CUMING, André-Pierre 1
User ID: L416. General Notes: "(André-Pierre) Cuming de Craigmillen's father, William, was a Scot who had fought, aged 18, at the disastrous battle of Culloden in 1746 and fled alone to France immediately afterwards. He subsequently forged a very successful military career and rose to become aide de camp to Prince François-Xavier de Saxe, uncle of Louis XVI. He married a French woman, Françoise Guillemot, and the couple had nine children. Raised to the French nobility in 1780, William immediately took the opportunity to place his first son, 10-year-old Andre-Pierre into the Military School at Brienne-le-Chateau, which taught boys of noble descent aged between 8 and 15. The family were largely unaffected by the French Revolution, with William writing to his sister, Jean, in January 1795 that he lived 'in perfect safety and quiet' and had managed to remain neutral in relation to the 'political commotions of that unhappy country'. Andre-Pierre would follow Napoleon to the Ecole Militaire in Paris and be appointed sub lieutenant in the Bassigny regiment in 1787. He subsequently served in the garrison in Martinique and was present at its storming by the British in March 1794. Indeed, it is very possible that he was killed at this time as his father, in the same letter to Jean, was 'in distress about his eldest son, a French officer, stationed in Martinico, who he has not heard from since April'." |