Jean Louis
*This date celebrates the birth of Jean Louis, a Black French fencer and teacher, in 1785.
From Haiti, Louis was arguably the finest fencer who ever lived. In his youth, Jean Louis participated in a winner-take-all tournament to the death. In the final, Jean-Louis, a short, around 5' 2", dueled for 1 hour with a Spanish opponent who was 6 ft tall. Then, as the Spaniard lost concentration, Jean-Louis finished him, and Louis served as a soldier in the French army under Napoleon.
He was most famous for a series of regimental duels held outside Madrid, Spain, in 1814. Italian soldiers from the 1st Regiment and French soldiers from the 32nd Regiment of the 3rd Division of the French Army quarreled. Within 40 minutes, Jean-Louis is reputed to have killed three Italian masters, including the Florentine master Giacomo Ferrari, and wounded ten others with 27 thrusts. On another occasion, having been subject to repeated insults, he insisted on defending himself using only a training foil against a larger opponent armed with a rapier.
Louis adopted the most familiar retreat tactic until his opponent tired himself with clumsy attacks. He suddenly parried strongly and riposted with a wicked slash to the face, teaching him humility. He refused a commission, and in 1830, he retired to Montpellier, where he opened a fencing school. Later, he taught that fencing to death was a blight on society. His style, which emphasized the conservation of movement, was a major influence on the French fencing school despite leaving no written record. This also led to his attempts to remove Tierce from the classic parries.
He is credited with the sayings, "A foil should be held as one holds a little bird; not so tightly as to crush it, but just enough to prevent it escaping from the hand." and "Fencing is the art of conciliation." Vigeant said of him, "Jean-Louis' face, which appeared hard at the first meeting, hid a soul of great goodness and generosity." John Louis died in 1865.
