BAUNARD, LOUIS-PIERRE-ANDRÉ. - French prelate and writer, b. at Bellegarde in 1828, ordained priest in 1852, d. in 1919.
Already known as an apologist (Le doute et ses victimes, Paris 1866, later continued with La foi et ses victoires, 2 vols., 1880-83) and chiefly as a hagiographer (L'opâtre s. Jean, 1869; Vie de s. Ambroise, 1871; Vie de Mme Barat, 1876), he was called to teach patrology and ecclesiastical history at the Catholic University (later faculty) of Lille, of which he was rector from 1888 to 1908 (cf. the collection of his addresses: Vingt ans de rectorat, Lille 1908).
He continued to write, chiefly well-documented biographies of great French Catholics: Histoire de Mme Duchesne (1878), Le général de Sonis (1890), Louise de Marillac (1891), Le cardinal Lavigerie (1896), Les deux frères (Phil. Vrau and C. Féron-Vrau, 1910), Frédéric Ozanam (1911), etc. More concise and somewhat apologetic was Un siècle d'histoire de l'Eglise de France, 1800-1900 (1902). He also left a kind of Christian De senectute, Le vieillard (1910), which met with great success.