Freycinet

Freycinet, CHARLES LOUIS DE SAULCES DE, French statesman, born at Foix in 1828, was an engineer of note when the Franco-Prussian war broke out. In October 1870 Gambetta appointed him his subordinate in the war department; his conduct as such he has himself described in La Guerre en Province pendant la siège de Paris (1871). Elected to the senate in 1876, he became minister of Public Works in 1877; and he has been premier in 1879, in 1882, in 1886, and in 1890, besides being War Minister in 1888, in 1889, and in 1892 (retiring in 1893 on account of the Panama scandals). He has published several works on engineering, sanitation, &c., and in 1878 was elected a member of the Academy of Sciences.