César Gabriel de Choiseul, Duke of Praslin

After having served in the Army, he was appointed in 1756 ambassador in Vienna to Emperor Francis I and Queen Maria Theresa of Hungary.

He negotiated the peace that ended the Seven Years' War and was Louis XV's plenipotentiary for the conclusion of the Treaty of Paris, which he signed, on 10 February 1763.

From 10 April 1766 to 24 December 1770, he served as Secretary of State for the Navy (his cousin Étienne then taking back the department of Foreign Affairs in addition to that of War).

After the death, in 1764, of Madame de Pompadour, who had been their protector, the position of César Gabriel and his cousin Étienne was undermined.

He fell from grace in Louis XV's court and withdrew from public affairs in 1770, at the height of the Falkland Crisis involving Britain and Spain.