The French statesman Léon Gambetta (1838-1882) rallied his countrymen during the Franco-Prussian War. A founding father of the Third Republic, he was an influential figure during its formative years.

Léon Gambetta was born at Cahors on April 2, 1838, the son of a grocer from Genoa and his French wife. Educated at Montfaucon and Cahors, he studied law in Paris and was admitted to the Paris bar in 1860. Soon he became involved in the republican opposition to the Second Empire.

As a lawyer, Gambetta began to make his mark defending opponents of the regime, and in 1869 he was elected to the legislature on a radical program (the Belleville manifesto). He quickly became one of the leaders of the republican minority, and though he criticized the Empire's foreign policy, he was a vigorous patriot. After the capture of Napoleon III at Sedan during the Franco-Prussian War, Gambetta...