Nicolas Joseph Maison, 1st Marquis of Maison (19 December 1771 – 13 February 1840) was a Marshal of France and Minister of War. Life Revolutionary Wars and Napoleonic Wars Nicolas-Joseph Maison was born in Épinay-sur-Seine, near Paris on 19 December 1771.He enlisted in the French Revolutionary army in 1789 and on 1 August 1791, he was named captain in the 9th Battalion of Volunteer of Paris and served in the infantry in the early French Revolutionary Wars. He served as aide-de-camp to Minister of War Bernadotte in 1799. In 1805, he joined the I Corps of the Grande Armée assembled by emperor Napoleon I and participated in the Battle of Austerlitz. During the campaign of 1806, he served as a General de brigade in the corps of Marshal Bernadotte and took part in the chase of the Prussian army to Lübeck after their defeat at Jena. In 1808 he was sent to Spain where he served under Marshal Victor and was wounded at the capture of Madrid. In 1812 he joined Napoléon in the invasion of Russia. At some point in the invasion marshal Ney saved his life, a deed he would later repay by refusing to join the court-martial which in 1815 was assembled to judge Ney after the Hundred Days. At the Beresina he was promoted to General de division and made a baron of the Empire. After the wounding of Marshal Oudinot, he took over command of the II Corps and led it during the retreat to the Weischel. He served in the campaign of 1813 and after Marshal Jacques MacDonald's defeat at the Battle of Katzbach was once again tasked with leading the retreat. After the Battle of Leipzig, where he was wounded, he was given the Grand Cross of the Légion d'honneur and was made a count of the empire. In 1814, he was tasked with defending what is now Belgium and the port of Antwerp. With inadequate forces, he managed to hold his own against greatly superior Allied forces and defeated Johann von Thielmann's Saxons at the Battle of Courtrai. Bourbon restoration After the abdication of the emperor, Maison rallied to Louis XVIII of France, who made him a Knight of St. Louis and appointed him Governor of Paris. During the Hundred Days, Maison stayed loyal to the Bourbons and joined them when they fled to Ghent. After the Second Restoration, he was made