Conclusion: Satisfactions and Regrets of a Life in Revolution
Keyword(s):
The Past
◽
Alexandre Rousselin, comte de Saint-Albin, never escaped the past. In retirement, further evidence of his activities during the Terror were published. Some continued to vilify him even long after his death in 1847. He remained committed to the ideals of the Revolution, but recognized that they would take a long time to fulfill. Obsessed with his legacy, he focused ever more on family. His hopes for the future centered on making sure that his actions did not prevent them from being incorporated into the French elite. If the Revolution was about making a new world, the governments of the nineteenth century saw some of the “new men” of the Revolution achieve social mobility, like Rousselin and his descendants.