TESTE (François-Antoine, Baron) Bagnols-sur-Cèze (Gard) 1775 - Lot 491

TESTE (François-Antoine, Baron) Bagnols-sur-Cèze (Gard) 1775–1862 - General - Letter signed “Brigadier General TESTE,” to a general, Grosdorff, on December 29, 1809, at 3:00 p.m.: “...The mayors and leading citizens of the assembled towns have heard your instructions. They are all people who took part in the last uprising (except for the mayor of Grosdorff, who, along with the parish priest, are the most respected elders in the region). They claim to have been coerced into it by the bandits’ emissaries... who threatened to kill anyone who refused to join them in burning Lientz. They say they have surrendered all their weapons, and in response to the threat to search the houses and burn those found to be hiding them, they declare that this may be done and that they will surrender the lead and gunpowder they have left. We are busy receiving them; but I have kept hostages until such time as the search... is completed...” — 1 page 1/4 folio.