2-359-939 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Georges Boulanger, French general and politician, with other army officers, 1888. A reactionary politician, Boulanger (1837-1891) gained great popularity in the second half of the 1880s, particularly with the monarchists. By 1889 a coup d'etat to install Boulanger as military dictator seemed a real possibility, but after the government charged him with conspiracy and involvement in treasonable activity, he fled into exile. Support for the Boulangist movement dwindled without its leader and in 1891 he committed suicide, shooting himself in the head in Ixelles Cemetery in Brussels. A photograph from Album de Photographies dans L'Intimite de Personnages Illustres, 1850-1900, 2nd album, Editions MD, Paris.