Benjamin CONSTANT (1767-1830). L.A.S., Paris 30 [March 1818] - Lot 67

Benjamin CONSTANT (1767-1830). L.A.S., Paris 30 [March 1818], to M. Cadet de Gassicourt, pharmacist; 1 1/2 pages in-4, addressed (small tear from broken seal without loss of text). On the Wilfrid Regnault case. [Sentenced to death on August 29, 1817 for the murder of a maid, and denounced as a revolutionary, the worker Wilfrid Regnault, defended by Odilon Barrot, was finally pardoned by Louis XVIII, after a press campaign by Benjamin Constant in his favor]. Constant was concerned that one sentence in the letter he had been given might harm Regnault: "it's the one where they seem to admit the possibility that he might be executed. It is so established, even among those who are pursuing him, that his death is impossible, that they must not be deprived of the idea that this barbarity would strike and revolt opinion all the more because no one admits or foresees it. I have therefore [...] taken it upon myself to suspend the insertion in order to consult you on a small retrenchment that you will find in the enclosed proof. I did not believe I had the right to change anything in a letter you sign"...