Louis-Michel le Peletier, marquis de Saint-Fargeau

Louis-Michel le Peletier, Marquis of Saint-Fargeau (; sometimes spelled Lepeletier; 29 May 176020 January 1793) was a French politician, nobleman, Freemason and martyr of the French Revolution.

Career Born in Paris, he belonged to a well-known family, his great-grandfather, Michel Robert Le Peletier des Forts, count of Saint-Fargeau, having been Controller-General of Finances. After the death of his title-holding family, Le Peletier gained a vast amount of wealth.

Le Peletier entered into politics by becoming a lawyer ("avocat") in the employ of the Place du Châtelet, a prison. In 1785 he was advanced to avocat-general. In 1789 he was elected to the Parlement of Paris, and in that same year he became a deputy of the nobility to the States-General. Pâris fled to Normandy, where, on the point of being discovered, he supposedly shot himself in the head.

The station Saint-Fargeau of the Paris Metro is named for him. A Sèvres biscuit porcelain bust of Louis Michel Le Peletier is on display in the Château de Vizille, Isère. On 30 September 1793 the French Navy's ship Séduisant, one of two newly commissioned ships, with 74 guns, over 56 meters in length and 1550 tons in weight, was renamed Peletier. On 30 May 1795, the ship reverted to her original name Séduisant.

Painting by David

The painter Jacques-Louis David represented his death in a famous painting, Les Derniers moments de Michel Lepeletier or Lepelletier de Saint-Fargeau sur son lit de mort. David described his painting of Le Peletier's face as "Serene, that is because when one dies for one's country, one has nothing with which to reproach oneself." This painting, known only through a drawing made by a pupil of David, is considered by scholars the first official painting of the French Revolution, a rehearsal for David's later achievement The Death of Marat.

Family Le Peletier had a brother, Felix (1769–1837), well known for his advanced ideas, and a brother Amédée Louis Michel le Peletier, comte de Saint-Fargeau (1770–1845), a noted entomologist. The writer and academician Jean d'Ormesson was descended from his daughter Suzanne le Peletier de Saint-Fargeau and her descendants owned the famous Château de Saint-Fargeau until 1960s.

In popular culture Le Peletier appears as an antagonist in Assassin's Creed Unity, where he is depicted as a secret member of the Templar Order under Grand Master Francois-Thomas Germain who believes that he is doing what is right for France before what is right for the Templars. He is assassinated by the protagonist Arno Dorian in the Palais-Royale after he votes to have the king executed.