High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Marie Edme Patrice Maurice de Mac-Mahon, 1st Duc de Magenta, Marshal of France (13 July 1808 - 17 October 1893) was a French general and politician. He served as Chief of State of France from 1873 to 1875 and as the first president of the Third Republic, from 1875 to 1879. Born in Sully (near Autun), in the département of Saône-et-Loire, Patrice de Mac-Mahon was the 16th of 17 children of a family already in the French nobility (his grandfather Jean-Baptiste de Mac-Mahon was named Marquis de Mac-Mahon and Marquis d'Eguilly (from his wife Charlotte Le Belin, Dame d' Eguilly) by King Louis XV, and the family in France had decidedly royalist politics). His ancestors settled in France from County Limerick in Ireland (although they were originally from County Clare and may also have had earlier connections with County Monaghan) during the reign of James II, owing to the Penal Laws. They applied for naturalization in 1749.