Jean Baptiste Adolphe Charras, a French officer and military writer, born at Pfalzburg, in the department of Meurthe, June 7, 1810, died in Basel, Switzerland, Jan. 23, 1865. He was early imbued with republican principles,, took part in the revolution of 1830, and was promoted in 1833 to the rank of lieutenant. Having written a series of able articles in the National on military affairs, which gave umbrage to the government, he was sent to Algeria, and distinguished himself there on the battle field as well as in the training of native troops and the colonization of the country; but owing to his unpopularity with Louis Philippe's government, he was only, after much delay, promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel. After the revolution of 1848 he became under-secretary of state, and representative for the department of Puy-de-Dome. He was one of the most zealous members of the national assembly, one of the chief supporters of the republican government, and one of the victims of the coup d'etat of Dec. 2,1851. First detained at Ham, he was transported to Belgium in January, 1852. In November, 1854, he was expelled from that country, at the request of Napoleon III., whom Charras had denounced on many occasions, and most effectively in a letter of which 5<),000 copies were printed in Belgium alone.

He then sought refuge in Holland, and subsequently took up his residence in Switzerland. A pamphlet, Les trois rnare-chaux de France (Brussels, 1853), is also attributed to him. A remarkable work from his pen, Histoire de la campagne de 1815, in which he severely criticises the generalship of Napoleon L, appeared in 1857-'8 (2 vols.; 6th ed., 1860). His Histoire de la guerre de 1813 en Allemagne, unfinished at his death, appeared at Leipsic in 1866.