Henri de Rigny

Marie Henri Daniel Gauthier, comte de Rigny (2 February 1782 – 6 November 1835) was the commander of the French squadron at the Battle of Navarino in the Greek War of Independence.

He was a nephew of Baron Joseph Dominique, baron Louis, and son of a former captain in the Penthièvre Dragoon regiment, and who died leaving five small boys, including his brother, the future General Rigny. The French Revolution led him out of the Pont-à-Mousson school, where he had been sent. He was ten years old then, had lost his father and his mother was listed as the list of emigrants. An aunt collected the family, consisting of a young girl of sixteen years and five boys, including Henry, the eldest. After spending several months in Special School in Brest, where he had been sent there to finish his studies, in 1798, he entered the navy as a midshipman with Admiral Étienne Eustache Bruix. In 1799 he was appointed midshipman.

He assisted in the blockade of Porto Ferrajo and the Battle of Algeciras, and then he made the Egyptian campaign, and took part in the Saint-Domingue expedition, Corsica and Spain. In 1803 he was appointed ensign and as such sent to the camp of Boulogne, he was responsible for commanding the corvette La Triomphante.

Interrogated by Napoleon about the tides for the invasion of England, the young sailor gave to the Emperor a response strong and concise. Embedded with the marines of the Guard in the Army in 1806 and 1807, he made in the course of two years these campaigns Prussia, Poland and Pomerania; fought at Jena, to Pułtusk, the siege of Stralsund and Graudentz, where he was wounded. Assigned to the army of Spain in 1808, he became aide-de-camp of Marshal Bessières; he distinguished himself at the Battle of Medina de Rioseco, and was wounded at the Battle of Somosierra, and he witnessed the capture of Madrid, in 1809, and the Battle of Wagram.

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