Far from the frontlines, the destiny of armies and generals has been considerably influenced by anonymous public servants working long hours behind a desk. On many occasions, these bureaucrats were the actual organizers of victory or the root cause of defeat. Count Pierre-Antoine Bruno Daru (1767-1829), Intendant Général de la Grande Armée, was one such man. The research concerns the critical nature of logistics and military administration in the performance of modern armies. It challenges the conventional view that the military commissariat was primarily responsible for the defeats of the armies of the First French Republic during the Revolutionary Wars. A professional bureaucracy was the response deployed by the French government to cope with the need to enlist, train, arm, equip, feed, shelter, pay, and control ever larger military forces. The solutions designed and applied by Pierre Daru and his colleagues, tested and improved by trial and error, became the foundation of modern military administration and, eventually, a model that was extended to contemporary, multinational corporations. Most accounts of the exploits of the late eighteenth-century French armies are devoted to describing their élan, maneuverability, and operational innovations. Yet, the fundamental distinction between the Revolutionary forces and their predecessors was scale. The gradual emergence of a professional bureaucracy was instrumental in making such an expansion possible.

Les intendants militaires constituent une catégorie particulière d’officiers qui s’occupent des besoins de la vie courante du soldat. Ils sont crées en 1815 et remplacent les commissaires des guerres et les inspecteurs aux revues. Leur étude comprend deux parties. La première est destinée à présenter leurs caractéristiques sociales et militaires générales et leur place dans les débats sur l’administration militaire et la communauté militaire. Elle comprend les domaines suivants : - l’origine géographique, - l’âge et le grade au mariage, - la profession des pères et des beaux-pères, - la composition et le montant des dots, - les dossiers de demande d’autorisation de mariage, - les demandes de bourses pour les écoles militaires, - la place de la vie privée dans les appréciations données par leurs supérieurs. - l’origine du recrutement (saint-cyriens, polytechniciens, soldats), - les causes des fins de carrières - les grands évènements de la carrière (entrée dans le corps de contrôle de l’administration, interruptions de service, mutations), - la remise en question de l’intendance militaire au cours des débats sur l’administration militaire après la défaite de1870, et notamment sa place vis-à-vis du commandement, - la place des officiers d’administration et des médecins militaires, - l’image des intendants parmi les autres officiers. La seconde partie expose les déroulements des carrières, elle comporte les points suivants : - les résultats de la scolarité dans les écoles militaires et leur influence sur les appréciations données par leurs supérieurs et l’avancement ; - les carrières dans l’arme d’origine (l’influence des appréciations, des félicitations et des punitions), - les conditions du passage dans l’intendance (le concours, la formation administrative), - les carrières dans l’intendance (l’influence de la carrière dans l’arme d’origine, les rôles de l’origine et des appréciations dans l’accès aux différents grades, les projections de carrières à partir du premier grade). / The intendants establish an officers’s particular body who deal with the support of the common life of the soldier. They are create in 1815 and replace captains of the wars and inspectors in reviews. Their study includes two parts. The first one intended to present their general social and military characteristics. It includes the following domains : - the geographical origine, - the age and the rank in the marriage, - the profession of the fathers and the fathers in law, - the composition and the amount of dowries, - files of wedding authorization request, - applications for a scholarship for military academies, - place of the private life in the appreciations given by their supériors, - the origin of the recruitment (graduests of St. Cyr, graduests of Polytechnique prestige engineering school, soldiers), - the causes of ends of carreer, - big events of the career (entered the body of control of the administration, interruptions of service, tranfers). - the questioning of the military estate management after the defeat of 1870, in particular its place face to face of the command ; - the place of the officers of administration et of the military medical officers, - the image of the bursars among the others officers. The second parts explains the progesses of careers, il contains the following domains : - the results of the schooling in military academies and their influence in the appreciations given by their superiors, and of the promotion ; - the careers in the element of the army of origin (influence of the appreciations, the congratulations and the punishments) ; - the conditions of the passage in the estate management (the competition, the administrative training), - the careers in the estate management (the influence of the career in the weapon origin, the roles of the origin and of the appreciations in the access of the various ranks, the progressions of the careers according to the passage in the second rank).