Martin Michel Charles Gaudin

Duke of Gaeta

Martin Michel Charles Gaudin was born on January 16, 1756 in Saint-Denis, near Paris. He joined the finance administration in 1773, at the age of 17, and was already a director when the Revolution broke out.

In 1791, when the National Treasury was created, he became one of its six commissioners.

Despite being the victim of several denunciations, his competence and discretion enabled him to retain his position until Year III. He even managed to use them to save forty-eight receivers general of the Ancien Régime from the guillotine, who were to be brought before the Revolutionary Tribunal.

After resigning in June 1796, he refused the finance portfolio offered to him by the Directoire and remained out of the limelight until April 1798, when he accepted the post of Intendant Général des Postes.

The day after 18 Brumaire, on the recommendation of Emmanuel Siéyès, he was appointed Minister of Finance. He remained in this position until March 30, 1814, and again from March 21 to July 8, 1815.

Honest, dedicated, hard-working and persevering, during his ministry he accomplished the immense task of restoring and then consolidating public finances. It was he who put in place a remarkable tax system, characterized by the creation of a department of taxation and the re-establishment of several indirect taxes, which ensured the State considerable regular revenues.

It was also he who set up the Cour des Comptes, merely implementing an idea put forward by the Emperor.

Napoleon 1st, who appreciated his clear ideas and his strict probity, was delighted with his efficiency, making him a count in 1808, duke of Gaëte in 1809, and peer in 1815.

Of rare constancy in an era of undulating loyalties, he refused all employment during the first and second Restorations.

Elected to the French Chamber of Deputies in 1815, he left in 1820 to manage the Banque de France, of which he had been the founder, and did not retire until 1834, after more than sixty years of a career that can only be compared to that of Colbert.

The Duc de Gaëte died on November 5, 1841 at the Château de Gennevilliers.

His tomb  is in the Père Lachaise cemetery, Paris, division 19.