DUCASSE

ducasse, pierre emmanuel albert, baron (1813-1893), french historian, was born at bourges on the 16th of november 1813. in 1849 he became aide-de-camp to prince jerome bonaparte, ex-king of westphalia, then governor of the invalides, on whose commission he wrote _memoires pour servir a l'histoire de la campagne de 1812 en russie_ (1852). subsequently he published _memoires du roi joseph_ (1853-1855), and, as a sequel, _histoire des negociations diplomatiques relatives aux traites de morfontaine, de luneville et d'amiens_, together with the unpublished correspondence of the emperor napoleon i. with cardinal fesch (1855-1856). from papers in the possession of the imperial family he compiled _memoires du prince eugene_ (1858-1860) and _refutation des memoires du duc de raguse_ (1857), part of which was inserted by authority at the end of volume ix. of the _memoires_. he was attache to jerome's son, prince napoleon, during the crimean war, and wrote a _precis historique des operations militaires en orient, de mars 1854 a octobre 1855_ (1857), which was completed many years later by a volume entitled _la crimee et sebastopol de 1853 a 1856, documents intimes et inedits_, followed by the complete list of the french officers killed or wounded in that war (1892). he was also employed by prince napoleon on the _correspondance_ of napoleon i., and afterwards published certain letters, purposely omitted there, in the _revue historique_. these documents, subsequently collected in _les rois freres de napoleon_ (1883), as well as the _journal de la reine catherine de westphalie_ (1893), were edited with little care and are not entirely trustworthy, but their publication threw much light on napoleon i. and his entourage. his _souvenirs d'un officier du 2^e zouaves_, and _les dessous du coup d'etat_ (1891), contain many piquant anecdotes, but at times degenerate into mere tittle-tattle. ducasse was the author of some slight novels, and from the practice of this form of literature he acquired that levity which appears even in his most serious historical publications.