Louis Archinard was a French Army

French Army

The French Army, officially the Armée de Terre , is the land-based and largest component of the French Armed Forces.As of 2010, the army employs 123,100 regulars, 18,350 part-time reservists and 7,700 Legionnaires. All soldiers are professionals, following the suspension of conscription, voted in...

 general at the time of the Third Republic, who contributed to the colonial conquest of French West Africa

French West Africa

French West Africa was a federation of eight French colonial territories in Africa: Mauritania, Senegal, French Sudan , French Guinea , Côte d'Ivoire , Upper Volta , Dahomey and Niger...

. He was traditionally presented in French histories as the conqueror and "Pacifier" of French Soudan (today Mali

Mali

Mali , officially the Republic of Mali , is a landlocked country in Western Africa. Mali borders Algeria on the north, Niger on the east, Burkina Faso and the Côte d'Ivoire on the south, Guinea on the south-west, and Senegal and Mauritania on the west. Its size is just over 1,240,000 km² with...

). Archinard's campaigns brought about the end of the Tukulor Empire. He also spent a large amount of energy fighting Samory Toure. In 1897 Archinard was reassigned to French Indochina

French Indochina

French Indochina was part of the French colonial empire in southeast Asia. A federation of the three Vietnamese regions, Tonkin , Annam , and Cochinchina , as well as Cambodia, was formed in 1887....

.

Decorations

• Légion d'honneur
  Légion d'honneur
  The Legion of Honour, or in full the National Order of the Legion of Honour is a French order established by Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of the Consulat which succeeded to the First Republic, on 19 May 1802...
  
  
  • Knight (25 August 1881)
  • Officer (9 July 1889)
  • Commander (11 July 1903)
  • Grand Officer (30 December 1908)
  • Grand Cross (11 July 1914)
• Médaille militaire
  Médaille militaire
  The Médaille militaire is a decoration of the French Republic which was first instituted in 1852.-History:The creator of the médaille was the emperor Napoléon III, who may have taken his inspiration in a medal issued by his father, Louis Bonaparte, King of Holland...
  
   (6 July 1919)
• Croix de guerre 1914-1918
  Croix de guerre 1914-1918 (France)
  The Croix de guerre 1914–1918 is a French military decoration.-Creation:Soon after the outbreak of World War I, French military officials felt that a new military award had to be created...
  
  
• Médaille Interalliée de la Victoire.
• Médaille Commémorative de la Guerre 70-71.
• Médaille Commémorative de la Grande Guerre.
• Médaille Coloniale with "Soudan" bar.