Adolphe Thiers

President of the Republic · 1871-1873 · born on 14 April 1797, died on 3 September 1877

Historian and Orléanist politician, Adolphe Thiers was appointed head of the executive power in February 1871, after the defeat of Sedan. He negotiated peace with Bismarck and the evacuation of the territory against an indemnity of five billion francs.

In the spring of 1871 he had the Paris Commune repressed, crushed during the Bloody Week (21-28 May), earning him a bloody reputation. A restorer of order, he then defended the Republic as “the regime that divides the French the least” and had the great military laws of 1872 voted.

Overthrown in May 1873 by the monarchist Assembly, he remains a founding figure of the Third Republic, of which he was the first president. He died in 1877 in Paris.

In the tree of power

Further reading