Martin-Michel-Charles Gaudin

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Martin-Michel-Charles Gaudin, duc de Gaete (January 19, 1756 - November 5, 1841), was a French statesman, Napoleon I Bonaparte's Minister of Finances (November 1799 - March 1814, including the Cent Jours.

[edit] Biography

Gaudin was born in Saint-Denis (Seine département) in 1756.

After Napoleon made him his Minister of Finance, to kep him i office till 1814, he organised the French direct contributions, reintroduced direct taxes ("droits réunis"), founded the Banque de France and the Cour des comptes, and set up the first cadaster. He was rewarded in 1809 with a duché grand-fief (hereditary ducal title, but extinguished at his death; nominal but of high rank), Gaeta in the satellite kingdom of Napels. During his Cent Jours return, Bonaparte reserved a seat for him in the planned imperial Chamber of peers, but that never materialised.

After the Bourbon restoration, he was deputy for the Aisne département, in the constitutional party's fraction.

In 1820 he became governor of the Banque de France.

He died in the Gennevilliers chateau, near Paris, in 1841. He left his Memoirs, Opinions and Writings.