Raymond Desvarreux-Larpenteur

Revolution and the Empire and the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-1871. He participated in the panorama of the Battle of Waterloo under the direction of Louis Dumoulin in 1911-1912, and obtained a 3rd class medal in 1910 and then a gold medal at the Salon des artistes français in 1913. He was a member of the Society of Military Painters at the end of 1913, approved by the Army Museum at the beginning of December 1914 and appointed painter to the Ministry of War in February 1915. He was mobilized in 1914 as a corporal in the 25th Territorial Infantry Regiment and fought in the North, at Cambrai, Bapaume, and Noyelles. In October 1914, he was hospitalized in Doullens and was declared unfit for service the following March. He left on his first mission to the Somme in December 1914. In the many theaters of operation he visited, he often served as an interpreter due to his American origins. He encountered numerous units of the French and Allied armies, whose uniforms he depicted in numerous small paintings for the Army Museum (150 of which are still preserved there). These works are portraits of soldiers and officers encountered on the front lines. He also included depictions of equipment and scenes of trenches and quarters. After the war, Raymond Desvarreux completely abandoned military painting in favor of landscapes. He exhibited the paintings "The Great Maneuvers," "The Dream," "Undergrowth," and a portrait at the 1929 Salon of French Artists. He would not return until after 1945 with scenes of battles of the Empire. One of his paintings dedicated to the "French Revolutionary Wars", Les Parisiens à Jemmapes Conduits Par Dampierre, was chosen as the main image of the game-box cover of the board-wargame "Levee En Masse", re-published in 2022 by "Worthington Games".