departure was attributed to various causes, including his constant quarreling and dueling, although he claimed he left to avoid punishment for being absent without leave. An ardent Republican, Murat wrote to his brother in 1791 stating he was preoccupied with revolutionary affairs and would sooner die than cease to be a patriot. Upon his departure from the Constitutional Guard, he reported to the Committee of Surveillance of the Constitutional Assembly that the Guard was guilty of treason and that his lieutenant colonel, a man named Descours, had encouraged him to serve in the émigré army of Louis Joseph, Prince of Condé, then stationed in Koblenz. This garnered for him the support of the Republicans. Murat rejoined his former regiment and was promoted to corporal in April, and later to sergeant in May. By 19 November 1792, Murat was 25 years old and elated at his latest promotion. As a sous-lieutenant, he thought, his family must recognise that he had no great propensity for the priesthood, and he was hoping to prove that he had not been wrong in wishing to be a soldier. Two of the ministers had accused him of being an aristocrat, confusing him with the noble family of Murat d'Auvergne, an accusation that continued to haunt him for the next several years. 13 Vendémiaire In the autumn of 1795, two years after King Louis XVI of France had been guillotined, royalists and counter-revolutionaries organised an armed uprising. On 3 October, General Napoleon Bonaparte, who was stationed in Paris, was named commander of the French National Convention's defending forces. Bonaparte tasked Murat, who had offered himself voluntarily, with the gathering of artillery from a suburb outside the control of the government's forces. Murat managed to take the cannons of the Camp des Sablons and transport them to the centre of Paris while avoiding the rioters. The use of these cannons – the famous "whiff of grapeshot" – on 5 October allowed Bonaparte to save the members of the National Convention. Napoleon’s later report did not mention Murat. Napoleon did not forget him, as Murat was made a marshal, the "First Horseman of Europe", Grand Duke of Berg and King of Naples. Italian and Egyptian campaigns In 1796 Joachim Murat went with Bonaparte to northern Italy, initially as his aide-de-camp, and was later named commander of the cavalry during the many campaigns against the Austrians and their allies. Murat