Antoine Joseph Santerre

The Santerre family moved from Saint-Michel-en-Thiérache to Paris in 1747 where they purchased a brewery known as the Brasserie de la Magdeleine.

His elder brother and sister, Marguerite and Jean Baptiste took charge of the household and family business, helping their mother raise the younger children, they never married.

Years later Antoine Joseph married Marie Adèlaïde Deleinte with whom he had three children, Augustin, Alexandre and Theodore.

He emerged again the following year to lead the people of the Faubourg St. Antoine, the eastern units, in the assault on the Tuileries Palace by the Paris mob,[3] which overwhelmed and massacred the Swiss Guard as the royal family fled through the gardens and took refuge with the Legislative Assembly.

He notified Louis that the motion had passed for his execution, and the next day, at eight o'clock on a 21 January morning, Santerre arrived at the convicted man's room and said, "Monsieur, it's time to go".

He escorted Louis XVI through the some eighty thousand armed men and countless citizens down the streets of Paris to the guillotine.

Wounded soldiers returning to Paris reported that he was living in Oriental luxury and complained that their defeat was due either to his treason or his incompetence.

Accused of being a Royalist due to his lack of glory during the battles in the Vendée, he was arrested in April 1794 and was imprisoned until the fall of Robespierre.