry and its proper housing: ''Aperçu historique sur la dignité de marechal de France'' (1833); ''Considérations sur les ordres militaires de Saint Louis, &c''. (1833); ''L'Emploi des troupes aux grands travaux d'utilité publique'' (1839); ''De la Cavalerie el du casernement des troupes à cheval'' (1840); ''Des Remontes de I'armée'' (1840).
External link
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''Encyclopaedia Britannica'' 1911: "Charles Nicolas Victor Oudinot"