Belgian historian and archivist
François Joseph Ferdinand Marchal (1780–1858), knight, was a civil servant in the First French Empire who became a Belgian historian and archivist.
Life.
Marchal was born in Brussels and was baptised there on 9 December 1780. His father was Jean-Nicolas Marchal, who had been professor of architecture at the military school in Mechelen and assisted Joseph de Ferraris in the production of the Ferraris map, and his mother was Marie-Anne de Rinonville, reputedly a natural daughter of Prince Charles Alexander of Lorraine. He was educated at the Theresian College in Brussels and at the Collège de France. In 1800 he assisted the librarian of the École Centrale in Brussels in cataloguing the books confiscated from pre-revolutionary institutions. In 1803 he was appointed salpeterer of Halle and Lennik, in 1807 manager of the domain of Montmédy, and in 1808 to an administrative position in the Grande Armée. In 1809 he transferred to the administration of the newly incorporated Illyrian Provinces of the Napoleonic Empire. With the loss of the Illyrian Provinces he returned to Paris, where he enjoyed the patronage of General Bertrand, and after the Battle of Waterloo he briefly served in the local administration in Montmédy before seeking public employment in Brussels, which had just become the southern capital of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands.
Unsuccessful in his pursuit of preferment in Brussels, in 1819 Marchal joined the Dutch colonial service, arriving in the Dutch East Indies in June 1820. Finding his poor command of Dutch an impediment to his career, he returned to the Low Countries in 1822. He worked as a publicist and translator for a number of years, before being appointed to the Royal Archives in Brussels in 1827. On 4 February 1829 he was elected to the Royal Academy of Science, Letters and Fine Arts of Belgium. He also provided a course of history lectures at the Établissement Géographique de Bruxelles and later at the École de Commerce et d'Industrie.
In 1830 the manuscripts of the Library of Burgundy, which had become part of the public library of the city of Brussels, were transferred to the Royal Archives, and in 1831 Marchal was appointed their conservator. He had several manuscripts rebound and began work on cataloguing them. In 1838 the Library of Burgundy was incorporated into the newly founded Royal Library of Belgium, headed by Frédéric de Reiffenberg, but with Marchal retaining the position of "Conservator of the Library of Burgundy". In 1850, when Louis-Joseph Alvin was appointed to succeed Reiffenberg, Marchal felt passed over. In August 1857 he retired with a pension. He died of an apoplexy at home in Schaerbeek on 22 April 1858.
Honours.
Marchal was knighted in 1845, and in 1856 was made a knight in the Order of Leopold. He also received honours from the governments of France, Prussia, Portugal and Brazil.
References.
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