Jean Paul Timoléon de Cossé-Brissac
Jean Paul Timoléon de Cossé-Brissac, 7th Duke of Brissac (12 October 1698, in Paris – 1784, in Sarrelouis), was a French general during the reign of King Louis XV. He is most notable for leading the French vanguard at the Battle of Minden, and he became a Marshal of France. He was also a Grand Panetier of France. Life and career. He was the second son and third of five children of Artus-Timoléon (1668-1709), Count then 5th Duke of Brissac, and of Marie Louise Béchameil de Nointel (daughter of the financier Louis  de Béchameil). He began his military career as a knight of the Order of Saint John of Jerusalem, becoming a "garde de la marine" in 1713. He served from 1714 on the galleys operating out of Malta, fighting in various actions against the Ottoman Empire. In 1716, he fought at the victory at the siege of Corfu under Johann Matthias von der Schulenburg. He left the navy in 1717 and returned to France. There, he became the "mestre de camp" of a cavalry regiment named after him, and he served until the Seven Years' War. He was rewarded for his  good conduct at the French defeat at the Battle of Minden in 1759 by being made a Marshal of France. His courage and politeness were seen as the model of an old-style loyal and frank French knight. He continued wearing Louis XIV-era costume, and for a long time wore a long scarf and a two-"queue" hairstyle. Charles, Count of Charolais, one day found him at his mistress's house and brusquely told him "Get out, sir", but Brissac replied "Sir, your ancestors would have said 'We get out'". He inherited the ducal title in 1732 when his elder  brother, Charles Timoléon Louis (1693-1732), the 6th Duke of Brissac, died without a male heir. Marriage and issue. In 1732, he married Marie Josèphe Durey de Sauroy (d. 1756), with whom he had three children: After Louis-Hercule's death in 1792 without a surviving son, the ducal title passed to Timoléon de Cossé-Brissac (1775-1848). He was the eldest son of Hyacinthe-Hugues de Cossé-Brissac, Duke of Cossé (1746-1813), whose father was René-Hugues de Cossé-Brissac, Count of Cossé (1702-1754). René-Hugues was the third son of Artus-Timoléon de Cossé-Brissac, 5th  Duke of Brissac (1668-1709), the father of the 6th and 7th Dukes of Brissac.