Brigadier Gerard Brigadier Gerard Brigadier Gerard is the hero of a series of 17 historical short stories, a play, and a major character in a novel by the British writer Arthur Conan Doyle. The hero, Etienne Gerard, is a Hussar officer in the French Army during the Napoleonic Wars. Gerard's most notable attribute is his vanity – he is utterly convinced that he is the bravest soldier, greatest swordsman, most accomplished horseman and most gallant lover in all France. Gerard is not entirely wrong, since he displays notable bravery on many occasions, but his self-satisfaction undercuts this quite often. Obsessed with honour
Gerard (archbishop of York) or entertain women in houses belonging to others. It was not only Gerard who complained about the relationship between him and his canons; the latter accused Gerard of impoverishing York by making gifts of lands to others. Gerard was an associate of the anonymous author of the "Quadripartitus" and the "Leges Henrici Primi", two 12th-century law books. The medieval chronicler William of Malmesbury charged Gerard with immorality, avarice and the practice of magic. Gerard encouraged at least one of his clergy to study Hebrew, a language not normally studied at the time. Some chroniclers considered his ownership of a Hebrew