Jean Antoine d'Averhoult
D'Arnoult was born the son of Jean (Jan) d'Averhoult, a captain in the Dutch States Army and Gerhardina de Valcke, the daughter of a Groningen burgemeester.
During this episode, Jan Anthony was cared for by his paternal aunts, especially the spinster Josina Benjamina d'Averhoult[Note 1] with whom he would develop a strong attachment.
[1] A year after his father's death in 1773 d'Averhoult started his military career as a Cornet with the cavalry regiment Van Eck of the States Army.
Like many in the early 1780s in the Netherlands, he became very critical of the policies of the stadtholder, William V, Prince of Orange and his regime, which was accused of mismanaging the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War.
As a Freemason he was a member of the same lodge as Joan Derk van der Capellen tot den Pol, the author of the revolutionary pamphlet Aan het Volk van Nederland, published in 1781, that criticized both the current policies of the regime and the oligarchic constitution of the Republic, with a regenten-class that monopolized access to political offices.
[2] In the Spring of 1785 d'Averhoult took a commission in the Turkije company of the Utrecht schutterij that was being rejuvenated by an influx of Patriot Free Corps members.
These troops threatened the safety of Utrecht city, as witnessed by the fact that the Amersfoort garrison in early May 1787 attempted to occupy the sluice in Vreeswijk, a strategic object.
The Amersfoort delegation was eventually restored to its position of sole representative of Utrecht in the States General, giving the majority to the Orangists.
The Prussians treated him respectfully and he was released and allowed to join the Patriot exodus to Brussels, together with his aunt Josina d'Averhoult.
On the recommendation of his distant cousin the Marquis de la Fayette, d'Averhoult (now calling himself Jean Antoine) was able to get a commission as a lieutenant-colonel in the French army in February 1788, thanks to the fact that the Edict of Versailles of 1787 made him eligible to serve, even though he remained a Protestant.
He became a member of the Diplomatic Committee of the Assembly, in which he was a voice for taking an aggressive stance against the surrounding states, in which the French Émigrés were making difficulties for the new constitutional kingdom of France.
[Note 4] His proposal to have king Louis XVI issue an ultimatum to the German princes sheltering the émigrés was accepted on 29 November 1791.
Mais devez-vous laisser à la philosophie elle-même le soin d’éclairer l’univers, pour fonder, par des progrès plus lents mais plus sûrs, le bonheur du genre humain et l’alliance fraternelle de tous les peuples ?
For instance, he spoke out against the lawlessness of the Journée de 20 juin, even in vain demanding the sanctioning of the local authorities who had failed to suppress that riot.
He died a few hours later, on 26 August 1792 of this wound in Sedan, where he had been transported, in the presence of his Dutch friend Daniël Michiel Gijsbert Heldewier.
