French writer and poet, known as an author of poems and tales often linked to the history and legends of the region of Franche-Comté, including Poésies, oublies et fragments (1901), as well as a diary of the events of 1848 in Paris Le Bataillon mobile de Besançon à Paris, impressions et souvenirs.
He was the son of Baron Charles Desbiez de Saint-Juan (1785-1862), general councillor of Doubs, and Zoé Gravier de la Gelière, from a noble family in Burgundy whose father was mayor of Beaune. Through his mother, he was the first cousin of Marguerite de Blic.
From childhood he was familiar with the arts and literature, his father was a member of the Academy of Sciences, Belles-Lettres and Arts of Besançon and Franche-Comté and co-founder of the newspaper Le Francs-Comtois, and he welcomed artists and men of letters (including Charles Nodier and Charles Weiss) to his private mansion in Besançon and castle in Salans.
He regularly contributed to the newspapers La revue Franc-comtoise and L’Impartial.
He took advantage of the advice of his sister Marie de Saint-Juan, whose erudition was as varied as it was extensive, author of several highly esteemed works, as well as the advice of man of letters and bibliographer Charles Weiss, friend of the family.
In 1848, Alexandre de Saint-Juan wrote a journal Le Bataillon mobile de Besançon à Paris, impressions et souvenirs, relating his expedition to Paris as a national guard during the revolt of June 1848 in Paris. The work obtained a certain success when it was published.
He tells how 700 National Guardsmen from the Doubs department left for Paris on coal boats and arrived in the capital after an expedition that lasted eight days and once the insurrection was over. He describes his camp at the Château des Tuileries transformed into barracks and the collapsed parquet floors and a bleak, depopulated and gloomy Paris.
Alexandre de Saint-Juan turned to poetry. The castle of Salans became the place of predilection and inspiration of the poet.
A Romantic poet of the school of Alfred de Musset, instead of taking his inspiration from modern life, he composed fabulous stories from the legends of the Middle Ages.
These legends and fables often inspired by the Franche-Comté tradition constitute his main works. He wrote in particular of L’Escarbouche de la Vouivre taken from an old legend of Franche-Comté, which tells of a young man who succeeds in seizing the ruby ??carried by the mythical character of the Vouivre and who becomes rich, forgets God and the woman who loved him and ends up falling prey to Satan.
Received at the Academy of Sciences, Belles-Lettres et Arts of Besançon and Franche-Comté, for ten years he was one of those members who contributed the most to public sessions.
On 6 March 1849, he married Elisabeth de Jouffroy d’Abbans (daughter of Louis Comte de Jouffroy d’Abbans and Catherine de Scey-Montbéliard) at the castle of Buthiers. He moved with his wife to his property in Saint-Juan near Baume-les-Dames, where he improvised himself as a farmer without much success. They had five children. He died on 23 February 1863 in Besançon at age 42.
Link to Wikipedia biography (French)