SANSON, CHARLES HENRI (b. 1739)

This article appears in Volume V24, Page 183 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: SAC-SAR

SANSON, CHARLES HENRI (b. 1739) , public executioner of Paris from 1788 to 1795, was the son of Charles Sanson or Longval, who received in 1688 the office of executeur des hautes euvres de Paris, which became hereditary in his family. Sanson's

brothers

BROTHERS, RICHARD (1757-1824)

exercised the same

trade

in other towns. In the last days of 1789 Gorsas in the Courtier de Paris accused Sanson of harbouring a Royalist

press

PRESS (through Fr. presse from Lat. pressare, frequentative of premere, to crush, squeeze, press)

in his

house

HOUSE
HOUSE (O. Eng. hiss, a word common to Teutonic languages, cf. Dut. huis, Ger. Haus; in
Gothic
- GOTHIC
it is only found in gudhiss, a temple; it may be ultimately connected with the root of " hide," conceal)

. Sanson was brought to trial, but acquitted, and Gorsas withdrew the accusation. After the execution of Louis XVI., a statement by Sanson was inserted in the Thermometre politique (13th

February

FEBRUARY

1793) in contradiction of the false statements made in respect of the king's behaviour when confronted with death. He surrendered his office in 1795 to his son Henri, who had been his

deputy

DEPUTY (through the Fr. from a Late Lat. use of deputare, to cut off, allot; putare having the original sense of to trim,
prune
- PRUNE (adapted in various forms, e.g. prunne, proyne, &c., from Fr. prune, Med. Lat. pruna, Lat. prunum, Gr. irpovvov, earlier Trpouľvov, plum)
)

for some time, and held his father's office till his death in 184o. There is no

record

RECORD (Lat. recordari, to recall to mind, from cor, heart or mind)

of the elder Sanson's death. Henri's son Clement Henri was the last of the family to hold the office.
The romantic tales told of C. H. Sanson have their origin in the
apocryphal Memoires pour servir a l'histoire de la Revolution Franyaise
par Sanson (2 vols., 1829; another ed., 1831), of which a few pages of introduction emanate from Balzac, and some other matter from Lheritier de l'Ain. Other Memoires of Sanson, edited by A. Gregoire (ps. for V. Lombard) in 183o, and by M. d'Olbreuze (6 vols., 18621863) are equally fictitious. The few facts definitely ascertainable are collected by G. Lenotre in La Guillotine pendant la Revolution (1893). Cf. M .Tourneux, Bibliographie de l'histoire de Paris .. . (189o, &c.), vol. i. Nos. 3963-3965, and vol. iv., s.v. " Sanson."

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