Early life and revolutionary beginnings Born in
Auxonne,
Côte-d'Or. As an officer of engineers, he presented to the
National Constituent Assembly in 1790 a
Mémoire on the
standardization of weights and measures. In 1791, the Côte-d'Or re-elected him to the
Legislative Assembly, and in 1792 to the
National Convention. In 1792, Prieur-Duvernois was sent on a mission to the
Army of the Rhine to announce the deposition of
King Louis XVI, after having voted in favor of his
execution. In 1793 he served as a
representative on mission to survey the ports of
Lorient and
Dunkirk. He was arrested in
Normandy after the fall of the
Girondists (June 1793) by the rebel authorities of
Caen. He was released in July 1793 after the defeat of their forces at
Vernon.
Committee of Public Safety On 14 August 1793, he became a member of the
Committee of Public Safety, where he allied himself with
Lazare Carnot in the organization of national defence. His role included providing munitions for the troops engaged in the
French Revolutionary Wars. Prieur worked closely with prominent scientists in France. The Committee worked with several notable French scientists, including
Lagrange,
Lamarck, and
Vandermonde. Prieur and Carnot advocated the use of
observation balloons in war after some experiments in
Meudon. This led to their deployment at the
Battle of Fleurus. With Carnot, Prieur aligned with the
Reign of Terror, and voted in favor of
Georges Danton's execution. As the Committee collapsed, Prieur aligned with Carnot and
Lindet, the two other specialists in the committee. Prieur retained his seat after the
Thermidorian Reaction. He avoided capture in the riots of
Prairial Insurrection (20 May 1795), and was subsequently spared the attacks of moderates in the Thermidorian Convention.
Directory and Empire Under the
Directory, Prieur sat in the
Council of Five Hundred until
Napoleon Bonaparte's 18 Brumaire coup (9 November 1799). In 1808 he was created a
count of the
Empire, and in 1811 he retired from the army with the grade of (the equivalent of
colonel). Prieur-Duvernois was one of the founders of the
École Polytechnique. In this role, he helped to establish the
Institut de France, to adopt the
metric system, and to found the
Bureau des Longitudes. Prieur died in
Dijon. ==References==