Bernard-René Jourdan de Launay however written on 5 July that "there are two sources of anxiety concerning the Bastille; the person of the commandant (de Launay) and the nature of the garrison there". De Launay had three daughters by two wives. Some of de Launay's brother's descendants settled in Russia (see Boris Delaunay and Vadim Delaunay for details). His killing is described graphically in Charles Dickens' "A Tale of Two Cities" (Book II, Chapter 21) and also in Hilary Mantel's "A Place of Greater Safety". Bernard-René Jourdan de Launay Bernard René Jourdan, marquis de Launay (1740–1789) was the French governor of the Bastille, the
Jean-Bernard Gauthier de Murnan in Villereversure, Ain. For his duties, he received Croix de Saint-Louis in 1791, and for his services during the American Revolutionary War he became member of the Society of the Cincinnati in 1783. He was the uncle of First French Empire General Aubry, killed at the Battle of Leipzig in 1813, and cousin of the member of the revolutionary French National Convention Gauthier des Orcières, also called Gauthier de l'Ain. Jean-Bernard Gauthier de Murnan Jean-Bernard Gauthier de Murnan (1748 in Bourg-en-Bresse – 27 September 1796) was a French officer for the Continental Army and a French General during the French