Jacques de Flesselles (11 November 1730-14 July 1789) was a French official and one of the early victims of the French Revolution.
Biography[]
Jacques de Flesselles was born in Paris, France in 1730 to a middle-class family, and he served as Intendant of Moulins in 1762 and of Rennes in 1765. From 1768 to 1784, he served as Intendant of Lyons, and he won respect as a reform-minded royal official. On 21 April 1789, Flesselles became the last provost of the merchants of Paris, a post roughly equivalent to mayor. On 13 July 1789, he received demands for weapons to equip a citizen militia being organized to restore order. He was only able to provide three muskets, and his suggestions for other locations of weapons proved to be either misleading or mistaken. After the Storming of the Bastille, Flesselles was accused of royalist sympathies, and he was shot dead on the steps of the Hotel de Ville while attempting to justify his actions.